Yarco ~ feb '26

when we went to see Miffy we also obviously saw some of Yarmouth. i also went on a train for the first time in years and had a great time. 

whether you like Yarmouth or not is how i judge whether i like you or not. (joking) (maybe)

a couple of photos from our quick rush round the museum pre-Miffy. definitely need to go back for a proper look at everything.

i saw so much good stuff this day, not all of it photographed, it was very needed during a tough week towards the end of winter. yarmouth heals.

Miffy

we went to the Miffy exhibit at Time and Tide museum in Great Yarmouth and had a great time. here's a lot of photos :)

she's 70. she's perfect.

it was very much a Miffy exhibit but they did also have some of Dick Bruna's other work which was nice to see. he was so clever with so few lines. i love these bear bookends and that is a perfect drawing of a jacket.

original Miffy pencils! getting to see original drawings irl is always so special and i loved getting to see Miffy pencils and framed examples of the layered pieces with the transparent linework sheets over the colour. obviously Miffy's whole deal is being so clean and simple and getting to see the textures and layers of how she comes together was so interesting.

there's just something about being able to see actual pieces, not just prints. the texture of the pencil, the tiny fraction of a mm of space between the layered pieces. the realness of it. a print in a book is a great thing but getting to see originals does a different kind of special to the brain.

Brother Cadbearl was impressed too.

the hands at the bottom this sketch!

this tent set is one with the layers. a transparent sheet with the line-work and cut out pieces of craft paper underneath for the colour. you could just about see the space between the layers, magic.

these were actual models from the stop motion series. incredible.

a perfect owl and some (probably) bootleg Miffy's down on the seafront.

i am playing Stardew Valley. again.

this is my third farm and i've never gotten further than 4 days into spring year 2 but i have always enjoyed myself. we have an old man rat and when we're both going to be out of the house we put Gab Smolder's streams on for him to watch and he seems much happier than when he's left in silence and he's recently been watching her first playthrough of Stardew Valley and i was watching it with him and had a realisation.

i've never really played it as though it's a game. 

i've always just used it as a soothe, as a brain smoothing activity, something to switch off too and just crack those rocks open. if i saw a quest that said Sebastian wanted a sunfish i'd have been like, i'm not doing that i want to go in the mines.

i don't think there's anything wrong with that obviously, it's just a game. play it however it feels fun but watching Gab be so "proper" about it as a game made me realise i'd never treated it like that so i started a new game and yesterday evening i spent a whole in-game day trying to catch a sunfish for Sebastian.

it feels really different. rather than just focusing on the parts of this huge game that i find satisfying and doing them until i don't anymore i'm paying attention to what it's telling me to do. i feel more like there's a goal to what i'm doing each day rather than just making money for no reason and i'm enjoying it. i'm appreciating the game more too because i'm paying more attention to it. 

it's still to be seen if i get past spring year 2 this time but it doesn't really even matter.

bandcamp friday ~ feb '26

i'm making a conscious decision to be more on purpose with things. it's really cool to have access to so much stuff but i've found it means i'm briefly in contact with a lot of different things but i'm not spending much time with any of them, and i'd like to, so i'm gonna.

one way i'm doing that with music is to take advantage of bandcamp friday and actually buy some music and get to know the albums i buy. and i also love the internet of however many years ago where we just shared things with each other so here's a blog post of what i bought on bandcamp friday.

two of these are actually gifts from Will.

Mys & Frox by Faery Ring

 

Sylvania Quest! by Sylvania Quest!

i've been really enjoying dungeon synth for a while. there's a lot of variety and i love all the stories and art that come with the music. also it's fun to support just a guy doing a thing. 

what i bought for myself was the entire back catalogue from The Dream Eaters. 

i've been a big fan of theirs for a few years now and i could have just bought the albums but it just felt right to be a little fanatic about it and get everything. 

i fudge the published dates on here so i can look back at things chronologically even though i'm slow to post so it's actually a week until the next bandcamp friday. i've been enjoying listening to these albums and i already have my eye on a few things to pick up on the 6th.

 

little bits of january

 

 

i just think he's neat

sorry for being a loser but Chappell Roan never peaked my interest. this GWAR cover of Pink Pony Club however, is my new favourite thing. 

just Blothar screaming "god what have you done" going over and over in my head. i really like his voice and love his cute piggy snout.

 he is in fact just having fun on the stage in his heels, it's where he belongs.

 

feeling fresh

a few things have lined up in an amazing way and this week i have a new phone, a new laptop and a new sketchbook. 

and that it's at the start of a year is even more cleansing. that delicious fresh year number and moving to a new phone and only moving over the photos taken so far this year (i saved all the other photos, i can't actually get rid of them, obviously). the phone isn't new, it's a hand-me-down from Will who had it as a hand-me-down also but it feels new and weird to me and that's what matters.

i got the laptop from the refurbished bit of ebay and i've installed linux mint onto it. i don't really know what i'm doing so i've kept windows on there for now just in case i can't handle choosing my own operating system but for now i'm feeling kind of proud of myself for trying something a bit scary. and also for having the money to just buy myself a new laptop, i worked so hard to get a part-time job last year and i work so hard to work a part-time job and now i can do things like save up and replace my laptop.

the new sketchbook is a shift to a4 again, it's been a while. a5 makes more sense honestly but every now and then a4 calls to me. it's a seawhite hardback and has a nice blue cover and i look forward to filling it up.

while i was in the art shop getting a sketchbook i also got a new pencil sharpener which might actually be the most important new thing. it's brass and it's one of those things where you don't think anything of an activity until you get to use a really nice tool and then like wow, it's so nice to sharpen pencils.

me with my new sharpener, sketchbook and phone taken on my new laptop webcam

 i'm very excited to use up as much of my art materials as i can this year. i've had a habit for hoarding and also waiting for the right moment and also being too mentally ill to do things and all together i just have a lot of stuff hanging around so i'm going to use it all up. i have some not very nice pencils that i'm working on right now and getting them nice and sharp with my new sharpener just made them seem better somehow. 

we got new carpets too, everything is lining up really weird for a fresh start right now in this exact moment of my timeline. we didn't ask for new carpets, the landlord decided that the upstairs rooms needed them so we had to comply. it's one of those things where i'm grateful to have a landlord that wants our carpets to be of a certain standard and it is nice to know that the carpets are clean and not filled with tiny bits of mould and dust but also we didn't ask for it and it was very overwhelming to have someone come in the house and make a lot of noise and new carpet smells and moving everything from one room into another room that is full of it's own stuff (and then in reverse the next week) and one of the rooms was my studio which as already mentioned is very full of stuff. full of stuff in a way that can make me feel negatively about myself, why am i not using these things, why has that sat there untouched for years...

but the carpet work is finished and now i get to unpack my studio again and i'm not just putting everything back how it was, i'm going to go through every item and only put it back if i really want to. i'll be brutal and it will be great and then i'll make lots of silly art. because it feels good. 

it's empty and overwhelming

 i'm not adding pressure to this list of things i have, i'm just enjoying the freshness and we'll see where it takes me. 

some 2025 stats

 

letterboxd // when i say i like old films and people think i mean the 80's 

 

last.fm // i listened to so much Skeleta (and all Ghost) in the spring that the other stats are too predictable to show but i'd like to special mention dungeon synth as a genre that was big this year and AFI would maybe be higher if i could include listening to cd's on our PS3 (and as always i wish i could include stats from youtube on the tv)

 

storygraph // they took away my mood pie chart and i'll never forgive them

2024

2025

 

digital photo collages from christmas eve, chrstmas day, boxing day and then the end of the year.

2025 was the year i got a part-time job and it used up the small amount of energy i have and everything else about me got lost.

i think i'm being a little overdramatic but that's fine, it's allowed sometimes. have a wallow. so long as you don't get carried away with it. don't focus on the negative version and give it any more power than it has anyway. pat it on the head and let it run it's course.

i'm struggling with job and winter but i'm paying attention to it and working on balance and i'm ok. also this year we adopted an old man baby rat boy. i love him so much.

 

no resolutions for the new year, i'll save that for spring and for now i will concentrate on being kind and gentle to myself and having as much nice fun creative time as i can.