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The things you do every day take on a certain beauty, and provide a kind of invisible architecture to daily life. – Gretchen Rubin

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Welcome to my landing page for 31 Days of Nurturing My Creativity.  If you want to see my posts for the month, jump to the bottom!  There are also links to posts I’ve done previously about creativity.

Why I Am Doing This

Several months ago, I questioned whether I was doing enough to nurture my creativity.  By the time I finished writing my post, I decided that I was doing better than I thought, but not as good as I wanted to be doing.

In September, I participated in the 30 Days of Lists.  I posted a few of them to share, then realized that I’d rather spend that time working on my photography.  I did my lists everyday in my paper journal and thoroughly enjoyed it.  All that changed was I chose to not share it so frequently.  Instead, I worked on my pictures every night.

My Vision (Because Everyone Needs a Quest)

I intend to continue this nurturing of my creativity for the next 31 days.  Some of my posts might be simply the photographs I worked on that evening (with before and after examples), others will be longer as I record what is inspiring me or influencing my creativity.

It helps me to set out expectations when I start something.  I can always adjust them along the way, but it helps me frame up a project and what I need to do to accomplish it.

My expectations are:

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I’m participating in a challenge called 31 Days:  A Writing Challenge, Every October, Every Day.  It’s an interesting idea – I choose my topic, put in a one-time link, and post every day.  The challenge is to go deeper into one topic for the  month.  As I considered whether to do this, I read over some of the bloggers who participated in 2013 and there is some incredibly good stuff out there.  The topics are all over, from cooking to faith to crafts of all kinds, and changes in home or behavior.  They all shared a desire to do something for 31 days and write about it.

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To help get you started, here are some past posts on nurturing creativity:

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Working Back From Discouragement – Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 & Part 4

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Day 1 – My Expectations and Intentions

Day 2 – Weekly Photo Challenge:  Nighttime (Processing A Night Photo)

Day 3 – It’s About Having Fun

Day 4 – Weekly Photo Challenge:  Signs (Trying out Topaz Labs filters)

Day 5 – Cleaning the House Nurtured Me

Day 6 – Patience for the Learning Curve

Day 7 – Chaos is Inevitable – Part 1

Day 8 – Chaos is Inevitable – Part 2

Day 9 – Traveling Helps My Creativity

Day 10 – Setting Expectations for Enjoyment

Day 11 – Belly Laughs Help Everything

Day 12 – Foodie Tour! (in which I try blogging from my cell phone)

Day 13 – Creativity Versus Needing Sleep

Day 14 – Weekly Photo Challenge – Dreamy (thoughts on being a more creative photographer)

Day 15 – Working a Day Job – Part 1

Day 16 – Working a Day Job – Part 2

Day 17 – Got Rust? (trying something different with my photos)

Day 18 – Stained Glass in Maine

Day 19 – Working a Day Job – Part 3

Day 20 – More Thoughts on Balancing Life

Day 21 – Baby Bump

Day 22 – Observations on Autumn

Day 23 – Still Life With Tea

Day 24 – A Walk in October

Day 25 – Bloopers and Practicing Failure

Day 26 – The One Thing – Book Review

Day 27 – My One Thing – Storytelling My Life

Day 28 – Staying Encouraged

Day 29 – Fixing A Dog Photo

Day 30 – Time For Tea

Day 31 – 31 Days Wrap-Up