My First Art Show {What I Know}




I know I've been up since 4:30 a.m.

I know I've already had six tons of fun, and this rodeo is only halfway done. There is still tomorrow.

I know people are paying me for my art. I know, right? It's a mad, mad world.

I know I've been up since 4:30 a.m.

I know I will never forget the little 13 year old girl who shyly stalked my booth, and asked her momma for two (expensive) paintings...of girls in pretty dresses. That little girl read every one of my paintings (all my art has words...can't...stop...talking...evenwhenIpaint). She stole my heart.

I know I will never be the same after a 40-something year old woman left my booth, weeping. She choked out the words, "You have touched me. Thank you so much." She didn't buy a thing, but she could not have affirmed my calling more had she bought me out.

I know I've been up since 4:30 a.m.

There's so much more I know from this experience so far....but I don't remember what it is.

Goodnight, moon...


Written for you with love...

Sheila Atchley

All blog content is the property of the writer, including all "In the Middle" intellectual and visual art property...

The Mighty, Wonderful, Powerful, Sweetest Name {Jesus}






Can I ask you to bear with me...to grant a little grace...cut me some slack...

...because I am such a jacked-up Jesus Freak.

I just love the Name. I believe "God" has a mighty name. I believe that this name...all by itself...has power. And the fact that a few fearful souls won't say the Name, for fear of offending or losing art clients or blog followers or hurting their networking opportunities...it all serves to make me more passionate about shouting this name from the housetops...

...Jesus.

Truly, "the Name that has heard my cry/and seen my tears and wiped them dry" (lyrics from the Margaret Becker song, "Say the Name") is a person, with whom I share an intimate, spiritual relationship, worshipping Him in Spirit and in truth.
I know Someone who has carried my griefs and sorrows, who has delivered me from my fears, who has set my feet upon a rock, who is my best friend.

Why would I not tell you His name?

Written for you with love...

Sheila Atchley

All blog content is the property of the writer, including all "In the Middle" intellectual and visual art property...

{Originality} What Is It...and What It Is

“Originality doesn’t mean making something that’s completely new;  nothing is completely new.  Originality means bending and shaping what’s come before until it belongs to you.” 

- Robert Hunt




Nothing...nothing at all is completely new.  "There is nothing new under the sun", the Bible says.  The only truly original Artist is The Original Artist - God.  So feel relieved...bathed in grace...free to be originally yourself in every way...the way you dress, the way you express your gifts, the things you love {and don't love} to do...the art you create.  Take what you see in someone else, deconstruct it, find out what you love and don't love about what you see, take what you love, leave out what you don't, and remix the whole darn thing.  Put your heart into it.  

What comes out, will be yours alone.  Who cares that you first saw it somewhere else? 

Obviously, this doesn't mean that we slavishly and sloppily copy others.  That constitutes a true lack of self respect on the part of the person copying...not to mention it could constitute stealing and plagiarism and copyright infringement and all sorts of unpleasant and illegal things.  

But no one...no one at all...pulls a style or a philosophy or a creative idea out of thin air.  Each of us is the sum total of our input.

So let your input be  mighty fine.  Mighty fine, indeed.

Easter Adorableness

The grandson was sick today...and this Mimi stayed home with him on this Easter Sunday, so that his parents could go lead worship at our church. So no pictures of him in any Easter Glory or Finery.

But this....oh, this...






And this....






Apparently hair accessories taste good. Or help with teething. Or both.

Later, the grandson was taken to his house for a nap, The Preacher made it home from church, and he and I went to the granddaughter's house for Easter lunch.

This Mimi has been deep in the throes of First Art Show Preparation. Deep, deep. And sick with an evil headcold absolutely all of Holy Week, on top of it.

Let me tell you, it rocks to have daughters old enough to host holiday meals. I cooked a ham and took it. BAM. I did not one thing more.

After the Easter Swine was joyfully consumed (because I can) The Preacher played with his new professional level (something having to do with CMOS and sensors and stuff and things) Birthday Nikon, and grabbed this shot...





SOC. Straight Out of Camera. A little bit low light (rainy day) but a money shot! And guess who she was looking at?

Her Mimi. Me-me.

I know, right? You want me to stop my bragging and get on with my bad self.


Written for you with love...

Sheila Atchley

All blog content is the property of the writer, including all "In the Middle" intellectual and visual art property...

Introverts Are Different






Do you love being with people? Do you have a felt need to socialize? (We all need it, to varying degrees...we simply were not created to be alone...)

If you answered "yes", you are not an introvert. Introverts have a felt need for more solitude than an extrovert. Many extroverts almost never feel an intense, consistent need to be alone or quiet, thus they will never really understand it. And unfortunately, they will often try to force their introverted loved ones into their own extroverted perspective. Extroverts mistakenly assume that everyone should be just like them, and oooooh boy, do extroverts need people!

Typically, introverts are more creative than their extrovert friends...which is good, because we introverts need all the props we can get. The entire world, it seems, is trying to make us apologize for the way we were made.

Yes. God made us this way. And some of us (like yours truly) He has made to be quiet souls, and souls that need quiet...

...and then He called us into public ministry. This requires a near-daily dying to self, and a continual setting aside of our own, very legitimate, need for quiet time alone. Something an extrovert will never comprehend. Just know that you don't know. Compassion for your introverted loved one starts right there: opening your mind to the idea that you may actually not know what it is like to be "her". And you do not know what she needs, so let her tell you.

May I gently encourage you to tell your artsy, introverted, quiet friend that she is enough? That she is enough as a friend, as a daughter of God, as a mother, that she is loved exactly as she is?

I can almost promise you, she will go off by herself and weep with gratitude for being told one simple thing: that she is loved, lovely, and enough. Tell her you delight in her in spite of herself.

Endeavor to understand and encourage the introverts in your life.





There is a link to a Facebook fan page for your incredible introvert here


Written for you with love...
Sheila Atchley
All blog content is the property of the writer, including all "In the Middle" intellectual and visual art property...

The Preacher's 50th

The love of my life turned 50 today.

I have spent the better part of two days cleaning my house, shopping, decorating, and generally preparing for what for us is a small family gathering of 16.





















That box...my gift to him..."brown paper packages, tied up with strings"...definitely had in it one of his favorite things!






Cards from friends...





I decorated the house in spring...





Having his grandchildren all around is definitely his favorite thing. (The granddaughter was napping during gift opening time...)

Surrounded and spoiled and adored and loved by his family. He rocked his 50th, for sure. Spent it exactly how he's always dreamed he would.

I am so honored to be the girl beside him and the one dearest to his heart. My beloved man of God, who has poured himself into all his relationships...thus has never had time for a mid-life crisis...he is too busy loving and being loved.

Happy birthday, Preacher!

You are the love of my life...




Written for you with love...

Sheila Atchley

All blog content is the property of the writer, including all "In the Middle" intellectual and visual art property...

The Evolution of an Art Studio

(a corner of my art studio...)

I had a conversation with a friend today, and it blessed me.  Just since I taught my first mixed media art class in February, she has acquired her very own art supplies, and even a cabinet to put her treasures in, out of reach of her small children.

It got me thinking about the evolution of my own space, and how important it is that a woman  have her own niche in the home...a place that is hers alone, to be able to create what she creates, and walk away from it, and come back to it...because a woman's life never seems to afford her long stretches of uninterrupted time, until her children are all grown.

Wait.  No, not even then.  I speak as One Who Knows.

What I really know is this:  I know what happens when you are truly content, and you make the most of what you have, instead of wishing for things to be different.

So I decided to dig around my archives, to share with you the evolution of one woman's art studio...mine.  I know what it means to have to "make do", and here's the amazing thing...

...it wasn't that long ago.  In fact, it was one year ago this week.  I checked the date on the blog post.

That.  gives.  me.  goosebumps.

To see what God has done in the space of one year.  One year.   How?  I'm not asking you.  I'm asking myself.  How?  One year ago this week, I had no idea what was coming.  Bigger art, bigger dreams, bigger goals, bigger things, and a much, much, much bigger art studio.

Here is how this all began...


...in my dining room.  My dining room.  Out of sheer determination to BOTH create AND be content with what I had available in terms of space, I cleared dishes out of a corner dining room hutch, and plunked my art supplies in it.  Every single art-thing I owned.  And then, on a whim and a prayer,  I made art to raise money so some kids from a single parent family could go on a mission trip.  I wanted so badly to give.  I wanted these kids to get on a plane for the very first time...

...I was stunned when I sold everything I painted.  I put half of it in the offering plate for the mission trip, the other half I put back into art supplies...simply because I felt strongly impressed that I was to keep painting.

So after the mission trip, I kept painting.

And people kept buying.  Then a local retail shop began to carry my art.  Then, on Mother's Day 2012, The Preacher bought me a tiny desk and we literally cleared out a corner of our bedroom, selling the treadmill (a girl has to keep her priorities in order!) and that corner then became my studio.

I was so proud of it.  The Preacher was so glad to eat at the table again.

 my tiny studio, in a corner of my bedroom...

It was exactly here, in this space,  that I found courage to dive into creating my W.E.L.L. Being videos..."Women Equipped To Love and Lead"...videos in which I attempt to bring encouragement to anyone who will listen.

And I kept painting.  And I started my business.  And I opened my online shop.  And started my business Facebook page.  (Like me?  Please?)

Long about August of this past year, the neighbor across the cul-de-sac offered to sell his house to my son-in-law and daughter, who had been living with us, along with our grandson Timothy (who is The Preacher's namesake).  They had been living with us so that Justin could finish his Master's, do his internship, work three jobs, and they could have their baby.  

With all those things checked off the list, and a nice savings built up, they were able to buy the house across the cul-de-sac from us.  That was a day I will never forget.  The Preacher and I wept for joy...and sadness...as this chapter of all our lives came to a close.  A couple of weeks after they moved next door, my tiny corner studio, once crammed in my bedroom became...

...a whole room.  With two rooms suddenly coming available, I had a studio! 

For the first time in 25+ years, I had a full-fledged art studio.  And guest room.

And my studio wasn't big enough.  It felt cramped.

I know, right?  I went from a dining room corner cabinet, containing all my art supplies (well, with a few more crammed into the dining room buffet) to a whole 10x12 room feeling too small.

In one year.  Here's the weirdness:  90% of all the art supplies that filled that room had just...come to me...over the course of about nine months.   

My family can bear witness to the truth of what I am telling you.  There is no explanation...tools and equipment and supplies have been...coming to me...since one year ago this week.  Non stop.  In the form of gifts, gift cards, loans (some equipment is on "indefinite loan").  It has come to me in the form of  Craigslist deals, hand-me-downs, The Preacher spending his lunch money on me...and me investing a little out of our budget, here and there, to fill in the edges of whatever this crazy-train thing is that God is up to in my life! 

Then, last month, I mentioned to the Preacher that our large guest room (the room Justin and Hannah vacated when they moved out) would sure make an awesome studio...because it has a tiny bath, and I could clean my brushes so much easier if my art studio had its own sink.  I truly wasn't even completely serious.

But it was all I had to say.

My Preacher picked up his phone and cancelled and rescheduled all his appointments that day.  (Nothing was life or death...no one was suicidal...that day.)  By the end of that very day, my studio became this:


TWO closets, tons of space, and my own bathroom. 


...and my first art show coming up in three weeks, in...of all places...art mecca of the south...Atlanta, Georgia!

Friends, where God guides, He provides.  Please do come with me on this crazy-train plan of His.

It is going to be one.  wild.  ride.

Oh.  By the way.  If you come stay with us....sorry.  Your room is smaller than my studio.  And your full bath is just across the hall, instead of in-suite.  But you won't mind, because I'll feed you so dang well.

And you would rather be able to crack your window and hear the pond waterfall, anyhow.