lifted letter collage I was in the great city of Chicago this past weekend and Saturday happened to be Independent Bookstore Day. Because I have a wonderful sister who indulges my crazy requests when I am there visiting, I was chauffeured all over the city to visit six (six!) independent bookstores. And what a day it was. I snagged a copy of Austin Kleon‘s zine, “Read Like an Artist” at The Bookstore of Glen Ellyn that he made especially for Independent Bookstore Day. I stopped in at Quimby’s (a bookstore that specializes in zines) which I have been wanting to visit…
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my ann patchett shrine; i am a huge fan of her books and her bookstore I am one lucky person, in part because I live close enough to Nashville to visit Parnassus Books a few times each year. Parnassus Books is co-owned by author Ann Patchett and is a lovely independent bookstore southwest-ish from downtown Nashville. I can get lost in this little store. I say little, only because we have become used to the big-box sort of bookstores (run by corporations, with pretty much all the same books and seemingly more and more coloring books). Parnassus is smaller in…
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This week, I made a little zine called “The Cognitive Bug”, inspired by a December 2020 post in Maria Popova’s excellent newsletter, now called “The Marginalian” (previously, and at that time, “Brainpickings”). In the post, she describes a little trick our brains play on us when we conceive a creative project. She says, “we invariably underestimate the amount of time and effort required to make it a reality.” “the cognitive bug” zine This, she argues, may not be a “cognitive bug” at all, but a “supreme coping mechanism”. If we knew what was ahead of us at the onset, what…
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the wandering line exercise from lynda barry Being bad at things isn’t easy for anyone. It’s probably worse for perfectionists, but no one likes to suck. Lately, I feel like I suck. I have been humbled by two classes I’m taking. The first is called “Art for the Fun of It” and the second is “Intro to Tai Chi”. And here’s what I’ve learned: I’m really bad at both. This can be very disheartening, of course. But then I started thinking about a list I made years ago, called “Universal Rules”. One of the rules I wrote down: the only…
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So you may have read in last week’s blog that last week I had COVID. I know some people seem to skate right through it, but I wasn’t one of the skaters. I know it could have been way worse and I’m grateful to be on the upswing, but it was rough at times. Last Thursday evening I found myself in a bit of a panic. I was lying in bed wondering what on earth could I post on Friday? I’m trying to post something every Friday (sometimes technical difficulties make me a day or two late), but I had…
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So, I guess it’s my turn: I have COVID. I’ve had 4 days of laryngitis and a sore throat (among other things), and I’m using cough drops to ease some of those symptoms. So why can’t my cough drops just leave me alone? Why can’t they just let me miserable? The wrappers are telling me to power through this when all I want to do is put my head down and get my feet warm. I don’t want a pep talk, I want someone to say “I hope you sleep well tonight” and then bring me a nice cup of…
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Have you heard of impostor syndrome? Or as David Epstein calls it: “I’m a fluke syndrome”. I have it and I have it bad. Impostor syndrome is believing you don’t have a place at the table. Thinking you’re a hack. A fake who is going to be found out. Your internal voice is saying one (or more) of these things: “I really don’t have anything worthwhile to share.” “No one is going to like this.” “No one is even going to look at this.” “What business do I have posting anything I make?” “I’m not a real artist.” etc. A…
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Welcome. So, this week, I’ve been working on little playing card collages. It helps me to have something small to work on. Something I can go to when I feel stuck, uninspired, or I’m just tired. Something that lets me be creative even if I only have a few minutes to spare. I’ve been making these collages with an old deck of playing cards. It gives me a chance to experiment with ideas I have for other projects and to play around with different materials and it makes me problem solve on a really small canvas. I think we just…
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I’ve been reading and thinking about the creative process a lot lately. I just finished watching an awesome conversation between David Epstein and Malcolm Gladwell on creative process. They discuss an idea where there are two types of creative processes: that of the architect and that of the gardener. (Well, I guess they included a third, they gave the musician Paul Simon a category of his own.) The architect has everything planned out ahead of time, imagining and planning the finished project before starting to build (or write, or paint, or make music) and the gardener doesn’t really know what…
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I love, love, love Field Notes notebooks. I fell in love with these beautiful notebooks a few years ago and I can’t stop collecting them. It’s so bad I even subscribe to receive the Quarterly Limited Editions. That’s right, four times each year, I get another 6 notebooks in the mail from Field Notes. And they’re always beautiful. Not everyone can understand this kind of notebook addiction (or should I say affliction?), but for those of you who get it, beware if you click the link above. It’s hard NOT to subscribe. The Winter 2021 installment included these beautiful 26-week Date…
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