I had the honor of being published in the winter issue of Somerset Art Journaling Magazine.
Here are some photos from my article.
I cannot tell you how delighted, honored and grateful I am. A true dream come true.
Thank you for letting me share.
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And here we go! Week One:
I talk about going to the San Francisco Zoo, Paddle boating, to the PLAY! center and building with magnets, playing with army men and seeing Life of Pi. So far, the 8.5×11 is working great. I haven’t found a way to fit my art yet but still thinking on it. See you next week! The Savor Project is a weekly project for 2013. You can see a detailed post on my goal and other details here.
There are people who like to set goals and those who shy away from them. During this time of year, I see a lot of articles on setting new year’s resolutions. How quickly they fall apart. How to not break them. How it’s better not to set them. Etc. etc. But I don’t see nearly articles on what kind of goals to set. Why resolutions might be useful. What type of resolutions are more likely stick vs others. There seems to be a belief out there that there are people who stick to their resolutions and those who don’t. And that’s that. So if you’re the kind of person who can follow through you’re in good shape. But if you’re not, well there’s nothing you can do; you were built this way. I don’t buy that. While it’s true that we all work differently and some of us can execute on personal goals more efficiently than others, I think it mostly comes down to how we set the goals and the content of the goals. And what goals represent for us. I think for a goal to be effective it has to be three things: 1. Specific: Lose weight is not specific. Lose five pounds is specific. I think there are other helpful steps along the way like setting positive, growth-oriented goals. Or goals that are more resonant to what matters to you in life, etc. But these three are the single most important part. Once you set specific, time-bound, and measurable goals, the trick is finding how you achieve that goal. This is the second biggest failure point. Most people assume there’s one path to success and if they can’t/won’t do that, they cannot reach their goal. For example, many people who set the goal to lose weight join a gym at the beginning of a new year. If you want to lose weight, the gym is your best bet, right? Not necessarily. This is where “knowing yourself” becomes super handy. If you know how you work best, you can create your own path to success. The gym is not the only way to exercise. You can take daily hikes. You can ride your bike. You can buy a treadmill. You can do a sport weekly. You don’t even have to take the exercise route. You can choose to eat exclusively whole foods. Or cut out alcohol. The goal when losing weight is to eat better and move more. There are many, many, many paths to that end. And the best one is the one you’re going to do. The one that works for you. When I started exercising, I took it extremely slowly. I ran at a laughable pace. I increased by tiny amounts each month. Even when I could do more, I didn’t. I knew what worked for me was the consistency. I needed to be able to do it every single day so it had to not be intense. I didn’t give myself recovery time. Would it have worked if I ran 5 miles 3 times a week instead of 2 miles a day every day? Sure! Did my way work, too? Yes! The trick is finding the way that works for you. Taking that measurable, time-bound, specific goal and breaking it into little chunks of achievable tasks that resonate with you. With your way of life. With your personality. With your capacity. The great thing about having goals is that it allows you to live your life intentionally. You spend your time doing what matters to you. (Assuming you picked goals that speak to you and not goals that make you look good for others.) It’s a great way to battle inertia. It’s a rewarding way to honor your life and your time. The one thing we don’t get to save is time so how you spend your time is the most precious decision you can make. And finding goals that resonate with you and breaking them into tasks that work for you is a great path to living intentionally. I have no doubt that every one of us can achieve whatever goal we set our mind to. What makes us break our resolutions is not who we are but how we define them and how we choose the path to achieving them.
I picked up Spectral on a whim. And while I did read it really fast, and enjoyed it, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend it. For me, it was a little on the fantastical side. I liked it ok. And if you’re into paranormal stories, you might like it more than I did. I like them ok but I’ve just read stronger, better, more interesting books. Having said that, it’s a quick, fun read. So, you choose. Here’s this week’s card:
It says: you are not alone, not ever. This card uses the Love Birds template by Dina Wakley for The Crafter’s Workshop (as well as a few others.). Gratitude PostCards is a weekly project for 2013. You can see a detailed post on my goal and the postcards I use here. Since I am really tired tonight, I thought instead of writing a thoughts-related post, I could share my One Little Word assignment. This month’s assignment was all about setting intentions for the year. I spent a lot of time thinking about mine. here it is as a spread:
The intentions I set are: January – Quietly Present – take a break. ponder. walk, don’t run. take it slow and steady. be calm. don’t yell. be quieter. listen. Here’s page one bigger:
and here’s page two bigger:
My goal for 2013 is to make three sketches a week. If I make more, great. If I don’t, that’s ok. Trying to keep the pressure low while still encouraging myself to draw. Here are the ones for this week:
that’s it for this week. Sketching is a weekly project for 2013. You can see a detailed post on my sketching journey here.
I had been looking forward to December for over two months. The months leading up to it were quite busy and rough for me and I knew I’d be taking about twenty days off in December and it couldn’t come soon enough. Each time I felt upset, I’d remind myself that the vacation was coming. The downtime. The time to relax. Reflect. Plan. Lounge. Snuggle. And then it came and it went. Just like that. Time’s so ephemeral. The days seem to pass so very quickly. I found myself worrying each day that I had one fewer day left. And then I’d step back and scold myself for wasting the precious time with worry. And on and on the cycle went. Even though I did plan some, lounge some, snuggle a bunch, and relax a bunch, I just didn’t feel whatever it was that I had decided December was supposed to bring. It didn’t meet my undefined expectations. Today was my first day back to “normal life.” My kids went to school and I went back to work. I woke up before the alarm this morning (which apparently was a good thing cause I’d forgotten to set it.) And I just felt the unease all day. I felt unprepared. Not ready to face the “real world” just yet. A part of me felt like scolding myself. I had just had one of the longest time-off’s of my career and I was not rested enough, peaceful enough, or prepared enough. I felt like I was being ungrateful. But instead of scolding, I decided to just go easy on myself. One of my goals with being present is not brushing away any emotion. I don’t want to sweep the crumbs under the rug. I don’t want to wallow either. I just want to feel what I feel and give myself permission for it to be OK. Whatever is it, it’s ok. So I slowed down. Way down. I did my exercise and got the kids ready. I took the kids to school without stressing about being late. I went into Nathaniel’s classroom and didn’t try to rush back home. I came home and slowly made some breakfast. A little bit of sketching and then I started my work day. Meetings, email, and a few little tasks. I got some work done. Not a huge amount but enough to feel productive. More than what I would have gotten done if I were busy scolding myself for being grumpy. Because I wasn’t preoccupied with my feelings and how inappropriate they were, I was able to focus on the work. And now we’re at the end of my day. I have a little time for art and a conversation with a friend and then it’s bed time. When I listen quietly, I can feel a small sense of peace. A little gratitude for the work done. I don’t feel euphoric but the heaviness I woke up with is gone. I feel like now I have a path through this fog. It might seem counter-intuitive to slow down but it aligns with my goal of being present. I am still doing all that I have planned for this week, so it’s not necessarily about doing less (though it could be) but just doing things more deliberately, not multi-tasking, not thinking about the next task while I am doing one, etc. Just really being present with each thing I do. I am not sure how long it will take me to get back into the groove of things. But in the meantime, I am taking this as a lesson in practicing my word. (Interestingly enough, my intention for January for the OLW class was to be quietly present. So far, so good.) There’s something magical in slowing down and living deliberately. Paying attention to the moments of life. It creates a lot of room for gratitude. And silent joy. In 2011, I did a weeklong daily art journal project that I loved. In 2012, I did a collage project that I loved. So this year, I decided to sort of combine the two and add the element of gratitude and celebration. I bought myself an A4 Moleskine Sketchbook and decided to use the right side pages only. My goal is to create some art on each page each week. Some might be collage-y and some will be more like art journaling. Whatever my heart desires. And then the goal is to update the page throughout the week to add 2 gratitudes each day from me, one from david and finally 3 things to celebrate for each of my family members for the week. Since I post these on Mondays, each page will go from Sunday to Saturday. Like most of my projects, I am not exactly sure how it’s going to work but I am open to playing along and letting it morph to what it needs to be. Here’s my first before page, I figured it’s best to start the year with my word:
and here’s what the page looks like with all the gratitudes and celebrations:
There we go. Just another excuse to create art and remember the present that is my life. I explained in this post how David and I decided to create Gratitude PostCards for 2013 as our project. We plan to mostly use stencils for him but also anything he wants. The cards are addressed to people he is grateful for and specific reasons why. I love this project cause it involves art, thinking, gratitude, and writing. Not to mention bringing joy to others. Unlike mine, I will post both the front covers and the back without the name/address. with that, here’s his first card:
and the back:
there we go. Here’s to gratitude in 2013!
Here are some snapshots from our week: Army men’s been a big hit.
David’s been teaching Nathaniel how to strategize.
he’s also been building more of his legos. This boat is from the Lighthouse which is awesome!
Nathaniel’s been playing with his toys, too.
finding creative uses for all of the toy’s parts.
we took a short trip to the Palo Alto Jr. Museum and Zoo and got to see bobcats, spiders, bees, bats, birds, fish, and many other animals.
and I snapped some photos of the kids, of course.
we played Blokus. Even Nathaniel’s pretty good at it.
our Christmas tree is still up and will be until mid January this year cause I will be away at a course next weekend and can’t take it down. Oh so sad. Not.
David’s been playing with the Origami Yoda books too and practicing his origami.
We’ve also been playing with paper and punches. Tons of fun.
the dark weather hasn’t been helping my photos.
but I soldier on anyway.
and here we go. i hope your week was lovely, too. here’s to a wonderful, incredible, peaceful 2013! Weekly Diary is a project for 2013. You can read more about it here. As we approached 2013, I knew that I wanted to continue to do art journaling. I’ve really enjoyed making art each week and wanted to make sure I created an excuse to give me time to create regularly. However, I have a tough time keeping all the art I’m creating. My books are becoming bulky and this year I am trying to focus on learning to let go and share. I’ve had people occasionally approach me to ask if I sell my art. So I decided to combine the two and create this project. I call it SixBySix because I cut up my watercolor paper in a small square (it’s actually about 5.5″ by 5.5″ so it can fit into a 6×6 envelope to mail.) and I create my art on that paper. I will then sell each piece. There will only be one each week. The price will be the same no matter where you live (unless this becomes really costly, in which case I might add a shipping cost for outside the US.) Assuming I can find my scanner and am not too lazy (which is a big assumption) I might at some point offer prints too, but I am not holding my breath on that. Please remember, this is personal and hand-made and thus imperfect. If you want perfect art, do not buy mine. Also one more reminder that these are pretty small. 5.5inches by 5.5inches. That’s about 14×14 centimeters). You will just get the original piece of watercolor paper with my art and signature in the back. No mounting, no frame. I don’t want to misrepresent anything. I will put a paypal button under each (you can pay with credit card or paypal.) the button doesn’t update so you will have to click through to see if it’s sold out. I will try to update them as quickly as I can and remove the button if it’s gone, but just in case. Each piece will be $35. That’s US dollars. If you have questions please leave a comment and I will reply as fast as I can. Since it’s for sale, I will not copy any artist’s art. I will use stencils sometimes and create my own other times but each piece will be my own unique creation and idea. If I use a quote, I will make sure to attribute. If you find something that looks like a copy, it’s unintentional and please notify me so I can attribute, remove, or do whatever’s necessary. I’ve never sold art before and have mixed feelings about it. Depending on how things go, I might change my mind and not sell them or whatever. Either way, I will aim to create 52 pieces of 5.5×5.5 art this year. With that here’s my first one:
This one has some gold paint so here’s a slanted view too:
It reads: You already have what it takes to make your wishes come true. here’s an example of what it looks like in an 8×8 frame.
Here’s to hoping for more art in 2013. |
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