I Find My Way Back To Making Art

Creativity doesn’t always come back when life calms down. Sometimes it returns in the middle of the mess, when your good supplies are packed away, your brushes are whatever Instacart can find, and you only have an hour before the day moves on. That’s where I’m starting: outside in the sun, painting a simple still life and letting the process be messy, honest, and real. 

I’m also sharing highlights from my Kauai trip with my daughter, including the surreal timing of leaving right before the hurricane hit. On the way home, I made digital art from what we saw together, and one piece turned into a Jiggy Puzzles licensing deal within 24 hours. We talk about what that kind of validation feels like, how my mahjong-based art has found new formats, and why sometimes a small “yes” can keep you going when you’re not sure what’s next. 

Then we get into the harder part: fear that sneaks into everything, grief that doesn’t move in a straight line, and the pressure of rebuilding your identity in midlife. I’m navigating counseling, a temporary living situation, selling my house in Ohio, and trying to find a place to land and unpack. The thread through all of it is simple: it’s okay to just play, and it’s worth making something even when you feel shaky. 

If you’ve been craving a creative reset, or you’re learning how to start over without losing yourself, listen along. Subscribe, share this with a friend who needs a gentle push, and leave a review so more people can find the show. What’s one small brave step you’ll take today?

Jiggy Puzzles- https://jiggypuzzles.com/search?options%5Bprefix%5D=last&q=brewtifully and use code Brewtifully for a discount!

Transcript

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A Different Kind Of Update

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Hey, it's Tracy with Brutley. I am doing something a little different today. Uh, back from a little vacation with my daughter, and um Wednesdays are my counseling days, so I had that today, and it was a beautiful day, and I wanted to paint outside, and I kind of put together my own little still life. So I'm going to share that video with you now and do a little voiceover and talk about my trip and my experience traveling. So I hope you enjoy it. Stay tuned. Hey

Building A Simple Outdoor Still Life

SPEAKER_00 0:40

everyone, it's Tracy at Brutifly. Um, I want to paint today, and I put something together so it could inspire me, and I can't find my paints, they are in storage. And I had to order some from Michael's. So they just got here and uh their craft paint, they didn't have any golden in stock. So we're gonna use those and see how it goes. So I went to home goods, got this cute little pitcher and sprouts, which is a farmer's market, um, and got a bundle of flowers, ordered some paints from Michaels, and had them delivered while I was in my counseling session. So I set up this uh bouquet, built that with both of those pieces, and took my easel and my canvas outside, and yeah, just kind of had to freehand everything on and doing some outlines. I can't find my paints, they're packed up. I can't find my headset to do any of the uh layouts, and that's okay. I

Kauai Reflections And A Puzzle Deal

SPEAKER_00 1:49

haven't felt like doing painting for a few months, and I did today after a beautiful trip to um Kauai um last week with my daughter, and ironically, our trip ended Thursday right before the hurricane came. So very uh grateful for the experience praying for them and uh Kauai. It was a gorgeous island, and I just hated to see the um devastation from the videos that everyone's sharing. It was uh really scary, and I just you know, we we barely got out of there just the day before when the airport just got bombarded with travelers leaving early so they could avoid the storm. So I did some digital painting and drawing on my way back from Kauai, and I literally licensed one of my pieces from the trip with Jiggy puzzles within 24 hours. So that was an amazing experience to see somebody really like that piece, and it was like a little landscape, the sunrise that my daughter and I saw, and just a bunch of different things put together to um create this image from the trip. And so that is now uh a puzzle that you can get in the adult series um from Jiggy Puzzles, and I'll put the link in the show notes. And it's actually one of five adult puzzles, and then they also licensed a new one uh for kids. So it was a very amazing day last week to come back from vacation and have that happen. I am incredibly grateful for for them uh doing that and their support of my art. A lot of my art has been on mahjong tablets or tablets, mats, and um, and I do have some books and tablets that you can write in um in tiles uh lately. So these were actually all some sort of mahjong-based art. They were a mat or they were on a shirt or a tile, and so it just translated well over to the puzzle world, but I hadn't had an opportunity to actually take out any acrylics. Um, that's mainly the medium I work in. I, you know, dabbling in watercolors, learning, uh, rarely work in oil, and I think I sold all my oils when I sold the um studio um materials. So I don't have those, and I cannot find my acrylic paints for the life of me. So I had to order some. I tried to get some golden paints, but they were not in stock, and so the only thing that was in stock um were craft

Making Do With Craft Paint

SPEAKER_00 5:00

paints. So I just got a big box of those because I know that I'll end up using those with the kids and stuff, and I didn't want anything to stop me because I finally had a little bit of that fire under me to want to paint, and I didn't want to lose it. I hadn't felt like this in a very, very long time, and I wanted to build my own little still life. Uh, I got this cute little bistro table and chair set from Wayfair when I moved here, and the flowers in Seattle are unbelievable, they are just incredibly stunning. And the bouquet that I found um was actually at a grocery store uh called Sprouts, and it's a farmer's market grocery store here in the area, and they just had this gorgeous bouquet, and I thought that is what I'm gonna use. And then I didn't really have any vases that were um solid, everything's clear, glass, and I kind of wanted something old-fashioned looking, and so Home Goods was right beside the store, and I thought I'll just go there and pick out something. And I found this cute little pitcher. Growing up, my mom had a dry sink. I don't know if you're familiar with that, but it's like a cabinet that has a tabletop, and you would put a bowl and pitcher on top. And way back in Western days, they would fill that with water and you would pour the water out into the vessel, the big bowl, and use it to like wash up. And so my mom always had this bowl in this pitcher on her dry sink, and I just think that that was such a cute memory. And this picture reminds me of that, it's much smaller and not as ornate as what my mother's um had to be, but um, yeah, I just thought it was cute. I like the little blue hydrangeas on it, so I picked that up and it gave me a reason to put a pop of blue into the painting. And of course, I love green, so the mint green uh table set was perfect, and the day today with the weather is just gorgeous, it's so pretty, so sunny. When I took a picture of the still life this morning, the sun was like beaming on it, it had this great shadow. And by the time I got out there after uh my counseling session and the pain arriving, um, the sun had moved a little bit, but you can see in the video how pretty it was still outside and just enjoyed painting. Um, I gave myself an hour to do this. I wanted to see what I could do in an hour. Um, I didn't want to be fussing over it. I just wanted it to come out of my head onto the canvas, and I didn't have my good brushes. Um, I literally just bought whatever I could get on Instacart because I had my session today. And uh I had gone out this morning. I went to the mail, um, had to mail some stuff that I'd sold, and I just didn't even think about oh, I can't find my paint until I got home and then was looking and thought I really don't know what box they're in or in the storage area, and uh so did the next best thing get some new ones and uh wanted to just put this down on canvas, and I just am so happy that I did it. I'm so happy that I took the time to do something creative and get to share that with you because usually I'm just sitting here talking to you and crying, and this rest that I had with my daughter was so much needed, and it was wonderful. I feel extremely grateful, and I I can't even explain how much it did for my soul. It was just wonderful to experience that. And

Home Changes And Selling The House

SPEAKER_00 9:06

after I got back, I got to see my granddaughters go to school on their bus. So it was almost like the first day of school, it was a couple days later, but I got to experience that, which I had never got to experience. And then um I got to look at some properties here in the area. I don't know where I'm gonna land. Um, or right now, I think a lot of you know that I'm just in a temporary place and I need to find something permanent. My house is still for sale in Ohio. It's been on the market, I think today is either 14 or 15 days. And um yeah, still doing things to it. I have somebody gonna freshen up the landscape. I have another person that's gonna restain the entire deck. Um, just you know, want it to be the best it can be for the next family because it means so much to me. And um that's happening next week. So uh just needed to do something with my time and my hands today. I really wanted to explore um just painting again and making something pretty. And I hadn't been able to do it, like I've said many times without someone giving me a prompt or requesting a commission. And um I I feel like it turned out really fun, and I'm really proud of myself for uh trying to do it, even though I didn't have a lot of the things that I would always depend on to do the layouts or the paints themselves. Um, it's okay. It's okay to just play. And I needed that, and I needed to remind myself of that, and I hope that that reminds you to do something just for the fun of it without being so harsh. That's my granddaughter's favorite word. Harsh right now, you know, on yourself, and um just you know, do something because you love to or you wanted to learn how to do it and just try.

Fear, Anger, And Learning To Grieve

SPEAKER_00 11:12

I have always been a proponent of not being fearful, and I was trying to explain that to my counselor, and then now all that fear just bombarded my life, and I feel like I can't get out of that thought process. I'm afraid to listen to the radio. I don't want to hear any music that's gonna like make me cry. I don't want to think about all of these terrible things um that have been happening to me. I only want to try to focus on the good things, and the things that I've lost in my life are so heavy. And it's so difficult to just pivot and think of light things, make things happier without desperately relying on a distraction or um a new experience. And I can't rely on that, you know. I can't burden my kids with being that which I need or my grandchildren. I've got to find this in myself. I've got to find my new purpose and I've got to find my new path, and I have got to figure out how to grieve um because I feel like I'm not doing it properly, because I'm still so angry. Um it's it's everything. And I start a new counseling uh group next week, which I am happy that I'm going to be doing that. Um and some new activities are coming up that I'll be doing um with one of the centers that I joined. So I'm very excited about that. Uh, and then I'm excited about looking for a place to call my own and land and unpack everything. Um, my best friend's coming from Ohio here in a week or so, and I'm super excited that she's gonna be here for like 10 days, and um, it will make me a little braver to go exploring a little bit more because I have a buddy. I won't have to depend on my kids or my grandkids, like, hey, let's go do this. I don't mind going by myself, but it's just more fun to explore with somebody, and um, so I'm very excited about that. She'll have grace for me because I don't know where I'm going and I don't know where to park and all that, but it'll be fun because it's gonna be new for both

Redefining Midlife With Small Brave Steps

SPEAKER_00 13:32

of us. So um I'm very thankful that she's coming to visit and we'll get to spend that time together. And I yeah, I just if you've had to redefine your entire life, especially in midlife, I mean, let me know how you tackled it. Did you make a list? Did you change everything about yourself? That's what I feel like I'm doing right now. I'm changing everything that I ever thought I was, and who I was, and the things that I loved and how I looked at life. Um it's all just so different. So different. All my security is completely gone, and it's just me depending on me. And I don't it just I don't want to screw things up. I want to to be a good life, I want to not be afraid to explore, I want it to be happy and meaningful, and I want to bring meaning to other people's lives. I mean, that's why I think I love doing art. I've connected with so many people when I was in Kauai. I met some ladies playing mahjong and they were familiar with my art. And it was like, are you kidding me? Are you kidding me? How can that happen? How on earth do you go all over this world and find somebody that was like, yeah, I was looking to buy your map? Like, what? I'm just and I would have never known that. That would have not been my path unless all of this happened. And I just I I can't wrap my head around it. Like, I really can't. It's just so difficult for me. So I really do hope that this brings you some joy watching me paint, seeing the whole process, and um, you don't have to like it. I don't care. You can like it, you can don't like it, you can say it stinks, but I did it, and that's what I needed to do, and that's what's most important to me right now is making sure that I do what my heart is telling me to do and listening to the universe and listening to that that's what's most important right now to me. And I hope that you can find that even with the naysayers for yourself and just try to do stuff that you love because it's so important, it's so important that we don't let fear stop us, and I've got to practice what I preach at that. So yeah, I hope that uh you find what you're looking for in the little pieces that you do throughout the day, and I hope you enjoy this, and yeah, I want it to bring you joy. It's brought me a lot of joy.