substance.

dears, i have missed you. i have begun this post many times in my head, but then i couldn't ever quite make my fingers type it here in my blogspot text box. the truth is: i'm struggling with the purpose of this blog right now. with all of the blogs and other content coming your way, i am determined to make each trip to the kelly loves whales blog *worth your precious time*.

&

so i wonder if my creative endeavors,
yoga journeys,
fragmented sentences about life with the world's cutest dog & sweetest husband
are good enough...interesting enough...fresh enough... enough-enough.

when i began this blog, i was only just remembering my creativity, my dreams, my time, and this blog was a way for me to do several things: motivate myself to make art every day and chart my growth (if you will).

but what is it now?

i'm still not sure. i do hope you will keep reading.

*

so, that being said, what is on my mind?


i'm finally feeling better after my war with pig-flu. good health is something i treasure. while i was ill, i began tinkering with the idea of going high-raw all-vegan (HRAV). it's going swell. my favorite new habit is beginning each day with a green juice. today's juice was turnip greens, kale, granny smith apple, golden crisp apple, + 2 carrots. the turnip greens are spicy. it's fun. why am i doing this?

{well, i already am vegaquarian (we have eaten fish about once a month for the past 6 years. before that i was a 7-year vegetarian who would eat a hamburger once a year.) and i had all but cut out dairy & eggs in order to alleviate asthma symptoms.}

I want to be my healthiest self. It's that simple. And I feel amazing having made this switch.

more on this later. feel free to ask me anything about it.

*

YOGA

as you might have guessed, i have been devoting a major chunk of time to my yoga practice & teaching. what a blessing. there is always something new to love about the practice. if you care to, please do check out my podcast over at http://sunroseyoga.com/. it is my dream to share the yoga with anyone whose heart is open to it-- so much goodness for the body and mind. seriously.

*

okay, i think i'm done writing for today. thank you for your patience with me. i am grateful for each of you!!

peace. & LOVE. always.

k

post-701.whooooo!

dears, happy wednesday. i thought today would be fun to share a few of my favorite photos from my yoga photo shoot. sending you sunshine.
loves.

hello hello.

darlings,
hello! what happened to me? well, i've been busy hosting a guest from American Samoa for over a week. we have been exploring all seattle together + enjoying the fall weather. i have also been making things. super exciting things. things i cannot wait to share with you.
and
i had a yoga photo-shoot on lake washington, so my podcasts will look even more polished. (a new episode drops on friday.)
my heart is bursting with things to share with you... insights i've had while meditating this week. in due time, though.
until then,
peace. & LOVE. always.
k

things are lovely.

dear-hearts! hello. what is new? i'm just making my way through the end of winter as best i can. we have been blessed with sunny days this week. this warms my heart, though i did truly embrace the grey like never before this year.
thoughts....
on things...
we are going to see david byrne tonight. this is a dream come true for me. i have such respect for him as a thoughtful, arty soul. it will be a packed night, since i volunteer at the legal clinic until 20 minutes before show-time. no lagging behind to chat up the other volunteers tonight.
and...
our spanish lessons are going remarkably well. i'm mostly happy that it has been fun for bk & me to sit down at the end of the day to do our lesson. we have a blast and then practice our new vocabulary while we make dinner afterwards.
also...
my yoga practice is on an upward swing. much like life in general, the practice ebbs and flows. i had about two months where i felt a downward pull, but we're out of that now. the tricky part isn't getting back into an upward groove, but keeping equanimity through the up-swings and the down-swings. life lessons for all, my dears.
and...
i'm running a lot. this is so good.
however,
i need to paint more.
i need to update my etsy shop.
i need to get on my goal of learning bass guitar already!
LOVE.
k

new work. cute overload. good things.

darlings, i've just spent the afternoon drawing in drippy ink and painting a few new pieces for the bedroom. i love to make things. lately, my schedule has been so hectic that the few hours of un-interrupted time for creating felt like a gift from the universe. so THANK YOU universe!

also, while i was away last weekend, my darling mister scanned a stack of photos of shyla as a puppy. i think they are both too cute for words.

have a positively delightful weekend, my dears. we are laying low tonight, but will be out spreading the good vibes at a show tomorrow night and at the free yoga class i'm teaching at lululemon on sunday! {seattle peeps-- would love to see you there at 9:30 on sunday morning.}

all love,
k

Autumn rising.

Dudes. This fall is going to be crazy wonderful!!! I feel like I haven't been giving up enough news lately. Here is the scoop:

1. YOGA: I'm teaching seven public classes this fall. {You can read about them right here.} Also, my workshop schedule is in the works... I'll be offering two hour intensives on chakra balancing, yoga for surviving grey winters, restoring and renewing during the holidays & more (think about it: partner yoga & thai yoga massage for Valentine's day). Also, private & semi-private classes. yippeee!

2. SKOOL: Drawing & apparel design. Dig it.

3. Art House Co-op: The CANVAS Project. Kiddos in Atlanta...five little pieces of me in the form of mini-paintings will be in your fair city.

4. Um, what am I forgetting. Oh yes, I'm working on getting into the Urban Craft Uprising! and I *heart* Rummage. Updates soon.

XO.

hi there.

the weekend was perfection.

heart-opening, smile-inducing yoga.

the whole weekend with my husband. it had been way too long.

a swim in the lake.

a humid hike.

joy.

friday. just breathe.

a little drawing of Nityananda. this drawing will be making his way to the shop very soon. i'm planning to release new work on Thursday, August 7th! there will be drawings, paintings, prints, papergoods and a few surprises (!!!). i cannot wait to show you what has been brewing in the studio.

Anjali.

Hello, dears.
This is Anjali. A new painting.


It depicts the anjali mudra.
Anjali means offering in Sanskrit.
Literally, mudra means seal (as in, sealing or channeling one's energy), and the mudra in this sense is a hand gesture-- palms touching in front of the heart (anahata).
The anjali mudra allows one to center, in order to offer all that is good back to the universe. Oftentimes, the mudra is accompanied by the word namaste. Namaste means (roughly) the light in me, bows with respect to the light in you. By coming back to the heart, we are able to offer that blessing to each other.
With that, Namaste, dear-hearts.

peak show.

just a little taste of what's to come.

i call this piece jnana.
jnana means wisdom in sanskrit, and this painting depicts the jnana mudra.
a mudra is a hand gesture that channels and guides energy through the subtle body.

remember

seriously.

Sometimes I feel so happy.

Loves,
Happy Thursday. I had some great dreams last night. I even dreamt that I was telling my husband about a dream I had that night-- it was like re-living the dream while I was still in it. The details will either scare or bore you, depending on your threshold for dream-talk, so I'll cut to the best part: my dog could talk. She had the sweetest voice, too! Can you even stand it?

>
I'm teaching two classes today, so painting might not happen, but know that I am making some serious progress on the piece I showed you yesterday and on the other two new ones I started on ... what was it... Monday.

In other news, check out this gorgeous blog Pintame el Dia (Paint my day) and tell me it doesn't make you feel like a brand coat of paint---props to anyone who gets that reference to my favorite boy-band, The Avett Brothers. This gal is amazingly talented and perceptive.

Later, dudes.

The path of least resistance. Svadhisthana.

Dear-hearts,

I finally have something fun to share with you. If you have been reading for awhile, you might remember that I have been working on chakra art for the last nine months or so. And I have occasionally written about the chakras and subtle energy body. Although I have had sporadic bright spots in my work on the chakras (pieces I liked on their own), I struggled to find my voice or angle on presenting the spectrum of major chakras of which there are seven. So, I would ocassionally create a chakra piece that I liked, but I never felt like the idea could carry through to seven separate, yet unified pieces.

A few weeks ago, while working on my illustration friday assignment, I scribbled out the first trappings of what I really wanted to convey in taking on this subject (one that has been studied by so many before me). What I sought to achieve with this series was the movement associated with the chakras. Instead of memorializing them in a heavy and static nature (which I DO find quite enchanting), I wanted to capture the dynamic fluidity of our subtle body of energy. Ultimately, the piece will consist of all of the major chakras, which I have yet to finish. I wanted to share this bit with you as it happened, though.

I'll be back soon. I have a hilarious story from my class last night involving one of my favorite topics: typography.

WOnderfully happy.

Oh kids, have I got some wonderful news to share with you:

I am ridiculously joyful right now after sending out the kelly LOVES whales care packages to you lovely readers out there who took part in the give-away.

Teaching yoga to the elderly is so special to me and I am finally volunteering again at an assisted living facility! (I'll write more about this later. It is such a source of love and joy for me.)

I just bought my first piece from Marisa & Creative Thursday!!! It is this polar bear named Fiona (i LOVE it) and her cutey cub from this wonderful polar bear series. I think it will look perfect in our crazy green guest room.

The LIBRARY had almost everything I was looking for yesterday. Books on business, books on dreams, books on computer programs. Now, if I could just get my hands on an Adobe Illustrator "how-to" so I can maximize my free trial!

We are going to see Krishna Das on Sunday night!!! I am a huge lover of the practice of bhakti yoga and am ecstatic about an evening of yogic chanting.

I have some new pieces in the works that are just super juicy.

Svadhisthana.

This piece has only just begun to take flight and form. The svadhisthana chakra resides in the astral plane and is associated with the element of water. I will share more shots of Svadhisthana as she grows.

After an out-of-sorts week away from my practice, I returned to my running at 3 followed by yoga and meditation routine today. Oh my goodness does it make a difference. The yoga is probably the best thing to have ever happened to me. (Incidentally, I have been listening to this swell podcast for teachers called Mudra Moments, which is lead by Hillary Rubin & Elsie Escobar. It is such a fabulous, community-building resource for teachers. AND, they turned me on to Dave's Lounge, and exquisite podcast, which lead me to the Alan Watts Podcast---totally get-out-of-town genius!) Ooh, I did have a point: I now listen to the Dave's Lounge podcast while painting & practicing yoga. It is MAGIC.

Namaste, dear hearts!

The un-precious.

I am definitely not Type A, at least not when I'm living authentically. Back when I was a prosecutor (motivated by a sense of Karmic duty to domestic violence and child abuse victims as well as the dubious quest for trial experience), I had to live a Type A lifestyle in order to keep it together-- working 90 hours a week, still trying to keep my yoga practice intact, making art only when there was *time*-- it required a lot of planning and scheduling, but not a lot of time to think or relax. This was not my path.


My path involves volunteering, teaching yoga to the elderly and at-risk youth, using the old law license on a low-key basis in an office at home, painting everyday, keeping the home fires burning and the such. Part of inching my way back to the path of living a truly authentic life has involved giving myself time to play. Play at yoga. Play at art. Playing is hard when you limit yourself to tools that are *too precious* to mess up. I've mentioned this before, but I do some of my best work (or my favorite work, at least) on cheap, throwaway materials. They allow me the freedom to just do what comes naturally, rather than plan out everything to the point where I've stiffled any of the ideas that have swirled into my brain at 5 a.m. But now that I have begun the process of offering my work for sale, I am torn about my re-use, re-tool, re-cycle tendencies. I want to give someone the best quality materials possible. Hmmmmm. Sounds like I might need to get over my *fear* of good materials. I think the new Fabriano paper might be just the starting point.



But before I do, I have some pack-rat scribbles to share with you, dear readers. The backstory: my husband studied geology as an undergraduate. He has all of these fabulous books from those days. I love digging through them to find new words or images. As I was looking through a petrology book, I found a cache of old tests and study guides. These are such a lovely bit of archeology, in my opinion, his twenty-year old boy handwriting, atrocious spelling, the professor's notes, it's so fascinating. The next day, though, I found the pile of tests in the recycling bin. What? I asked him if he really wanted to get rid of them. He gave me one of those "not everyone keeps their retainer from junior high" looks, so I knew he had let it go. Nonetheless, I thought it proper to ask him if I could scribble on them. These images are the result. Un-precious fun.

For Peace. For Love. For Potential.

Even though inspiration has come quickly and kindly lately, I keep my inspiration-practice going. I make the collages, I listen to the music, I watch the films, I sweat, I breathe, I try to sleep, I move into asanas, I offer all that I have to something greater than myself. All of these rituals keep me going whether the inspiration strikes or not. For these rituals, I am so grateful.

This particular collage is inspired by the wonderful and amazing Amma. She has inspired me lately to take my yoga practice and my teaching practice to a new level.

Heart. Soul. Peace. Love.

I have been kind of obsessed with mandala-making for years. This summer, I really wanted to begin incorporating more spiritual elements into my work and have been trying to find a comfortable balance in making spiritual art that speaks to my own experience.

The thing that is tricky, for me at least, about making mandalas is the circle. Until my husband bought me this lovely new compass, my mandalas were limited to whatever round objects I could trace. The compass has literally changed my life with respect to the mandala. Oh this makes me happy.

I have only just begun this piece, and already it has brought such a great energy into my aquamarine studio. I cannot wait to get back to work on it once I have finished posting this.



I'm hoping to offer this as an origninal and a print in my Etsy shop. (Opening very soon, I promise!)

Namaste.

Restore.

I began practicing yoga in 1996. Yoga beckoned me with it's reputation for encouraging inner peace and blissfulness. In the beginning, though (and I suspect this is true for many yogis), my practice was focused on the physical aspects of yoga or asana practice. I dove into a vigorous Ashtanga practice, very muscle-y. I loved the regularity of the sequence. I loved how strong I felt, the meditative groove we entered during our Surya Namaskar (sun salutations). As much as I enjoyed the hot, sweaty, fast, heart-pumping pace of Ashtanga and as much as I appreciate and honor its tradition, I knew that this was not the yoga life for me. Slowly, I gravitated towards a vinyasa flow style, finally settling into a quite traditional hatha practice in the Shambhava school of yoga.

It was while I studied to become a teacher of Shambhava yoga that I discovered restorative poses. Restorative poses do just that: restore your depleted resources of prana, or life force. The restorative pose is one that may take a little work and creativity (plus props) to get into, but once you are in, you are transported to a place where the earth cradles your body in the perfect embrace.



I love restorative poses. They remind me that it's okay to be good to myself, to cultivate energy before the next handstand or bout of crazy, frenetic energy. They remind me to be peace, be love and be true.

Namaste.

Tantric lotus.

I'm feeling a lot of crazy creative energy today. Woke up with a million ideas and just had to get the pen to paper to keep them corraled. I am really making this happen!