Celebrating family - family tree art

When I had the boys I had some birth prints ordered, and made my own family trees, it's now a privelige to be able to create beautiful, bespoke pieces of art to help other families celebrate the people who are important to them.

Above is the finished piece of artwork for the Barwick family. I love being able to add custom words and phrases to make my family tree art something really unique to each family. Under the tree, it states "Love Lives here"

This shows you some of the detail that goes into the border and the trees. They are a mix of painted work and collage to make a truly individual, detailed piece of work just for you. 

Outside the border I added some pen and glitter details, and here you can see more individual details in the border itself.

 Each name has been added by pen to it's leaf, painted one for each member of the family. Small collage leaves were added to make the tree stand out. 

Finally here are some of the details that go into packaging these family tree pieces off to their forever home with love, care and attention. All ready for framing and placing up in your home.

All about the new brand for C Sheehan Art

Today I am sharing my new branding. I'm so excited about this important milestone on my journey to sharing my art professionally with you. I've been working with a wonderful designer who has taken one of my mandala designs and created a wonderful logo for me. The mandala theme is one I have worked with a lot and which has meaning for me. Circular art is for me reflective of the way life keeps shining a light on what is important to us, and reminds us to come back to the centre to be grounded in those priorities. 

My new tag line is "Art of the singing soul" which celebrates the way I love to create art and hope to live life. It can be easy to get sidetracked and stuck, especially when you've been through times of transition like becoming a mama (especially when you find out you're having two!) 
My art, and my business celebrates all that I love and the process of returning to what's important to me in this new stage of life as artist, mama, wife, daughter, friend. This is reflected in my logo which contains trees, to show the importance of nature in my life and my art, spirals, to represent the sacred and the work I do with mantras, mandalas and affirmations, and hearts, to represent love of family and friends. 

For more about me and my work, pop over to my ABOUT page.

Making room for what's important

Recently I've been feeling very "busy" in the soul, a sure sign for me that I have been overthinking things! I find when I get like this that I really need to slow thing down or it impact in all areas including my ability to sit down and enjoy my creative time. A feeling of rush detracts, for me, from my ability to create work that represents that lovely feeling when it's all going well. I'd been re-organising my art space a little anyway, and had the wonderful idea I may be able to make a meditation space within my art room to inspire me. I'd tried creating similar in other rooms in the house but always found that they got over run with bits and bobs (tidy is not my middle name, even before I had twins!). So I had a huge sort out, moved a bit of furniture, threw some things away, and now I have a lovely, inspirational space to sit in front of and slow it down. It's a good reminder to me to trust my instincts and how important that element of the spiritual, the everyday sacred, is for me. Here are a few more pictures of how it looks. Do you have a space like this at home?

Journeying from anxiety to possibility

I chose BELIEVE as my word of the year this year. Choosing a word is just the start of the journey. It turns out, choosing the word, invites you to look deep into what it means for you and what needs to shift in your life for you to really embody that word and the feelings it evokes.

I started this journey because I knew deep in my soul that so many things were turning into a question. That doubt and worry were becoming my strongest companions. This is not who I want to be. Anxiety and fear cause you to second guess everything. They guide the choices you make. What you do, and what you avoid. They guide where you go and where you don't go. They guide how you feel, as you make decisions and then spend the rest of the time worrying about whether those decisions were right. Fear and anxiety rob you of a quiet mind and make your stomach clench that something you do may lead to a problem later.

I've decided I'm tired of fear and anxiety deciding how much I can relax. How much I look forwards to things and do what I think would be fun, or good or playful.

My artist prayer

I've been attending a local Artists Way group, which I've taken as a serendipitous sign on my own journey as an artist, and a chance to meet up with other creative folk who want to meet up and talk about their creative journey. One of the exercises is an artists prayer, here is mine.

May I sit here, inspired by nature. Each grain of sand, each vein of leaf and love of the land.

May I sit here, wild and free as the birds who soar, curious explorers on their pilgrim way.

May I sit here, In love with colour, moving forwards, finding my own way home.

May I sit here, in awe of what may be. Open to possibility, trusting in the process. Feeling my way home with a trusting heart. 

Author - CM Sheehan

Art by C SheehanArt

This is part of my journey and means so much for me. I've been feeling very much in a time of shift, from one season to another. I've been a stay at home mama now since 2012 and the time is coming where it's time to open up to new possibilities. To consider what my income streams will be as I move back into the workplace.It's more than that, it's a journey I'm continuing from when i started self development that led to me becoming a coach. I'm constantly curious about my own way forwards, and I've been feeling stuck, and fearful and anxious and doubtful. There - it's said. 

Do you know what? It's OK. It's ok to say how you feel and it's OK to want to change. I'm ready to open up to ways of possibility rather than fear and doubt, and my prayer is to that sense of open-hearted possibility and commitment that it's all going to be OK.

In my year of "Believe" I'm discovering that I need to do more than just believe. I need to commit. I need to take action. I need to trust. I need to let go of some stuff. And most of all, I need to be kind and compassionate to myself as I unfold and unfurl into these new possibilities and opportunities and hear those small, quiet whispers that have been trying to get my attention of what could be.

I hope you join me on my journey.

Room to be inspired

In March I celebrated my birthday and my main gift this year was going to be a new desk for the room formally known as the study and now more often referred to as my art room! 

The main things I wanted when I decided this was my birthday gift priority, was to make my room both more practical, giving me more space, more working room, and also to make me feel more inspired in how I work.

I'm so happy with all my choices! We already have some built in storage in this room and I had an old bookcase and a wooden table for my art. I found the room could feel a little dark so I really wanted to open it out for the light, and to feel a sense of expansion in my work. I chose a table and as we were looking at what would fit, I had a declutter and found I could free up so much room by moving my bookcase and existing table closer to the window, freeing up room for a new desk. We took down the curtain and nets which were making me feel the space was too dark, and put up a gorgeous floral blind instead. 

Finally over the desk I've now got small shelves and also an inspirational hanging space for pictures and images I hope to have as a mood/inspiration space. Oh yes - and I even got a new pink chair!

The light is so much better now and I feel much more free to create the kind of work filled with love, light and joy that I enjoy creating.

Making a leap

February 29th only comes around once every four years. It feels a little like an extra, free day to do with what you will. I love the idea of a leap. A leap of faith. A sense of energetically moving forwards. My twins leap. A lot! And sing. And dance around. It feels fun, in other words. I saw one of my favourite authors Patti Digh was offering a short course on making your own personal leap, and couldn't help jumping in (pun intended!). It ran alongside the great work I have been doing with Shawn Fink at the Abundant Mama project on how I stay centred as a mama. For me, that's having my own time and space as well as honouring the gift of my family and the energy of my twin boys. 

And - I feel ready for a leap. Ready for some good positive change. I feel I am transitioning from the space I have been in for the last 3 years as a stay at home mama. My boys have just started preschool and we are all getting used to them going out and learning, growing and making friends. It's both exciting and a little scary, I can see now why people say childhood goes so fast! 

I can always tell I am ready for a shift once I start investigating courses again! I love self development, ever since I went on an early Fiona Harrold course and then signed up to be a life coach. So. My leap. It's been linking really well into my word of the year Believe. It turns out, I find it very hard to believe in myself. I know others do. And I sort of do...sometimes! But I have that kernel of fear that I'm missing something and could do better. 

And in this leap course I've been talking about whether I want to move my art to being a business, as well as something I do for fun. And all the fear that brings with it. Am I good enough? Will it work? What if it doesn't? And Patti asked me something that made me stop. And think. And breathe. And say....ahhhhhhhhh.

"If you think of it as making a commitment to yourself, and not to a business, how does that feel?"

It feels...well, pretty amazing. It feels like it puts belief right at the heart of how I work. And by that I mean often it's felt like I put so much emphasis on what others think and are doing, rather than listening to my heart, trusting what I want to do and accepting those whispers that say, yes, it's time. Go do this.

And yesterday I took my leap. I went down to the beach, and drew a labyrinth. I asked for power and strength in making my leap. I gathered up stones to represent all the heaviness I wanted to let go of. And on the way into that labyrinth I asked for clarity about what fears I had and what I wanted to release. And in the centre I stopped and breathed and said thank you. 

On the way out, I picked up each stone I had written a fear on or something I wanted to release, and asked the universe, what do I need right now? What is the opposite of this fear and heaviness? And I realised it was all about making the leap. The leap overall to have that commitment to myself, to showing up in the arena, and to putting belief in the centre. And then I threw all that heaviness out to sea. (Or, more accurately as the tide was out and it was all mudflats, as far as my arms could throw them.

And I feel lighter and more joyful. I've already taken a few steps today that I have been thinking about for ages, but been putting off because I didn't feel ready. Well, now I want to show the universe I am wholeheartedly in to play. To commit. To give things a try where I would have let fear win. 

I feel excited, I hope you join me on my journey.

A winter retreat

Ever since I saw the idea of a seasonal check in, in Alena Hennessy's new painting book, I've been playing with the idea of having a small winter retreat at home.

I've never been that amazing at the winter season, although there is so much I love about it - Christmas, crisp winter mornings, the shape of the trees, winter sunshine....the days just feel so long and the time after Christmas to when spring arrives - so far away. This year I've really listened to how I am feeling and I have been working on being purposeful in my slowing down. I could feel for instance, that I wanted to jump into a lot of different activities now that my twins have started preschool. So tempting to fill up all that time! To feel each and every moment must have a reason and a purpose.

And yet winter is a time to slow down, the earth itself is preparing for all the new activity and life of spring. Animals are hibernating. It's dark and cold. My soul was craving nourishment, and taking care of myself. 

If this is how you are feeling, here are some of the things I did that may inspire you for your own winter retreat.

Reading my cards

I occasionally do these but usually for a shorter period, like to inspire my day. This one I used a set of Sonia Choquette cards that I had that I love the imagery for. I felt a deep sense of acknowledgement from the universe that I am in a season where I need to listen to the clues that are around me, whether that is seeking to nourish myself, or look at what is dormant that may benefit from being refreshed.

Walking the labyrinth
I painted a labyrinth on canvas and I love it as a way to slow down and take some time for myself. Unlike a maze where you can lost, there is just one way in and out of a labyrinth. It's an opportunity to walk mindfully. 

To take things step by step. Sometimes I walk with my boys who love the "maze" and really understand the walking process. This retreat was all about me and my needs. Feeling my footsteps. Walking slowly. Listening to inspiring music. Moving my body slowly around the labyrinth. Sitting at the start, and at the end. Pausing in the centre and breathing deeply. Repeating my own loving kindness meditation.

Letting go and meditating on what I need right now
I listened to a meditation I haven't listened to for a long long time, just because it felt so right. It's by Lucinda Drayton and is letting go of fears. I could feel myself slowing down and letting go and just being present in the moment.


Journalling on winter
I've just got a lovely new journal which is to inspire me. To fill with things that make me happy. To let go of what I "should" be doing as a mama, as an artist and enjoy just playing with words and techniques and pictures.

What would you include in your retreat?

Alena Hennessy Intuitive Painting workshop

I feel very blessed to have one of my pieces of art featured in this beautiful book by my online art tutor and mentor, Alena Hennessy. I've completed two years of painting prompts with Alena now, and this year of painting is the idea behind this latest book she has published. As well as her own gorgeous art and style, there are many, many paintings from my fellow students on the course. We are all pilgrims bringing our own voice and our own steps to the way we approach an idea. The book is available on Amazon.com and also here in the UK on Amazon. I couldn't wait for it to arrive in the UK! It arrived on Christmas Eve so felt like a gift from my creative self. 

Personally, as well as the generosity of Alena in sharing our work, I love the style and format of the published book. It's spiral bound so is lovely to open and read. I feel called to the seasons and see them featuring more strongly in my work this year and as well as the month by month prompts the book has a check in for each season. I feel excited at where the prompts will take me this year, on this journey into 2016.

What I learnt from my year of painting

At the start of 2015 I bought a Moleskine diary with the intention of completing a piece of artwork everyday for all 365 days of the year. I've recently completed the diary, a couple of days after the end of 2015.

It's a complete joy and sense of accomplishment to complete a task for the whole year. It wasn't perfect, but I let that go. To do otherwise was to risk stopping and getting stuck halfway through the year or when I got busy or distracted by all the other things which come up as a mama to two toddlers.

I chose a diary as I wanted the accountability of being able to see where I was in the process, of whether I was on track or not. It gave me grace to be able to come back when I got behind, when the boys were poorly or if we were away from home and I didn't have time to complete. I let go of being on track all the time. Mainly I let go of that when my daily art pieces became fuller, and took me more time to complete. Sometimes I'd come back to them through the day, letting the paint dry on a letter and coming back to add more later. Small slots of time, available in the there and then, in the way that often bigger slots of time don't open up.

The diary format itself was both a help and a hindrance. It helped me keep on track and it helped me to go back when I was behind, I knew exactly what needed completing. It was all in one place. The downside was I could only find a lined notebook, when really I wanted the blank space. By the end of the year it was getting very hard to fill in pages as they wanted to collect together, especially when working on left hand pages. This was helped with a giant elastic band. 

The paper itself was...ok. As I used different media, watercolour, acrylics, and some collage, some of the pages worked better than others. Some of the collage  stuck together. Some of the paint eeked through onto different pages, as it did when I tried mark making. I integrated these where I could into the next painting, and the one after that if it was necessary. 

Part of the way through the year I started painting mandala which helped give me a focus point instead of staring at the blank page. It helped me with a structure for the time I had to give. I enjoyed seeing the different emblems and motifs I could use and how each was different, some loose and fluid, some planned and more detailed. 

It was all a learning. It feels like a gift to myself to have a record of a year of work, and someone described it as like a patchwork of the year. I'm already thinking about what I will see at the end of 2016. It won't be completely like this. I liked a piece a day but I did have to prioritise that and that meant saying good bye to other ways of working and other projects. So far I'm sat with what I want that to look like as I look back and review 2017. 

May your year be full of joy and creativity.