Letting control go and getting it back after leaving the family on their own for a weekend...

At 8 am I am leaving the house for the homeschooling mums retreat until Sunday. It is a long drive of several hours and It is the first time I am leaving the household by myself in the past few years.

I Have been anxious, trying to organize things for the fami

ly to be smooth while I am away.

I gave numerous instructions on how to eat, sleep, feed animals, keep an eye on the dog (who escaped twice for the last two weeks) and got up at 4.45 am at the "day of departure" as I could not sleep being overwhelmed with emotions.

It is so strange as I am supposed to be excited, not anxious.

I ask myself what is the real reason for all these feelings?

Is it giving out control? And the subconscious fear that they will understand I am not all that important and they can easily enjoy life without me? Would it be a discovery bringing the relief and the feeling of being proud of my family or the selfish childish tears when I find out I am not the centre of their world?

This is really really not the adult person thinking but I keep thinking these thoughts.

After a bit of a consideration I came to the conclusion that more likely it is the fact of changing the familiar into the unknown.

It always brings emotional turmoil and I haven't figured out yet how to deal with the sudden changes of the routine.

I love when the things are predictable, when I have an ability to decide what the next hour will look like and have a clear idea of what to expect of it.

For some people it is boring but for some - it is the flavour of life that leaves energy to create.

And isn't it great that we are all wonderfully different?

So I decided (with the cleared up mind after listening to my rooster for an hour while I was doing my morning practices) I will accept the fact that for the next three days I will not have to produce anything (including meals and drawings) - I will absorb, get new ideas, relax and get give control to someone else (to the certain extent :)

And how well THAT went!!!

These were amazing, inspiring and refilling several days and I am back full of ideas and appreciation! My family survived, and cooked fancy dinners and had a great time too.

Not sure about you but when I come home from being away I usually am horrified with the amount of things at home that need to be improved, corrected or even eliminated.

The new experiences give me the fresh eye to look at my own existence (sometimes quite exaggerated :))

For example I am looking at my chickens and planning a “palace” for them as I decided their living conditions are far from ideal.

And maybe it is time to invite the plumber and reinstall the hot water in my own kitchen… or.. Start regular work on my youtube channel :)

However last night it was just laying in bed and desperately hoping to find the existing things in place as the wind, rocking the bed (with the rest of the house) was biblical (with all the attributes of an extreme event like a power outage and getting the mini gas cooker for coffee in the morning).

Luckily everyone survived, power was reinstalled by 8 am, the only thing that was out of the ordinary - my 5 am wake up moved to 7 as I was up most of the night.

But this is the smallest thing that could be happening. So I am pleased with just minor inconveniences.

And thinking about my creative life again.

Spending a lot of time in the neighbouring “book town” with the whole street of little stores with the old books inspired me to try and keep the old style of illustrating the children's books, something influenced by 1949 illustrations which were influenced by the 1890s :) well.. I mean the the books from the past… with clear lines and clear message of who is in the picture and what they are there for, with the appropriate colours too.

And possibly it will move into a project which I really would love to take a part of ...but too early to talk about it. :) Reading the books of an amazing Rose Boom feed this idea and many others including life in general.

With the rays of sunshine I just noticed it is the time to wash the windows, so I will add this to my to do list to the sample illustration, writing a chapter to my book, writing a blog post, finishing two videos with the voice over, planting in the glass house, sorting the seeds and dropping Zac, the mighty and naughty Gotland ram back home after the long sleep over he had with our ewes.

So hopefully in 120 days or so we will have the joy of little lambs in the household.

And hopefully it will take less than that to complete my current to-do list 🙂 I might take my own advice and listen to the meditation on peacefulness before diving into the ocean of endless but so satisfying tasks. You can listen to it too now, by filling the form on the homepage of this website (and choose out of two things I would love to share with you).