Have you heard of the Painting a Day movement? It started back in 2004 when Duan Keiser set out to share his work on the internet. What started with one man has turned into thousands of artists striving to do one small painting a day – mostly every day. I am always looking for practical ways to get creativity into my life so when I discovered this idea years ago, I was intrigued.
What a delicious week of happiness!
Thank you for all of your support of my new eBook, Happy Journal, Happy Life. I have BIG dreams for this little book because I think it is a method of gratitude that is accessible to so many.
You don’t have to be an ARTIST.
You don’t have to have a lot of supplies.
This is the little book that almost didn’t happen. I was writing another book and ran into a major roadblock. And while I was digging myself out, Happy Journal, Happy Life emerged.
It also almost didn’t happen because the concept of drawing my life is one I’m too familiar with. I have been sketching vignettes of my day and the things that make me happy for years.
I think keeping a regular journal is wonderful. I will likely write in one until I’m an old woman. Might as well—I’ve been journaling since I was six years old.
But this drawing-my-day practice? It didn’t even have a name until recently.
I think it’s safe to say that you and I know about the benefits of keeping a journal—any journal. Benefits…
Join me for 2030make live on the Little Girl Designs Facebook page during the month of October. It’s going to be FUN!
Hello, hello!
When I met 1:1 with a mentor during a conference recently, one of my chief questions was how to be authentic and build community in a social media driven blog world. For those of you who don’t own blog businesses, this might seem like a strange question to ask, but for me it is a real problem.
Who knew a sticker-covered book would start me on this journey?
I was digging through our flat files one afternoon when I came across a small booklet. The sight of it immediately brought a smile to my face. It was completely covered with stickers from fruit I had eaten.
Opening the pages, I entered into a world I had forgotten. Tiny sketches of my life in Los Angeles filled the pages. At the time, I had been planning a trip to visit my family for Christmas. This tiny book chronicled my excitement as the day drew near.
One thing I noticed in that book was the joy. I couldn’t help but smile as I flipped through the pages. How had I forgotten these moments?
Want to make your friend’s day? Make her a spa in a box care package! Here’s how . . .
Can I tell you how excited I am to share this DIY spa kit with you today? I recently bought a stack of small boxes to use this year for gifting and immediately thought how fun it would be to use them to send a spa in a box through the mail.
The idea for a survival kit isn’t new. Maybe you received a care package or two while you were away for college. Maybe you’ve even sent some through the mail. (Total side note, but if you want more survival kit ideas, you’ve got to check out Lauren Lanker’s gem of a book, Thinking Outside the Gift Box. It’s packed full of meaningful gift ideas like this one. K—back to this presentation.)
At the beginning of the year, I began writing a book. Except, instead of writing said book the normal way, I jumped into this project with three blank sketchbooks and began illustrating and hand-writing it.
Every day for months, I wrote four pages a day. I wrote until I had those three sketchbooks filled to the brim.
And then I stopped.
My initial thought had been I would scan all of those pages and add color spots to them as I had done for some of the pages in The Creative Retreat. The problem was, have you ever scanned hundreds of non-related pages? And the thought of color-correcting each and every one of them . . . Oh. My. Goodness.
Wouldn’t it be amazing to be mentored by your hero? It might not be as difficult as you think. Here’s how to be mentored from the best in your industry.
Years ago, I began noticing how leaders across niches and work spaces were talking more and more about mentoring. I wanted to be mentored too, but when I looked around, I wasn’t sure who to ask. Or what a mentoring relationship would look like.
I imagined sitting in a cafe with a seasoned writer, talking about our creative careers, and hashing out what was holding me back. I imagined homework, because my personality type loves homework.
I love these journaling prompts for all occasions. I use them in my bullet journal, for art journaling projects, and to get rid of writer’s block!
Don’t you hate it when you can’t think of anything to write? Maybe you’re new to journaling and feel intimidated by all the blank pages in your journal. Or maybe you’ve been writing a while, but need an extra spark.
Sometimes when I go on my personal creative retreats, I bring along a prompt or two to get my creative juices flowing. Often the questions or words in the prompts are things I wouldn’t regularly write about, and it’s interesting to explore something new to me. I don’t know about you, but I always liked it when teachers gave us good prompts back in the day for writing assignments. Something about the constraints of a specific word or question makes my imagination soar!