Entries Tagged as: creativity
Guess Whoooo Turned One?
May 8th, 2012, Comments (25)
My daughter, Annabelle! Here's a whole lot of pictures of the party and the decor that helped us celebrate this big milestone. Enjoy!
This party was a labor of love with lots of folks involved. I went with an owl them partly because when I was in labor with Annabelle, I kept seeing little owls in my head. I knew that owls represent wisdom in Greece (Andrew's father is Greek) and that Sophia means wisdom. And I just knew that should be her middle name!
I asked my best friend and partner in crafty crime, Judean, to help me out with the party because she is amazingly creative. I sent her a drawing of an idea I had for the invitation and she brought it to life in paper, with moving wings. So awesome! And then our friend Lis at Butterqueencakes.com took the invitation design and created a stunning cake and cupcakes that simply blew me away (and tasted delicious!!)
Judean also created the beautiful owl art above the timeline and the tissue paper one on the front door.
I also created owl lanterns, decorated branches with little owls, hung a "Happy Birthday Annabelle" owl banner, and created a clothesline style timeline with pictures of Annabelle in the same chair from 2 weeks through 11 months.
I made sweet little owl stuffies as favors for the kiddos. They were my first attempt at stuffies and they were a little wonky, but very cute.
Annabelle had a great time and was a real trooper with all the attention. She looked so sweet in her little dress, I could have just eaten her up.
I think she wanted to take pictures too. 
She wasn't quite sure what to think of the cake, her first sweet! She's a bit of a picky eater and likes to play with her food, so at first she just made faces as she squished it around in her fingers. Then she tasted it, made quite a face, and dug in for more! Mm, butter cream frosting!
She also had fun playing with the other kiddos and telling one little friend about her favorite toy, Ernie. She actually shouted "Ernie!" so loud at her, which cracked me up.
Here's our happy little family. We made it through our first year together, which was one of the fastest and slowest years of my life. I feel so lucky to be Annabelle's mom. She's a beautiful, bright shining light that makes the world a better place! Happy Birthday, Annabelle!
Inspired by Poetry
April 6th, 2012, Comments (11)
How fun that the theme is language this month and it is also National Poetry Month! I'm often inspired by poetry. Poems are often so visually rich, that I see great images in my mind as I read them. This happened when reading "The Guest House" by Rumi. I read the line, "a crowd of sorrows," this image immediately popped into my head and I had to create it.
Do you have a favorite poem? Have you created work based on a line of poetry or a whole poem? Tell me about it!
Dark Night
March 23rd, 2012, Comments (19)
Snuck in some art during yesterday and today's nap times and came up with this creation, "Dark Night." Going with the mixed-media theme, I used acrylic paints on watercolor paper to start, and later went into it with white and black inks. I had intended to do something different, but as often happens, once I get started, I see some shape in the paint and have to go with it!
Bird Hearts
March 7th, 2012, Comments (5)
One of my favorite ways to work in mixed-media lately is with paint and ink. I think it's partly the immediacy of it. Acrylic paint and ink dry fairly quickly and the ink part is not messy, too things that have become more important to me with a baby at home.
Speaking of making art with a baby at home, I recently did a guest post about how I fit in time to make art during my first year as a mom, which you can read here. It's part of a series about motherhood and creativity, with lots of great posts, so check it out!
Love and a Work in Progress
February 14th, 2012, Comments (6)
Happy Valentine's Day to all you creative souls!
I had a lot of fun making a little Valentine for the hubster with Miss Annabelle. I traced her hand and doodled some hearts on tracing paper. And she added her own touches with some dots and lines. So sweet! Later I took the tracing paper, taped it over some colored paper and wrote in a Valentine's Day message. Writing it out in chunky pastels, I unintentionally made it look like Annabelle wrote the message herself. haha! He loved it.
This week, I've been working in bits in pieces on a larger piece that's been a work-in-progress for a long time. And it still is! It's been more challenging to work on larger pieces because I don't have big chunks of time right now, but it's coming along. I had the original idea back when Annabelle was a newborn. Up late at night, I had the image pop into my head of a woman nursing in the middle of the forest, surrounded by night animals and trees. In the summer, I started the collage background. During Art Every Day Month, I dove into it. And then I set it aside for a while. I'd love to finish it up during this month of Night! We'll see if I can wrap it up. I don't want to rush it either, but it's getting closer!
She Carried the Night in Her Hair
February 4th, 2012, Comments (14)
I started this piece at the Intuitive Ink workshop I taught last weekend at the wish studio (so fun!) Today, I went back into it and saw a woman with stars in her hair and began to draw that out. Annabelle saw me drawing and wanted to take a closer look.
And here's a snapshot of the workshop in action. I'm going to be teaching something else at the wish studio, so if you're in the area, stay tuned And if you're not in the area, I am creating an online version of the workshop to release sometime this Spring!
Mystery Build
February 2nd, 2012, Comments (7)
How is it February already? My little girl is turns 9 months today. She is "talking" on her toy phone and dancing up a storm. Hilarious stuff!
She's already a creative little being who loves music. Gotta love it.
I got this awesome package in the mail this week from Mystery Build. They're running a super cool contest and I wanted to be sure to share it with all you creative folks. The idea is this: they send you a tin container filled with materials you can use to create something based on a theme (this year's is "Favorite Movie.") You can add water plus six ounces of liquid (paint, stain, etc) to make your creation. Fun, right? And the prize? It's 10,000!
I'm actually a little out of my element when it comes to building 3-dimensional things. I've taken some classes that involved glass, clay, and wood in my college days, but it was never something I was particularly good at. I may need to create a team to tackle this, but I'm excited about it!
You can purchase your own Mystery Build kit here. Let me know if you decide to give it a go!
Guest Post by Whitney Ferré
January 25th, 2012, Comments (9)
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“The Creativity PORTAL”
By Whitney Ferré of Creatively Fit
What if the true intention behind your creative practice was to be a PORTAL for change on this planet? Would this be NEW to you?
For me, the most exciting part of my creative journey has been the corresponding emotional and spiritual journey. I have inspired “non-artists” to embrace their creative power since 1996, but I confess that I did not do so in order that they might create “quality” art or marketable product. What has always inspired excited energy within me and a passionate drive to share paints, colored pencils and watercolors with as many people as possible is my belief that it is our creative energy that is going to save the world—literally! As the world prepared for 2012 I was further inspired as some of my most respected spiritual philosophers and leaders started sharing their own beliefs surrounding our creative spirits. This following quote is from Andrew Cohen.
“In the way that I use the term, God is the energy and intelligence that created the universe and is driving the process forward in every moment. And that energy and intelligence cares desperately about change and innovation and the release of potentials that have not existed before. So it is constantly looking for portals through which it can enter into the world and consciously engage with creating its next step. As conscious human beings who have been blessed with self-awareness and free agency, we are those portals.” ~Andrew Cohen
Can you go there? Can you imagine the infinite universe scanning kitchen tables and art studios around the globe, searching for PORTALS through which to channel its infinite, creative energy? Why not? As human beings we created art before we created a monetary system OR a written language. We can look at tribal art and we know the sculptures, paintings, and symbols were created to access other dimensions and powers. We can still do that today.
The image below hangs above the door to my art studio. The “double croc” is an ancient symbol of protection. My painting it was a meditation on protecting the good, positive energy and my own “inner croc” that needed a boost to “own my power” and protect my own inner landscape. (Read more in my blog post here….)
This Creative Goddess is my most recent painting, still in process, and has already provided hours of colorful, sparkly meditations on all that is possible. As I layered and layered the colors, scratched through to bottom layers, and made her glow with my white & yellow painted fingers, I felt as though I was really accessing this goddess, encouraging me to think bigger, to expand my awareness about my own creative power and really let go!
I do believe it will be when more people proudly state, “I am creative!” rather than, “I can’t even draw a straight line…” that our global consciousness will shift and our world will step into a new time of greater peace, compassion and sustainability. YOU getting “Creative Everyday” is building that energy that our world needs. Here is what Ken Wilber has to say about creativity….
“Creativity: in some ways it seems so common, yet in other ways it is actually at the foundation of virtually every important activity and practice in human life—from relationships to play, from work to relaxation, from meditation to transformative practice, from parenting to teaching, from emotional expression to cognitive competence, from recreation to career choice. In many ways, creativity has been thought of as a rare, difficult, hard-to-come-by talent or gift, evidenced only by the few geniuses of each era. But according to the Integral view, creativity is actually a component of each and every moment of existence, and it can be learned and exercised with a few simple practices.” ~Ken Wilber
This is why there is such power in what Leah is doing here at Creative Every Day. Each day that you flex your creative muscles you are opening up as a portal to infinite creativity.
Here is a really fun & easy exercise to create and, should you choose, integrate into your spiritual life. I call them Story Cards.
Grab that stack of magazines and tear out ANY images that catch your attention. If anything, a color, a texture, an image, makes you go, “Oooooh!” tear it out. Don’t judge and don’t wonder what you are going to do with it. Just grab the pages that speak to you.
When you have a nice stack of images, divide them into 3 piles (you can make many sets of these, but each time make 3 piles). How do you divide them? Just let the images that you intuitively feel should be together join the same pile. You do not even have to label them yet, or understand the difference between the piles. One pile may have all bluer images, another pile nature images. The image above is a collage of three of my Story Cards. The far left card is about my spiritual life. When I look back on that card, with the fact that right now I am busy with our new SPIRIT Project 2012, I get the chills! The middle card was all about things I love. The far left card was inspired by nature.
When you are done, you will have exercised your “creative intuitive” muscle and have cards you can go to over and over for insight into the ART that is your LIFE!
I hope this NEW perspective on your daily creative activity inspires some new thoughts and energy into your practice. Namaste. Whitney
Whitney is the author of The Artist Within, A Guide to Becoming Creatively Fit and you can learn more about Whitney at www.CreativelyFit.com and join the SPIRIT Project for only $20.12 for the entire year!
Intuitive Ink Prep
January 21st, 2012, Comments (12)
In a week from today I'm teaching Intuitive Ink at the Wish Studio in Newburyport, Massachusetts. If you're in the area, I'd love to see you there! You can get all the details and sign up here.
Earlier this week, I did some inkblots in prep for the class. Above, are some "before" inkblots which we'll play with and make creations from in class. I'm loving the way they look all lined up together though. A nice burst of color during these dark winter days.
And here's a couple example of some "after" inkblots. They're so fun to make!
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I'm also planning to create an online version of this workshop, which I hope to have ready to offer in the Spring!
I hope you're all having a wonderfully creative weekend. I had the fun experience of letting my daughter play in the snow for the first time on Friday. She was having a blast until she realized that snow was very cold. heh.
Trying Something New
January 10th, 2012, Comments (20)
Last year at this time, I decided I wanted to learn how to sew. I started out with a book and an old sewing machine and I made a huge, frustrating mess. I didn't want to give up, so I signed up for a class. I drove my pregnant self out to a small, local fabric shop where the owner was offering beginner sewing lessons. Sitting around a re-purposed kitchen table, 2 other woman and I learned how to thread a machine, how to make a lot of mistakes, some stitches, and came out of it with a simple bag.
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Leaving the class, I was ready to do more, so I took a book (Anna Maria Horner's Handmade Beginnings) out from the library and used the patterns to create a pair of baby shoes and then a jacket, which was first modeled by a teddy bear, but made for Annabelle. I definitely gained a whole new respect for clothing makers! I also loved making little touches, (curtains and crib skirt) for the nursery, which make the space feel even more special for me.
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This year, I'd love to learn how to make flower headbands for Annabelle. I've been gathering up the supplies and will post pictures here when I give it a go.
Learning something new really stretches and inspires me. I think it's good to learn something new every so often, even if it's not something you'll continue. You never know how trying something new will inspire your main creative outlet(s).
Do you have plans to try something new this year? How will you learn the new skill? What kind of supplies and/or support do you need?
