lettering

Lettered Letters: a passion project

September 5, 2013

I’ve mentioned a few times that last month I took Braid Creative’s ecourse on personal branding (and it was awesome! Seriously, do it.) One of the things that they cover in there is ways to share with your audience, and one of the ideas is sharing through the lens of a passion project or an experiment. It got me thinking about the experiments and passion projects that I’ve done on the blog.

Some of the ones that I can remember are In This Place, Channeling, and even my month of salad experiment. Most recently I did the Creative Cleanse in February, which I really enjoyed but haven’t really kept up with.

Thinking about how much fun I had with those past projects, I knew I wanted to do something like that again, but this time I wanted to do it on a longer-term scale. Most of those projects have 5 or less posts each. I wanted something that could be bigger than that.

I got to thinking about having a creative exercise built into my weekly routine. Something that I could spend 15 to 30 minutes on and be creative. Work with my hands. Oh yeah- and I wanted it to be something that makes other people happy. Not just another piece of paper that I was reluctant to throw away because I might repurpose it later (when we moved it became very apparent how big of an issue that is for me.)

So that’s how I came up with Lettered Letters.

You see, I love lettering. But it’s not something that I do very much. It’s something I want to get better at, and we all know that only happens through practice.

I’m also not the best at staying in touch. At reaching out to people I care about or appreciate just because.

So here are my rules:

1. I’m sending 100 letters in a year. That’s about 1 every 3.5 days. I think I can do that. My deadline is September 1, 2014, so it’s time to get busy!

2. I will not overthink this. Analysis paralysis is something I suffer from a lot. These are quick, fun little notes that I will send to people, just for fun. So no second guessing whether it’s “good enough” or whether someone will think it’s weird or dumb. Just popping it in the mail, and knowing that they’ll be happy I thought of them. End of story.

Those are the only rules. I’m sticking to KISS for this project (keep it simple, stupid) in hopes that the simplicity of it will help me keep it up.

Want to join in? I’m using the hashtag #letteredletters on Twitter and Instagram to share my progress with you guys. I’ll also be sharing these on the blog in groups of 4. I’d love for you guys to send some of your own letters!

How about you? Have you ever shared an experiment or a passion project on your blog? Or do you think you’ll join me in this one?!

Reflecting

February 22, 2013

I wanted to spend some time today reflecting on this exercise that many of us have been doing this past week. When I recorded my vlog last Thursday, I set out to blog every day with something new that I created. That clearly didn’t happen, and while it stressed me out a little bit yesterday, I think that it’s important to know your limits. And with all the work that I had yesterday (which is mostly creative) I just didn’t have it in me to do something else. And that’s okay.

I also wasn’t entirely successful in staying off of blogs and Pinterest. It was just too hard with blog posts popping up on Twitter and Facebook every two seconds. I think what I’ve learned moving forward is that I don’t have to try to keep up with blogs all the time. I’m thinking about abandoning my Google Reader altogether- it’s really just a way for me to hoard information.

I really want to thank everyone who tweeted, instagrammed, or commented about the the creative cleanse this week. Your support was incredibly motivating and it made me so happy to see others inspired to take action in their own creativity! I so enjoyed posting it on Instagram that I think I’ll probably continue to use that hashtag for future creative cleanses, even if they’re just for an afternoon or so. Have a wonderful weekend!

Krystle experimented with patterns.

Kristin made some cute fabric eggs!

Eliza was a creating machine! Loved all the different ways she exercised her creativity.

Evani made s’mores bars (they look amazing!)

Betsy did a sweet needlepoint project.

Annabelle made this cool illustration.

Allyssa came to the realization that she needed to create on her own, which is so important to recognize.

And thank you so much to everyone who tweeted and instagrammed their creative endeavors! I so enjoyed seeing everyone’s projects.

You can only go forward.

Four recipes that I’ve tried recently.

A page from my sketchbook.

A look at our wedding on Sugar and Type.

An interview about my work and creative path on Her Silent Musing.

An interview about why I blog on Designing a Life.

Go Forward

February 18, 2013

Maybe it’s just winter, but I’ve been feeling generally uninspired so far this year. Until recently, that is. I don’t know about you, but when I get into a funk, I find myself thinking of better times and trying to go back to feeling a certain way.

This phrase has been creeping in the back of my head for a few weeks now. Because really, you can’t go back to feeling a certain way- you can only grow and move forward and hope that the future is just as happy and inspired, if not more, as the place that you’re coming from.

I doodled this in one of my sketchbooks a few weeks ago, and then worked on the lettering in Illustrator and I layered it with a picture that I took from the car on a happy day in December. I really love working on lettering but it’s something that I don’t spend time on very often.

By the way, your reaction to the creative cleanse has seriously been so inspiring! Keep in coming- I want to see the projects you’re working on!

Handwriting

November 5, 2012

I hope you all had a wonderful weekend! I’ve always been a total ~~freak~~ dork about handwriting, so I was really excited when Joelle announced this link-up! You can see my answers to the prompts below.

I forgot to write the song on there- but it’s from The Muppets. I couldn’t decide on a song or a quote, so when it came on my Pandora station I decided to go with it. So don’t worry, it’s not my favorite of all time or anything, but… it does put a giant smile on my face. I’m kind of obsessed with that movie.

Do you like to write things by hand? Tell me in the comments, and then go join the link-up!

Oh! You might notice that I made some much needed tweaks here over the weekend. My blog should look much better on mobile devices now, and I’ve updated my sidebar and footer widgets. So if you’re viewing this in a reader, come on over!