medium conundrum

I have a lot of print ideas up my sleeve- well, thats kind of a bluff, but I have some print ideas anyway- but what I really want to do right now is learn to crochet. Or go buy tools for needle felting. Which I also don't know how to do. Yet. And I plan to go to a bead festival on Saturday for still another of my obsessions. I'm not going to get into the whole what is art thing, it all is- but what I am trying to figure out, and what has become my eternal dilemma, is distinguishing between what is the beginning part of making work and what is procrastination. I know some of the work I like best comes from that calm playing around in the studio part. That is the part of creating that has been the hardest for me since I've become a parent. I can work my ass off pretty well, but just sitting allowing the thoughts to come? Thats hard.

I should mention I have a deadline, which tips the scale to this is procrastinating. Except it doesn't have to be a print. The work I need to finish, and um... start, is to be auctioned off to benefit inliquid, (which is, in their words, "a nonprofit membership organization dedicated to providing opportunities and exposure for visual artists and designers, serving as a free public hub for arts information and resources, and making the visual arts more accessible to a broader audience. More than just an online presence, InLiquid also nurtures our creative community through a continuing series of venue-based art exhibitions and events.") That blurb is all true, I am a big fan of inliquid.

Am I missing out on creating great work because I am stubbornly adhering to my medium? Or will I end up making thousands of macrame owls if left to one side of my mind? And would that be so bad? What I really want to do is to do it all. I need to loosen the reins a little- in art and in life. And now I'm thinking a macrame owl would make an awesome tag.