Here are more pages I did during November:
The full text reads: The fastest way to get inspired is to start creating.
And here’s the next page:
Starting from here, I began to use my own handwriting so I could practice it daily.
The full text reads: Be patient with yourself. It takes time and practice.
And here’s the next page:
The full text reads: Take time to laugh and give a hug everyday.
And here’s the next page:
The full text reads: You decide who gets a piece of your heart. Choose wisely and carefully.
And here’s the next page:
The full text reads: One key to happiness is to practice gratitude.
Well here we go. More coming next week.
I am creating multiple art journaling pages a week for now. You can read more about this project here. This set uses the Fabriano Roma papers.
In honor of my older son turning seven today, I decided I wanted to write a bit about Time. I’m very conscious of the passage of time. Not in that, wow-i-am-getting-old-wish-i-was-young way. I’ve never (so far) worried about getting old. I actually like getting older. I feel like my body/age is finally catching up with what my soul always felt. But, that aside, I am very aware that time is a very limited resource and if we don’t use it wisely, we lose it.
The fact is we lose it no matter what.
Time passes. When just yesterday he was born, now my son is seven years old. I can’t stop him from growing. I can’t stop time from passing. The only thing I can do is make the most of it while it’s here. The thing with life is that day-to-day moments can be overwhelming. Filled with lots of small activities. Like cleaning, commuting, taking kids to activities, packing lunches, getting homework done, etc. Most of these can be annoying and time-consuming and are repetitive. So they wear us down. They make us notice the big things less.
Things like your little boy becoming seven.
One of my big goals for this year is to pay attention more. To pay attention to things in between all the daily churn. To slow down and notice the beauty and amazingness of our ordinary days. To stop and be grateful. Deeply grateful. For my very ordinary life. I think the best way to use time wisely is to pay attention. To notice what truly makes your heart happy. To notice what makes the people in your life happy. And to do more of those. Even if a little more. To infuse your days with a few more things that make you joyful.
Just a few minutes makes a big difference.
Making better use of your time, like all things, is about the little steps. You cannot change your life overnight. And those chores are pieces of life and will not go away. This doesn’t mean you can’t make changes. I’ve been making a huge effort to stop and pay attention. To smile at the little things my kids do when they don’t know I am watching. To give an extra hug to my husband. Send a sweet email to a friend. (In fact, my friend Jess sent me a book in the mail today. She said she loved it and wanted me to read it, too. Something relatively not time-consuming on her part, but completely made my day.) Paying attention allows you to make changes. Paying attention changes the way you look at what’s there. It’s sort of a magical way to slow time down.
With my photos, I capture my little magical moments in the day. When I process them later that day, I get to relive those moments. When I print them out later in the week, I relive them once more. And when I scrap them for my Savor Project, I get to relive them once again. That allows me to extend the one small/magical moment by reliving it four times. That’s pretty awesome magic if you ask me!
I am learning more and more that everything starts with paying attention. If you know what’s really happening, then you get the opportunity to make change. Without that, you’re operating blind. Taking everything granted. And not exercising the choices you have in life.
So this is a reminder for me to honor my word, pay attention, and try to savor the moments of my day.
And happy birthday my sweet son, David. I love you more than life itself. I am so grateful for you.
And here’s the spread for week four. Tried to keep it simple this week:
so here’s the left side:
two stories on this page. The first is nathaniel sharing his drawing with me and asking me to take a picture of it. The second one is how the kids are sitting head to head and looking at the catalog together. I love it so much.
And here’s the right side:
Three stories here. The first is of David reading to his teddy bear. Then Nathaniel playing peek-a-boo with my parents over Skype. And then the last story is CHA. I worked in the Maya Road booth so I put my badge, my booth sticker and the little make-and-take we made all into the flap with some of my thoughts from the weekend.
As usual, the bottom has my art and our weekly family photo along the bottom.
So there we go. That’s week four. So far, so good. Loving getting to savor these memories again and again.
Happy Savoring.
The Savor Project was supposed to be a weekly project for 2012. You can read about my setup here.
I picked up Shiver because I saw someone comment on it on Pinterest. She said the series was fantastic and I just felt like reading another love story after Beautiful Disaster even if it was young adult and paranormal.
And I wasn’t disappointed.
I loved Maggie Stiefvater’s writing style and I read this book in a single day. I didn’t want the story to end and I felt connected to both of the main characters in different ways. I even liked the tertiary characters. Yes, as with most novels, I had issues with some bits and pieces but overall I swallowed the book up and felt contended at the end.
So much so that I decided to move on to the next in the series right away. Which is pretty much unheard of, for me. But maybe it was because I went through it so quickly and I just didn’t want it to end. So now I’m reading the second one and let’s hope it’s as good.
After reading the comments on yesterday’s post, two things came up for me. One was about being an advocate for yourself which I will save for another post. But the second one was about giving others the chance to do things for you.
There were a few comments about not asking because you didn’t think you deserved it or being worried to bother others. (I don’t want to put words in your mouth so just know that this is me rephrasing and not any particular person’s comment.) This made me think of how frustrating it is to have a friend/spouse/family member who won’t ask. Because here’s the thing: I really love being able to do things for people. Given the chance, I’d much rather do something I know they will love instead of doing something I might think they will like.
When someone cares about you, they love to see you happy. I think we all have this. It’s the joy that comes from giving presents to people and seeing their face light up. If I knew for a fact that I could do something that would make my husband, my son, my friend smile each time, I would make a huge effort to try to do that often.
There’s so much joy in being able to do something for someone you love.
And when you don’t ask, I think you’re denying that person the pleasure of being able to make you happy. This is one of the best things about little kids. They are quite vocal about what they like and they squeal with joy when they get it. And seeing them happy makes us happy too. It’s a huge boost.
Put yourself in the other person’s shoes. What if you lived with someone and they wanted something but never asked you. Wouldn’t it be frustrating to know that there’s potentially something you can do to make them happier but you will never know because they are not asking?
In my personal relationships I find this terribly frustrating. As long as it’s asking and taking what you get (and not throwing a fit if you don’t get it) I feel like asking is giving the other person the opportunity to do something that will bring joy into your life. And if this person cares about you, they will try their best to do it. Won’t they?
And if they don’t care about you….well maybe it’s time to reconsider that relationship.
But, again, if you don’t ask, you won’t know. And if you don’t ask, you can’t expect them to read your mind. It’s not fair. By not asking, not only are you unhappy but you’re also denying them the chance to do something for you. If I found out that someone close to me was doing that, I’d be so sad. I’d feel terrible that they are not giving me the benefit of the doubt. They’re assuming I wouldn’t care.
But I do.
And I bet the people in your life do, too. If you don’t ask, you’ll never know. And, even worse, you’ll be denying them the chance to get to do something for you. To give you. To show you their love.
And that’s a shame.
Here are the sketches from last week:
Sunday:
Monday:
Tuesday:
Wednesday:
Thursday:
Friday:
Saturday:
Daily Sketching is a weekly project for 2012. You can see a detailed post on my steps here.
David has this habit where instead of asking for something, he’ll just say “you won’t say yes anyway.” I will admit, this always gets me annoyed. I feel like saying no just out of spite. But, that aside, I am a big fan of asking for what you want. I’ve noticed that people tend to make a lot of assumptions about what they can and cannot have.
I’m not sure what it is that stops people from asking for things. I’ve found that when you ask for something straight up without being conniving and passive aggressive or annoying, you’re more likely to get what you want than not get it. I’ve asked for things in so many different areas of my life. In school, at work, in my personal life. My husband jokes that I am good at getting my way, but I find that, more often than not, I ask when others don’t. And people have a hard time saying no to your face. Especially when they have no reason to do so.
When I was in college, I did this often with the random class limits. I used to walk up to my advisor and ask him to let me take more classes than the limit. I figured if I kept my grades high and fulfilled my requirements, why shouldn’t I just be able to take whatever class I wanted. If the rules seemed arbitrary to me, I always questioned them. That’s how I ended up getting my Masters at the same time as my Bachelors Degree. It’s also how I ended up working three days a week on Wall Street and still getting promoted. It’s how I got to work at home now. There was no big trick to getting what I wanted.
I just asked.
This is not to say sometimes the answer is not “no” but you will never know the answer if you don’t ask. Trust me. Even when you think you know the answer, you often will be surprised. I find that if you do your part and are a reliable student, employee, spouse, friend, you often find the other party is happy to help accomodate you when they can.
The other side of asking for what you want is accepting what you get. Once you ask, you need to be ok with getting yes or no as answer. But here’s what I think about that: if you don’t ask, you’re guaranteed a “no” so if you ask and get a “no” you’re no worse off than if you hadn’t asked. But if you get a “yes,” you’re much better off. So, by asking, you can only end up same or better off. So why not ask?
That’s what I told David yesterday when he, once again, made some passive aggressive comment instead of just asking for what he wanted. I said that if he didn’t ask, he would never know what the answer is. And if he did this trick where he said “oh you will never say yes anyway,” he would end up being right because I would never say yes to that. So his best option was to ask straight out and take what he got as an answer with dignity. Sometimes I might say yes and other times he’s right that the answer might be no.
But he will only know if he asks.
This layout is for Write.Click.Scrapbook’s February Gallery. The theme is to scrap “music”.
Journaling Reads:
My sweet boys, even though having two boys around means a lot of noise that drives me crazy, it also means a lot of laughter and giggling, and there’s nothing I love to hear as much as the two of you giggling and making up games together and giggling some more. Especially when the games end up in hugs and kisses. I feel so blessed to get to hear all this laughter all day long. I love you.
As I mentioned, I plan to keep this project simple and fun for both of us. So, I did the same thing with the letter B as I did for letter A. I cut them all up and then, Nathaniel and I glued them down together to create this simple page:
Like last time, w e talked about each of the words and then differentiated between big C and little C (which in this case is very little). Then we colored all the c’s.
Here he is gluing:
and coloring
Yey for week 3. Nathaniel seems to still be enjoying the process so I am grateful.
Letters with Nathaniel is a weekly project for 2012. You can read more about it here.
I started this week with a weekend in Anaheim and then crazy/insane amount of work so I don’t have a lot of great photos from until after Tuesday. I’ve been mostly working. Nathaniel’s been enjoying school and practicing his letters and numbers. David’s been working at lego projects and Jake’s having an excellent week. His parents are here now so I will keep this short. We’re all grateful for a relatively uneventful weekend and looking forward to the next one.
Anyhow, here are some highlights from last week:
One Daddy snapped while I was out of town.
I love how David’s in the background in this one.
They’ve been building huge towers of legos while I was gone.
Nathaniel really loves building them up.
and he’s been asking me to take his picture.
even digs up my camera for me so I can do it.
David’s been coming home late so I have bad light when it’s time to capture him.
And work’s been insane so Nathaniel’s been entertaining himself a lot.
and laughing a lot. thankfully.
i am grateful he’s easily amused.
he found this old batman computer david had.
it asks questions about letters and numbers. he listens, and then thinks.
and then makes his choice.
he gets really happy when he’s right.
and cheers himself on.
gives himself a round of applause.
and to me too.
and then there’s more cheering. he says “woo, woo” and “Big boy!” It makes me laugh so much. I love seeing it.
another david I tried to snap before light was totally gone.
tickle-time from yesterday.
I still love and adore tickle-time.
Jake’s mom and dad are visiting and the kids love love love having them here.
i love how Nathaniel’s completely immersed in anything David does. The true definition of a younger brother.
and here we go. Another wonderful week gone. So grateful for my family. Here’s to a great week next week!
Weekly Diary is a project for 2012. You can read more about it here.
Here’s page number five:
Lots of paint and random artsy papers in this one. I can’t stand the yellow paint in the middle but it is what it is. It feels a little more collage-y to me even though I know it’s still more art journal than collage.
oh well…
Journey into Collage is a project for 2012. You can read more about it here.
When we went to David’s parent-teacher conference last week, one of the things the teacher mentioned was that David reported a lot of thumbs-downs post-lunch. His class has a routine where they sit in a circle when lunch is over and each of the kids get to say thumbs-up, sideways, or down for how their lunch period felt.
And David was often choosing thumbs-down.
This lined up with what I’ve been seeing lately, too. David seems to often choose to look at things from a negative perspective. And also he doesn’t always realize something is not enjoyable until quite a bit of time has been invested into it. For example, sometimes he gets to spend special time with Daddy at night before bed. Occasionally, at the end of this time, he’ll come down to say good night to me and tell me that it wasn’t fun and he didn’t like what Daddy and he spent their time on. When I ask him if he told Daddy this, he invariably says no. So I tell him that he needs to make sure to communicate when things aren’t going the way he’d like them to go.
But until this week, I didn’t realize something else might be at play, too. Maybe be he doesn’t realize that he’s not enjoying an activity while it’s still happening. It’s only at the end that he evaluates and feels regret. So I told him to try out a new strategy at lunch. I said, “About halfway through lunch, stop and think: Would I give my lunch a thumbs-up if I had to go back in right now? Pay attention to your answer. If it’s not a yes, you still have time to change things so that lunch is more enjoyable for you. You get to control how lunch goes for you. So if you go back in and it’s a thumbs-down, remember that you had the opportunity to fix it and you didn’t take it.” Of course there are times something happens to him and he doesn’t have control over it and it’s a genuine thumbs-down. But most of the time, it’s really because he’s not taking control of his lunch period as much as he could. He’s not stopping to pay attention to how things are going. He’s evaluating too late when there’s no way of going back to change.
That’s how regret thrives.
I notice that we do that often in our lives. We get into relationships that seemed right at the time but don’t take the time to regularly evaluate (or re-evaluate) if it’s still a good relationship. Same goes with long-term projects. Or anything where there’s a long or no defined end-point. I believe that one of the most powerful rights we have as humans is the right to choose. We have choice. This is no small thing. If we don’t exercise our right to evaluate and actively choose things over and over again, we’re no different from people who have no choice. This is a huge deal. It’s one of the major keys to happiness: realizing you have choice and exercising it often.
I believe it’s crucial to take the time to evaluate and re-evaluate all the things in your life. I make a point to choose my husband each morning. I don’t want to be married to him just cause it’s the status quo. I want to choose to be with him on that very day. I want to remember why I made the choice in the first place and see if I still feel that way. Or see if I still want to be with him even if it’s for different reasons than I had when I first met him. Even though the alternatives aren’t as wide, I make a point to choose my kids, too. I remember why I wanted kids. I remember the joys they bring into my life. I make the choice. Same with my relationships. It’s better to not have any relationships than to have one that feels destructive. It’s important to reevaluate because people change constantly. You change and the other person changes, too. Sometimes it’s not in the same direction. Sometimes conflicts that weren’t there show up and it’s no longer a positive friendship. It’s ok to put it on hold for a while. And it’s ok to let it go, too.
Same goes for work. You need to make the choice so you don’t feel trapped. Maybe it’s not the work itself but the fact that the income allows you the freedom to buy things you want. Either way, you need to evaluate and actively make a choice. I do that for my art even. If I don’t feel like scrapping or art journaling many days in a row, I step back and evaluate. While I work hard to honor my commitments to myself, I also take the time to evaluate my choices again and again so I can modify as needed. So I can feel like I am savoring my life fully and not feeling trapped in it.
Some choices come with harder consequences than others. Some even feel like non-choices. I understand this. And, trust me, I feel it too. But I still think it’s important to take the reins when it comes to your life. And you can only do that if you take the time to evaluate regularly.
And make the choice to live a thumbs-up life.
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projects for twenty twenty-five
projects for twenty twenty-four
projects for twenty twenty-three
projects for twenty twenty-two
projects for twenty twenty-one
projects for twenty nineteen
projects for twenty eighteen
projects from twenty seventeen
monthly projects from previous years
some of my previous projects
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