Supercharge your income as an artist

Hey gorgeous souls! I want to share some on my art I have been making lately, and share how on earth I am actually selling stuff!

 if you want to keep up to date on a daily basis pop over to Facebook as I am on there a lot ;)

So I have been such a busy bee lately since I have gone ahead and become a full time artist, its amazing, I get to wear my fluffy My Little Pony pjs, eat Green and Blacks chocolate, watch films like Cinderella and paint and draw, plus get paid! I think this is THE happiest I have ever been in my whole life.

I feel truly blessed and thankful for this kind of abundance and life I am living.

How am I doing it?

You know, there are a couple of key things that have really resonated with me and I think they have been the key to me believing in myself, being able to have the knowledge and guts to go ahead and start living my dream. One is this amazing book  The magical Path by Marc Allen and his amazing meditation:

Watch his video

The other is the amazing Leonie Dawson she is an inspiration, I have joined her academy to do the business goddess workshop and it has been invaluable, the support from the groups and women you connect with is amazing. I love that it is not stuffy business and that its filled with rainbows, unicorns, love and really useful information that you can implement as a creative person.

In the academy there is a magic money making kit where you predict the total you would like to make that month (there is a brilliant workshop that goes alongside it to help you learn) I was a bit nervous about saying, too big a figure, its got to be believable for me and even though I have had mini successes in the past earning money, it's never been constant or I never thought it would be, anyway I put £500 for the month, to someone on a full time wage this probably doesn't seem that big, but you need to remember this is coming from an artist (in fact its even weird for me to call myself that, do I have permission?) but to me thats a great amount, so imagine my delight when I totalled up the amount of sales I have had for the month so far (5 days in) and it came to over half the total for the month!!
Like holy shit I am actually doing it!

I can only imagine it growing too, I have only been a member for just over a month and I feel like my life is transforming before my eyes. Its magical.

Hard work?

I do keep thinking someone is going to come and say "you can't do this, work is hard and you are having fun!"

We are conditioned at an early age with sayings that work is hard, such as:
“Nothing worth having comes easy.” – Theodore Roosevelt
"Nothing ever comes to one, that is worth having, except as a result of hard work."Booker T. Washington
 Hard work brings prosperity; playing around brings poverty.     -- Bible
Or a favourite is well meaning parents saying you have to do a job you hate because you have to pay the bills. 

Yes the bills need paying, yes you need money to live but don't forgo your happiness for this, find a way that works for you and your family, do something you love and you will never work a day in your life


 Contrary to popular belief with some friends, I don't loll around in pjs all day ( I do get dressed occasionally to go out haha) I don't spend my days faffing about, eating chocolate, watching films whoops! ;) in all seriousness, I have a whale of a time but I don't keep conventional hours, I don't finish working at 5pm, sometimes if I have a commission I am up till 2.30am, the housework gets rejected until its a must, I have to literally prize myself away from the computer sometimes to go to bed, the painting canvasses is a tiny part of running your own business, especially if you are a one woman show, theres all the marketing, admin, accounts etc but I wouldn't change a thing, to some it seem like 'hard'work but to me I am loving it. You can love your life and job too.

Like my work?

If you like my art and want to help me feed my chickens, children, rescue dogs and my chocolate habit you can pop over to my Etsy page or come stalk me on Facebook, get in touch if you want a commission piece painting, I love, love doing them so much!.

Love Dotty xx

Another day at the plot and lovely books

I spent a lovely afternoon in the sunshine today at our plot, did some weeding and dug over a bed ready for planting, planted some seed potatoes that were on offer (I normally just sprout my own in a dark cupboard), built up the next layer of compost with grass cuttings, veg peelings, coffee dregs and horse poo and then sat on a bench we made from bricks and a scaffolding plank and closed my eyes and listened to the birds and the sounds of nature all around me. It was amazing, I remembered when we first got the phone call to say we could have an allotment I said to Tom (my partner) which plot I thought it was, we had visited plenty of times on open day so knew the plots quite well, it was a middle plot with fruit trees on, when we visited to view our new plot it wasn't that one, it was right at the far end with no trees, it was only today I realised when we moved from the half plot to this double plot just over a month ago I was sitting next to the original plot I dreamed about and our new plot has loads of fruit trees on it too!

I was so happy and filled with gratitude, I gave thanks to *God and Mother Nature, my eyes filled up and I could feel an awakening in my body and heart, I feel so lucky and blessed by the life I have, we may not be rich in money yet but I am so rich in other ways.

I took some pictures to share of the beautiful flowers on the plot at the moment, this is Kale that has gone to seed, the flowers are so lovely, I am waiting for the flowers to die off and capture the seeds for next year before giving the greens to the chickens.

Gorgeous apple blossom, how perfect are the flowers, they have a delicate fragrance and the bees love them

I also went to the library and got some amazing books, The thrifty forager by Alys Fowler, foraging by David Squire, Old fashion remedies from arsenic to gin by Dr Rob Hicks and Nature handbook by Chris Packham I also scored The Power by Rhonda Byrne for £5 from The works, got to love the discount book shop!

 

I am going to do another foraging walk and talk tomorrow to coincide with “PLEDGE TO PLANT – EARTH DAY", be a part of the biggest grass-root effort in history by planting a seed/tree as a “give back” to Earth. I am meeting some people at Salisbury gardens behind Stanley park in Blackpool for an informal foraging session, to teach them about the plants they can eat, learn about the plants health benefits and the best ways to cook them. 

*God = all around us, not one person/thing, I believe in the universe, energy and spirit, I think all religions have the same theme running through them all, be kind to each other and the planet, I like to pick different parts from different belief systems and just know there is more to my life than just being here.

Happy colour revolution!!

I want to start a happy colours clothes revolution in UK, pledge your alliance to Dotty wear and this week choose to wear an outfit the does not include grey or black. Make sure you tag your photos ‪#‎Dottywear‬ on Twitter so I can see you in all your gorgeous glory! Share this and lets see how far around the UK this can travel.

                                                             Lovely colours = happy

I love making clothes and wearing combinations that make me feel beautiful. Today I went to town in the pink skirt in the last picture, I had a bridal net underskirt under in which peeks out of the bottom and floral docs, the amount of filthy looks and stares like I was an alien I got (mainly off women) was crazy, I often don't really care what people think or if they stare, after all I live in Blackpool in the dreary north of UK where the folk wear black and grey clothes but today it made me think, why is it so wrong or not normal to wear colour?

 Little girls wear lots of colour and loads of pink, at what age does it become wrong and the 'adult' wear has to be bleak and dark colours? I looked out over the high street and surveyed the sea of jeans and black coats, the only bits of coloured clothes was on children and a disabled lady. 

This is sad really. In other countries women wear glorious coloured clothes and are deemed beautiful. I think women should encourage each other to look lovely and support each other by smiling and not sneering. It just reminds me of bullying and that's not nice.

  
I think seeing women comfortable in their own skin and owning their power can make other women uncomfortable, or feel like they are somehow inadequate, which is crazy because we are all beautiful x