ABC Wednesday - D

Another week, another letter on the march through the alphabet. D gets the nod this week.

D is for dream and dance

Dare to dream.

Dream bigger

Dance as if no one is looking

Be sure to check here to see what others around the world did for D.

ABC Wednesday - C

This week at ABC Wednesday, we focus on C.

C is for creativity - something that is important for everyone. And everyone is creative. It does not just mean painting or writing music or sculpting. How we arrange flowers, or decorate our house or design a shed or host a party - these are just some of the ways to express one's creativity.

Elizabeth Gilbert writes about the creativity and the importance of living a creative life:

An excellent book of hers to read is  Big Magic - how to get past fear and live a creative life.

ART on Friday

Another week has gone by - already the middle of January. Like many parts of the U.S., we face severe cold and snow this weekend. A good time to get some reading and creating in for sure!

Here are a few challenges I worked on this week.

Mary Oliver
I was shocked to hear of the poet Mary Oliver's death yesterday. She has penned so many beautiful poems. One quote from her that I love bears repeating:

Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

Another of her quotes I turned into a journal page:

Here is a link to more information about her life and work.



Take a Word Challenge
The theme at Take a Word Challenge this week was "Green and Blue". When I saw this quote I knew it would work with the colour theme.

Tag Tuesday
The theme at Tag Tuesday is "Mail, postmarks or Postage stamps"
I have hundreds of used postage stamps, so decided to use a few of these and created two tags.

FOCUS
My OLW is Focus and here is my second card.

Linking with:

Paint Party Friday

Inspire Me Monday

ABC Wednesday - B

This week at ABC Wednesday, B gets centre stage.

B can be so many things - butterflies, bees, birds.

But B is for Be - a word that Shakespeare used in a famous phrase: "To be or not to be"

Some have used the word as their OLW - their One Little word to define their year.

And there are so many things we can be:

Brave      bold     boisterous

But we can also be: amazing    capable     happy   flexible

Yes, there o many things to Be. 

Be sure to believe in yourself though and be present.

We can also "Just Be".

Be sure to check here to see what others around the world did for B.

ART on Friday

Time once again to share what I have been working on the past week.
There have been several challenges I have participated in as well as a new yearly project I started last week.

Focus
Here is the new card I created for my OLW - FOCUS:

Sunday Postcard Art
The theme at Sunday Postcard Art is "wings".
I chose one of my favourite quotes as well as a photo of my daughter when she was around 4.

Take a Word Challenge
The theme at Take a Word Challenge is "botanical".

Art Journal Journey
The theme this month at Art Journal Journey is "Geometric Shapes"

Linking with:

Paint Party Friday

Inspire Me Monday

ABC Wednesday - Round 24 begins!

We are now starting Round 24!  A new year and a new round.

This round I plan to focus on actions that can be taken to make this the best year ever, and will use a journal to create a page of quotes.

A is for A new year. 2019 has the potential to be a turbulent year, carrying on from the upheaval and discord that has spread like a cancer around the world;

-where a U.S. president is under intense FBI scrutiny and lies repeatedly

-where populism and white supremacy is exploding, world-wide

-where racism has reared its ugly head

-where even schools and churches are no longer safe from gun violence.

But we do not have to succumb or surrender to the hate and negativity of last year.

We need to act.

We need positive, assertive actions and attitudes to push back that negativity.

Yes. It is A NEW YEAR. A year

- to take action

-to adjust attitudes

-to assert positive affirmations.

Make 2019 your best year yet.

Be sure to check here to wee what others around the world did for A.

Connect Five Books Reading Challenge

A soon as I saw this challenge I knew I had to participate. As a teacher, I often connected books - for them, author, illustrator- for my students. I don't often purposely do this in my own reading, but I aim to do this, this year.

Guidelines:(check here)

Let’s look at connections for books… what books link for some reason or another.

When you have five that connect in whatever way you are able to group them then link up. How might you do this?

• Write and link up a blog post
• Share the five books on Instagram and link up
• Have a Goodreads shelf and link that up – this may be a little different but maybe use it in combination with a comment.
• Or… if you belong to none of these places, share five books in a comment.

What’s the Challenge?

To look for connections between books you read. There will be  many connections that just float over our awareness. Let’s see can we raise that a bit, whether its fairly surface level or something deeper.

Guidelines:

Here are some examples that might get you thinking! It’s not hard work, you don’t need to plan it out, just see what happens.

It could be ….

• Five books of the same genre
• Five books by the same author
• Five books with a similar theme or issue being explored for example mother/daughter relationships
• Five books from the same series
• Five books you bought in 2018
• Five books from the depths of your TBR
• Five books with fabulous covers
• Five debut books
• Five new to you authors
• Five books that weren’t for you.
• Five books that really connect to your own life in some way.
• Five books with the theme of friendship

However

• The five books connection cannot be too simple, for example five paperbacks or five ebooks or five women authors – unless of course you hardly ever read women authors. I could challenge myself and have a group though of five male authors because I hardly ever read male authors! Five USA authors would be rather simple, but it could be five USA authors from the same state.
• A book can only be used once.
• The books must be read in 2019.
• Books can be carried over until you have five of something. It may take a few months to gather five of something.
• You may have  many connections of five to link up . So if you have two groups of five then you can link up twice and so on within a month.
• You may just link one group of five during the year sometime or many each month.

Beyond the Bookends Reading Challenge

Beyond the Bookends is another favourite reading challenge I have enjoyed and completed for awhile.
I aim to be successful again - and have fun choosing and reading books from their categories.

Here's the outline:

Modern Mrs. Darcy's Reading Challenge

The Rading Challenge hosted at Modern Mrs. Darcy has been a favourite for a few years. There are 12 book choices and give variety to one's reading.

Here are the choices:

ART on Friday

The first Friday of the New Year - a perfect time to start fresh. I have resolved to make sure that I make time to create more this year - both art and writing. I need to focus on what makes me happy and ensure I just do it.

This week I started with creating my OLW canvas - to help me focus on the word all through the year.
My One Little Word is (appropriately) is FOCUS. (Check here to read how it found me!)

Focus Cards
I am starting a new project - a 52 card challenge, to create 52 cards to highlight my OLW..
I found some round playing cards (about 3" in diameter) and thought they would be fun to work with this year.
Here's the first.

Tag Tuesday

The first challenge of the year I joined was for Tag Tuesday. The theme for the next two weeks is:
New Beginnings.
Here are two tags I created:

CED

The theme for January at Create Every Day is Goals.
Although I don't do resolutions, but rather pick a word to represent the year, I do create a seasonal vision board, which does help me focus on the season ahead.
Here is my winter vision board:

Happy New Year everyone! 
May 2019 be filled with creativity, happiness and good health!


Linking with:

Paint Party Friday

Inspire Me Monday

My OLW - One Little Word for 2019

2019 is a brand new year and an opportunity to choose a new word that will carry me through this year.
For several years now I have followed the example of Ali Edwards. She has helped me every year since I took her OLW course and rather than make resolutions, I chose a word.

These are the words I have focused on over the years:
2010 - YES
2011 - Balance
2012 - Carpe Diem (Seize the Day)
2013 - JOY
2014 - Embrace
2015 - Bloom
2016 - Shine
2017 - Cultivate
2018 - MORE

Each word fitted the need I had for that year and helped me navigate throw the ups and down of the year, some more than others.
I had hope MORE would be a catalyst to more of everything - art, writing, fun, adventure.
But - not as much as I hoped. I felt scattered, stressed, less focused on what I needed to focus on.

It hit me in December that what I really needed was that focus; that I needed to clear away distractions to get more done.

Thus - my OLW chose me. I needed focus - the perfect word for 2019.

I created my canvas for the year, which I post in my art room, to remind me each day to focus.
And I chose a new daily calendar, to choose I or 2 things to focus on each day.

The definition of focus gives me guidance::
the centre of interest,
 clear visual definition and of course,
to pay particular attention to (something)

I plan to focus on:

my health

what really matters

creativity - through writing and my art

God

family,friends

fun, adventure, learning

I hope to make my word more visible this year by creating quote cards - one a week.

Here are a few quotes I will use to create these cards,  to keep me inspired through 2019:


Live life to the fullest, and focus on the positive. Matt Cameron

Change your life, by changing your focus.

Focus on the journey, not the destination. Joy is found not in finishing an activity but in doing it. 
Greg Anderson


I don't focus on what I'm up against. I focus on my goals and I try to ignore the rest. Venus Williams

Don't focus on negative things; focus on the positive, and you will flourish. Alek Wek

Change your life, by changing your focus.

Let your eyes look straight ahead, fix your gaze directly before you. Proverbs 4:25

Where focus goes, energy flows.

What you focus on grows stronger.



LINKING with: :

It's the first Thursday of the month and time to join Spiritual Journey First Thursday with my chosen word for the year 2019. Ruth is rounding up  posts today at her blog, There is no such thing as aGod-forsaken town.    

Friendship Friday Blog Hop

#OneThingThisMonth January

I have been following Kim and Tanya of GirlXOXO for awhile. I have decided to join in their #OneThingThisMonth as a way to focus on one goal for January.

This month it is all about setting my intentions for the month, and ultimately for the year.

My first step was to create my Winter vision board, which will help me focus on the 3 months ahead.

Then I chose my word of the year - which is FOCUS.

After 2 years of not accomplishing much in my writing or art and experiencing so much stress (re my hubby's health), I knew I needed a change. Thus focus - I have to focus on me first.
I need to focus on: my writing, my art, my health.
I have to choose a focus each day, each month and achieve more.

I am using 4 journals to help me keep focused:

The red flowered daily log to record the books read,
the large blue flowered one to keep a more detailed review of the books read,
the light blue diagonal journal as a catch-all for 2019 to record favourite passages, books to read, ideas, dreams etc;
and finally the dark blue one is my daily to-do diary.

As I signed up for reading challenges (check here to see my master list of challenges), I came across the Bookish Resolution Challenge and The Good Rule Reading Challenge. Both stress the need for setting intentions for your reading life. The Bookish Challenge encourages intentions for your writing/blogging life.

Here are my resolutions for 2019:(as I wrote in my reading journal)

What is your One Thing for January?
What bookish resolutions are you making this year?