I did this peacock during my friend’s and mine weekly group painting, but I hated it. The first one looked so terrible. I didn’t finish it, I just threw it away.
I stopped to think about why it looked so awful, and evaluated why I disliked it so greatly. The colors were unclear and muddled together and looked like poo. What causes that? Well maybe it was my ridiculously old brushes that weren’t even designed for watercolor being too thick and wide to make the clear lines. I was unable to make the project look correct. So I went and got a new set of brushes. I also considered that my paints were getting used and running low. Perhaps they needed to also be replaced. So i also purchased a new set of paints.
New paper. Start over. The second one came out significantly better than the first. I can stand to look at this one. It could still be better, but that will be on a different day with different paper.
When you mess up, don’t throw your hands up and give up. Look at why you made a mistake, analyze how you could improve. What would make this project move more smoothly? Once you’ve done that, correct your errors. Make those changes. And then try again. If its still wrong, go back and try again. Don’t stop, keep changing things.. Keep making corrections until you get it right.
Dose of Sunshine 