Category Archives: My Life

This week on etsy: organization

Who wouldn’t want a bookcase like this:

Funky Entertainment Center from KidsCreationBeds

We’ve been spending a fair amount of time cleaning and organizing lately. I’ve made three trips to The Container Store without making a purchase. While I am a sucker for bins and drawers and anything to make things appear cleaner than they are, their stuff feels almost clinical to me. I want color and feeling!

Etsy is full of amazing organizational ideas. Check out some of my favorites in this week’s treasury. I’m especially excited about the meal planner hooks. That is absolutely genius.

Learning to read

Do you remember learning to read? Yeah, me neither. Lily’s learning right now. Let me tell you: IT. IS. HARD. She knows what sounds letters make. She knows what sounds they make when you put them together. She knows what letters are what. What she doesn’t seem to be getting yet is the visual “that is a word because the letters are all together” part of reading. And I don’t know how to teach it to her other than just keep working on it.

The funny part of all of it is, she’s much more okay with the process than I am. She doesn’t get frustrated or upset. She can go right back to coloring or playing, whatever. No problem. She’ll get it.

I’m trying to take a lesson from her. I’m not nearly so patient when I’m learning something new.

Narrowing my focus

I am a daughter, sister, wife, mother, friend, Pilates instructor, jewelry designer, author, cook, musician, painter, illustrator, yogi, barista, cashier, etc., etc., etc,. yada, yada, yada, the list can go on and on. I hold a bajillion different rolls, and, benethe them, sub-rolls (not in the sub-sandwich sense) and even some of those can be broken down into sub-sub-rolls. . For example, as an author, I write:

  • Fiction
    • Short stories
    • Novels
  • Non fiction
    • Health
    • Memoir
    • Self-help
    • Creative
    • Craft
  • Freelance
    • Blogging
    • Business/Corporate Writing
    • Content generation
    • Feature articles
    • Catalog copy
  • Children’s stories

I’m sure if I thought about it longer I could even come up with more.

Unfortunately, I can’t be perfect at all of my rolls. Heck, I probably can’t even perfect one of them. But, I can become darn good at some of them. And I’m realizing that to do that, I need to let some of the others go. So, for now, I’m choosing one to cross off the list. Well, actually, the sub-list. I’m going to back-burner the children’s writing I’ve been working on. It’s been nagging me, not because it wanted to be completed, but because it’s been one of those items on the “to-do” list that never gets crossed off. I’m done moving it from list to list to list. Today, for now, I’m removing it. Along with that, I’m unsubscribing from the children’s-market focused writing and illustrating blogs I’m currently subscribed to. I just don’t have time to digest everything, and I’ve got to make some room.

That’s not to say I’ll never come back to the Children’s world. Heck, I’ve got two kids, so, minimally, I’ll continue creating stories for them. It just means that, for now, my writing muscles are training for a different kind of sport. It’s like putting football on hold to focus on baseball. Just like Bo Jackson, I’ll be back. But even he couldn’t play both sports at the same time.

Best writing resolution I have read (so far)

So, I’m a bit behind with my Google Reader.  Right now, I have 410 unread items.  Before your head starts spinning, let me say that I subscribed to something like six blogs today, so right off the top there are sixty posts right there.  And I subscribe to Design*Sponge, which I love, but which posts multiple times a day.  So that right there accounts for…oh…wait…they’ve slowed a bit for the holidays.  That’s only 30.  So, all in all, I’m only behind by about 300.  Luckily, I read fast.  And the kids are finally asleep.

Anyway…on Ask Allison Sarah Jio gives her 2012 writing resolutions.  This one really stuck with me.

Write every day, even if it’s just 10 words: I’ve found that writing is a lot like exercise. If I take too many days off, I’m stiff and exhausted when I try to jump back in. I lack the focus and energy to power through a challenging chapter or scene. But when I open my work-in-progress daily, even if it’s only to write a single sentence and to say hi to my characters, I feel as if I’m still in the story, the rhythm of the project.

Since leaving my day job a little over a month ago, I haven’t written every day, but I’ve written most days.  And let me tell you, I can attest to the fact that writing is easier the more you do it. SERIOUSLY. I promise.

Creatively Fit

Happy almost New Year!  I’m really excited about 2012- there are so many awesome changes happening in my life, and they mostly stem from this one huge change that I made.  I’m creating full time.

One of the things that helped propel me to make this leap and begin a profession that I should have had all along was my work with Whitney Ferre and Creatively Fit.  Creatively Fit is built on the premise that our creative muscles need and deserved to be exercised as much as our analytic ones: our right and left brains should balance each other.  Our society is so rigidly focused on bottom line and efficiencies we are loosing the ability to be creative.  It makes sense when you think about it.  And when you start to practice exercising your right brain and creativity….wow.  You will be amazed.

Whitney is kicking off 2012 with The Sprit Project.  I highly recommend you check it out. We’ve already been “talking” in the Facebook group and the people that are involved are incredible.  Don’t be fooled either- this isn’t just for painters or “Artists.”  It’s for everyone.  

A Creative Thanksgiving

I woke up this morning, made some stuffing and a turkey.  Then it cooked for three and a half hours.

Thanksgiving Turkey 2011

While it was cooking I got so caught up in the Macy’s Parade and working on wire wrapping that I forgot all about the potatoes, rolls and green beans.  Chris took the kids to the playground while I threw them all together.  While they were cooking, I made this:

The poem is from an amazing prayer book Morning and Evening by Johann Habermann that you can get for free here or here.

We ate a wonderful meal that I thought about taking pictures of only after it was gone.  Everyone laid down for a nap, and I worked on finishing the necklaces I started in the morning.  After a quick trip to Michael’s for an amazing easel, we all ate chex mix and popcorn while watching Charlie Brown’s Thanksgiving.

After everyone went to bed, I decided to work on a few more necklaces.  Here’s everything I made today:

Necklaces I made on Thanksgiving Day

They will be in my Etsy shop soon, and available on Cyber Monday!

(I also started a painting tonight, but all I did was paint a canvas black, so I don’t have a picture of that.  I’ll post it when it’s done.  I do love my new easel!)