Sketchbooks are for sketching...

I have several sketchbooks sitting around the house with pretty much nothing but blank pages in them. A couple have a few pages of unfinished work that may never get finished. If I'm an artist (or just fancy myself to be one), why don't I have more sketches done? Well, because for some silly reason I have been convinced that a sketchbook should contain only GOOD work. The art in the book should be a somewhat finished product, not some scribbles or poorly proportioned figures to jot down some fantastic ideas for future projects. I suppose this came from the whole being surrounded by people with much more practiced talent than my own having great images in their books. I somehow got stuck in this rut of comparing myself to others, not taking into account that art is more of a hobby for me and these people have been practicing their techniques for years. I've been sketching a little these days after not sketching at all for a few years. A friend of mine is looking for ideas for a logo and artwork to be printed on tees and such for a business she and her husband are starting in the near future. It has a Wonderland theme, more specifically the Mad hatter character. Now, I am a big fan of Alice in Wonderland and have had several ideas for art pieces with that theme. I haven't really touched upon Hatter yet, but after hearing about the idea from my friend, I have found some inspiration! I've been working on a few ideas for this character, and emailed my friend last night telling her that she may not want to use the images for a logo but she would love them, and I had to thank her for providing me with a muse again! So now she's really curious about how she inspired me and is looking forward to seeing the work I come up with on this one. I have been grabbing images from stock sites and from galleries of some of my favorite artists to use as references and to provide some more inspiration. Browsing through hundreds of images and pulling out ones that I can see a different version of Hatter posed in, or the expression is perfect, or the outfit has potential... whatever the reason it works for me and I have now used my sketchbook to actually sketch out a few of these ideas! I decided it would be good for me to have all my sketches together, telling myself that there's no reason I can't go back over them later and fix some of the roughness or other flaws to give them a more finished look. I also need to remember that my main issue with drawing is the amount of time it takes to get something to come out just right. I'm all about the instant gratification and having things done well quickly... and art is not something that allows for that unless you've been doing it constantly and consistently for many, many years. And really, some of my sketches aren't that bad, so I should be happy having them in my books. Not to mention, no one else is really going to see them anyway so it shouldn't matter how good they are or how rough and flawed. Besides, isn't there a saying, "Nothing in this world worth having comes easy."? If not, I'm saying it now!