(this is what i tell myself when i have trouble starting- writing that is)

Chomp Chomp.

Last week I picked this one off my shelf and found myself pausing to touch all the beautiful textured pages. Love it!

Take a moment today, put on music, and let your body do what it wants with crayon marker paint in hand or just a wave to the paper may be enough to reignite that creative swirl inside you.

I'm always finding scraps of paper with notes or drawings in a pile I forgot about. It's like Forest Gump instead of life is a box of chocolates, it's piles....life is a pile of papers....you never know what your gonna get.

Love Maria Popova's definition of creativity on her about page.
"The core ethos behind Brain Pickings is that creativity is a combinatorial force: it’s our ability to tap into our mental pool of resources — knowledge, insight, information, inspiration, and all the fragments populating our minds —

Recently I spent a few hours for some reason researching humming birds. I don't know how it started but once I began looking at pictures and then drawing them I became completely amazed. These creatures are truly WOW material.

soooo, I feel since January I have been in a bit of a funk creatively. And the more I thought about being in a funk the more I felt I'm in a funk and I will never get out. And the more I thought I will never get out the more I felt in a funk.

There is so much inspiration every where. In books, movies, overheard conversations.Here are 3 things that I've enjoyed this month.

This one is about "The What", the WHAT I am creating, the WHAT I want to create, the WHAT i feel swirl around my heart and brain trying to shape it's way into existence. I have often beat myself up, not literally, but energetically, in that I feel I don't have a defined one thing, one WHAT. My WHAT shifts and changes.

I haven't posted or shared much about my pursuit to create children's books. I'm not really sure why. It is something I have been working on for many many many years. Did I say many, well it has been. But it is also something that I work on for months and then put away and take out again and then put away.

Pick an object, some paper, and ink, then set timer and go.

When I was in college I spent a semester in Florence. I made it a practice to walk home a new way, winding down new streets, getting lost sometimes, but always discovering and keeping my eyes fresh. I think I forgot how to do this as lately I have been very straight walking from here to there with not much wiggle room.

When I was little I learned to draw in my mom's friend's basement. She had an after school art class and I didn't know it at the time but I think it was the foundation for me as an artist.

There is so much inspiration every where. In books, movies, overheard conversations.Here are 3 things that I've enjoyed this month.

Quote from George Saunders

In the beginning of this year I had some fun making this video for Carla Sonheim's 365 daily class.

1. This book I recently picked up again off my shelf. It's a highly original take on creativity from the high wire performer and artist Phillipe Petit.

Last week I was in a yoga class and the teacher had a mantra he was offering through out the class- stay awake, don't go back to sleep, stay awake.