Introducing the daily card project

When Elise wrote out her business story this fall, I discovered her old daily card project and was inspired enough to buy a deck of playing cards, thinking they would be fun to play with someday. I figured I'd decorate a card a week, or when I felt like it, or something else that seemed manageable. 

During a crazy fall, I mostly forgot about the cards until I heard Elise's podcast with Crystal Moody. In 2014, Crystal embarked on a year of creative habits, making a drawing a day and sharing it on her blog and Instagram. I definitely recommend listening to the podcast, but the main takeaways were that quantity leads to quality and creativity breeds more creativity. 

I fell in love with the idea of daily creativity and decided to "make something every day" in 2015 and quickly thought "why not a card?" I think it was a good call. "Do something creative every day" is vague and I know I would have been tempted to bend the rules as to what counted as creative. (Making boxed macaroni and cheese is still making something.) It's a case where having structure, rules, and limits can make you more creative.  Too many options and you freeze up.

I made a card on January 1, thinking I should cover my bases for anything I might want to do every day this year. (I also went for a run, took a photo, and wrote in my journal). And I have not missed a day since then. About mid-January, the excitement of starting something new wore off a bit and I realized how many cards stood between me and the end of the year -- but I kept it up. (The first couple weeks of cards are pictured).

And so far I am in love with this project. I am hoping it really will make me more creative. I go through phases when I have a ton of ideas - phrases, reflections, etc. - playing around in my head, and others where I am mainly thinking about what I am going to eat for dinner. I am hoping to tip the balance towards the former.

I'll be back next week with more card photos and more thoughts on daily creativity.

a year in sunsets (an addendum to the "best of" series)

(From top to bottom: Shenandoah, Virginia; Chelan, Washington; Cap Bon peninsula, Tunisia; Tunis, Tunisia; Washington, DC; Newport Beach, California)

This blog has gotten pretty photo-heavy lately. Which is funny because I consider myself more a writer than a photographer - at least not a capital-p Photographer. (Though I am not really a capital-w Writer either.) But you don't have to be a capital-p Photographer to capture amazing sunset pictures. They are pretty much handed to you on a silver platter. It was fun to look through my iPhoto and remember the different places I've seen the sun go down this year.

Best of 2014, part three

When I started this exercise, I thought this had been a same-old, same-old kind of year - not good or bad, just nothing incredibly exciting. I didn't get engaged or married or go through a dramatic breakup, I didn't change jobs or start a new degree or move across the country, I didn't check any new countries off my personal map. I did move apartments but really, I seem to do that every year. And I got burglarized, but I would prefer to forget that.

But picking out favorites reminded me of all the magic 2014 really held. If nothing else, this was a year of beauty and adventure and new experiences. Not to mention a marathon election observation experience in Tunisia, trips to New Orleans, Seattle, Pittsburgh, and Southern California, fun with friends, another summer of gardening, new creative passions, and sustainable exercise routines. I came away so grateful for the year that's passed and so excited to fill 2015 with even more good stuff.