2025 Roundup
Reflections on the year
Welcome,
and thank you all for being here, both old and the new 300 subscribers. Happy New Year and very best wishes for 2026.
Read on to find the pictures, some discussion about numbers, some shout outs, and reflection. I hope you’ll get something from it
Substack Numbers & Growth
As you can see I started the year around 200 and have stayed steady at just over 500 for a few months with very little increase in paying subscribers.
I opted for a ‘Freemium’ strategy which I explain here in this post. It basically means I see my art as a little gift from me to you without using a paywall even though paid subscriptions are turned on for anyone who fancies contributing .
When people choose to subscribe they are giving a gift back to me. I see it as good karma. In return I offer people plenty of opportunity to engage and join in by using video, meets , live stream and chat threads and open access to DM for anything.
I’m very grateful to the few who have supported me on this journey so far, thankyou.
Some New Year shout outs
I would also like to give a big thankyou to the financial supporters as well as those who have regularly engaged and shown the substack love. I apologise if I don’t cover everyone but thankyou all, there are too many to mention, Nancy Lynn-Parker, Alica Cristal Water, Jacki Crawford, Katie, John Miller, Dolores Holt, Pip L, Inez.brandon@gmail.com, Bree, also Jo, Lisa Burda, dotdeb, Shauna K. Hunt, JanC, Geoff Mantooth, Nino van Vuuren, JS Hyder, CatherineBsketches, Hue Walker, Lori
Reflections are not just in mirrors
Those are the numbers and I can’t quite make out the reason for the stall. It might be I’m not offering enough for people or there are so many other fantastic Substack writers and creatives, the algorithm is not being kind to me. The good news is I’m going to try and do something about it this year.
My year has been a year of pausing and taking it easy on myself, along with another bout of surgery, orthopaedic this time though rather than cardiac! I tried to refocus my attention in helping others in my job but found it wasn’t doing much to improve my own mental stimulation, as well as the continued randomness of working days.
I really have the utmost respect for people in the nursing and caring professions, particularly the lower paid or the unpaid. To carry on, with not much in return, makes them some of the most special people around. So I now have a more consistent role starting in the new year with regular hours and consistent days on and off work. It should also be more stimulating whilst still helping sone of the more vulnerable in our society.
I’m hoping this consistency will follow through into my Substack presence which also may explain the graph above.
Despite enjoying the meetings and live streams I found the streams were a little disconcerting as many people don’t engage and so the stream can feel a little cold.
I also realised I like to talk, which is an unusual discovery for me!
I’m going to try and do more regular virtual meets using Jitsi rather than Zoom.
I prefer the meet format over the streaming format for the interaction with you lovely people.
More details can be found here, potentially every week on the same day or
CLICK BELOW 👇
Did someone mention Art?
I finished the Fabriano A5 hardback so there will be a sketchbook tour coming at some point.
Here are some of the recent creations, good and bad, also through times of recent barren creativity 😊.
An 18month old baby can teach you a thing or two
I recently realised how the pressure to make good sketches can easily creep in without you even realising. Let me explain.
Whilst with my son and his little family over Christmas my granddaughter needed occupying before bedtime. I had a load of sketchbooks with me but only one that I was happy for her to scribble in with a pencil. It was my cheapest sketchpad with simple cartridge paper. She merrily went back and forwards in the book scribbling across most pages, even using some blank pages (I did try and steer her away from these!), but you know what she didn’t care and neither did I.
She literally fell asleep while turning a page still holding the pencil sat on my lap 🩷You can see some of the scribbles on the Trennick Mill page and across rudolph too.
That evening I sketched and coloured Neptune from a photo I took on Christmas day in Cheltenham in the very same book she had scribbled in. It took on a sort of casual abandonment where I didn’t mind writing straight across it.
It was a picture I wanted to use to start my expensive Etcher book but enjoyed the freedom and the look it gave me in the cheap book.
All this made me realise how much the worry had crept into using ‘decent’ sketchbooks!
I’ll show this book in its entirety when its finished, it’s not pretty and despite it ‘nastiness’ I now have to keep it because it contains memories of my beautiful granddaughter falling asleep when all else was failing and the liberating nature of just making those marks on the paper. You never know what you’re going to end up with🩷
On that note I wish you all a peaceful and prosperous New Year ahead and hope to see some of you on my upcoming meets or picking up a pencil for the first time or just come and say hello on a DM like Lori did.
Carl
Nicely written, Jack and I wish I hadn't missed out on many live session you've had in the last half of this year. For me it has changed a lot not having anymore such free access to Substack at work - it was my little breaks at work, helping me to relax my mind and focus better. Agreeing with you that worrying how the drawing/painting will look can suppress the organic flow of creation, a lot. That's why with cheap sketchbooks we can often create some of our best drawings/paintings. I was for the first time painting on a cotton canvas (a gift from a tenant at work) and that was quite a new experience - that texture, that size (A2?).
Happy New Year, Carl! I wish you a creative and productive year!✨ Live streams and meetings are such a great way to connect! Unfortunately, due to my day job and uni I rarely attend those, but I hope to join a couple when possible!