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Tab Bird

@tab.bird.studio

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illustrator. fine artist. believer in the impossible.
Go to @birdtabitha for my novels

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There this little girl with wild hair who is turning up on the pages of my sketchbook again today. This time she’s painting an octopus or maybe just trying to clean up after an octopus?
And thank you to those of you who reached out after yesterday’s post. It was a rough day yesterday but feeling heaps more positive today! by @tab.bird.studio

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6 months ago

Happy Easter Monday!
I hope you’re all enjoying the Easter long weekend. I’m going through something quite huge at the moment involving my son and as a mum it’s hard when we see our children struggling. Yesterday was a very slow day where we both missed family and friends. So to help myself smile I drew a watermelon coloured whale and a little girl with a big imagination. Hope it makes you smile too! by @tab.bird.studio

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6 months ago

Trying not to be too serious with my art today. Just picked a bunch of colours and went to town. by @tab.bird.studio

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7 months ago

Joy is an act of hope. It’s an act of aliveness. In a world where most things are measured by outcomes, how much you achieve, what money you make, joy says, I simply AM.

I’ve lived many years with trauma. If you too are healing, even though you are safe now, your body might not know it. You might still scan constantly for the next thing to hit. You might try to control things and make a life where you can foresee out comes and are never blindsided.

But friends, such as life does not exist.
The unforeseen will always happen. And bracing for the worst isn’t living.

Joy is living.
But joy requires that we let go. That we trust ourselves enough to know we will cope. We will respond. And we will nurture ourselves with JOY!

So, here are my flamingos.
They have no purpose. They just are.

I’ve spent decades proving i can survive.
Now I’m proving I can live.

Go be wildly, unnecessarily JOYFUL! by @tab.bird.studio

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7 months ago

Today I’m painting penguins! Not sure why. Maybe because it’s so hot where I am. Maybe because I too understand what it feels like to have a lot of fish that are out of water and out of control! by @tab.bird.studio

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7 months ago

Painting sweet little pool animals because they make me happy! I’ve been in Bali for a month now and trust me when I say that touch points to home and happiness matter more than ever. by @tab.bird.studio

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8 months ago

A STORY OF TINY DRAGONS AND MY YEAR FIVE CLASS.

So, this year in the gaps of life, in between working full time and being a single mum and all the other things us women do, I have been working hard on a middle grade novel.

If you are not sure what that is, a middle grade novel is a novel for children aged 8-12 years. The magic is that I teach year 5.

All year my students have been very active in telling me what should and should not go into this novel. These keen little editors don’t like editing their own work, but they LOVE taking a red pen to mine! So I let them! What a wonderful way to learn!

I let them read parts of COURAGE IS A POCKET DRAGON and tell me in no uncertain terms what the girl in my book would do and what the cranky little pocket dragon would really get up to! These grade five knew things, you see! And I dare not ignore their voices!

I also let them see what goes into the creation of a book, what it means to dream chase and how long you have to work on something with no outcome.

My class and I bonded over many things this year, but that manuscript and a tiny dragon on the pages were some of my best memories. They’d stop me after school to inform me of important details that MUST be added. It was them who knew that pocket dragons ate jelly and liked to sleep rolled up in soft bread! (who knew?)

As I near the end of this year, I have a shared my life with some very wise year fives AND I have a completed manuscript.

And one brave day a month back, I entered into the Australian wide competition, JUST PITCH IT.

I’m super proud to announce that the middle grade novel came second!

I win feedback from a publisher and a mentoring session with a published middle grade author!

Here’s to my year fives and to pursuing dreams in the middle of mess and joy, no time and endless late nights by @tab.bird.studio

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10 months ago

I have been drawing dragons lately because there’s a tiny little guy with a very grumpy attitude that’s turned up in a children’s book I’m writing. I’m not sure I’ve found the one I love yet but I’m leaning towards the little pink and red one.
Which one do you like? by @tab.bird.studio

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a year ago

I did not plant this plant but I think we can agree that she is super cute. by @tab.bird.studio

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a year ago

And so after a week of work and quite a lot of playing and making it up as I went along, this canvas is finally finished! by @tab.bird.studio

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a year ago

The messy middle.

I don’t normally post this point in any creative project because, well, it’s messy!

It’s the point in any painting, piece of writing, home Reno project, weight loss journey )you name it) where your not sure that anything is working. It’s not finished. You’re not sure if you have what it takes to finish it and you begin to doubt your reasons for starting. Life has plenty of these moments and no matter how many times I go through them they still feel uncomfortable and I still want to quit.

Right now I’m not sure the colours are working. I wish I’d made the flowers larger and I think I need to add something but I don’t know what.

Keep going, friends. If it doesn’t look like the end you imagined then maybe it’s not the end.

Happy Sunday x by @tab.bird.studio

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a year ago

Sometimes you just gotta leave the mice behind. Ya know?
And it’s okay to miss the mice, even cry over the mice. This does not mean you need the mice back in your life. What mice are you leaving? by @tab.bird.studio

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a year ago