organizing

Katherine Kean is writing about organizing and inventorying her artwork and it got me thinking about (and drawing) my half-baked process.
How do I keep track? First, I have various notepads where I document a piece as I finish it:

Then I used to use these index cards:
(Katherine mentions these in her post -- I think they are no longer available. She came up with a new form for herself that is very nifty)

Now I use GYST software:One drawback with this system: data entry. I hit a glitch in a section and that was my excuse to stop altogether. So there sit the cards, in a box, part of the clutter.

fridge clutter

fridge clutter, originally uploaded by ambray66.

day 1, start of upper right corner
sharpie + gel pen on canson paper

this is a 1:1 scale drawing

fridge clutter

fridge clutter, originally uploaded by ambray66.

model and drawing

here's my setup... the drawing paper is taped to foamcore

20 colors

I made a list and sampled what I thought were my essential oil colors:
Cadmium Lemon
Cadmium Yellow Pale
Cadmium Yellow Medium
(Cadmium Yellow Deep)
Cadmium Orange
Cadmium Red Light
Cadmium Red Medium
Cadmium Red Deep
Alizarin Crimson
Lamp Black
Titanium White
Cerulean Blue
Manganese Blue Hue
Cobalt Blue
Ultramarine Blue
Prussian Blue
Viridian
Sap Green
Naples Yellow
Yellow Ochre

I made some discoveries:
I didn't have Cadmium Yellow Deep and think maybe I can get along without it
Cadmium Red Med and Deep look the same -- all these years I've bought both! I think of the money I could have saved if I'd done this color array 35 years ago...
(yes, I can't believe I've never done this before - silly me)
So my 20 essential colors are now 18 essential colors.