Foraging My Creative Flowers

On Saturday, I spent a blissful hour capturing close-ups in my garden. Watching the bumblebees go in and out of the flowers foraging for nectar is one of my favorite things to watch. Evidently, bumblebees return day after day — sometimes traveling several miles —  to their favorite flower patches (as long as there is food available). 

I'm like a bumblebee in how I stay creatively inspired. 

I return again and again to the same flowers to fill up: I visit my favorite blogs daily. I keep the books that inspire me most by my bed. I repeatedly grab for the art materials that I love. Of course, I'm always out seeking new flowers, too. (One can never have too many flowers in their gardens, I say.) But these inspirational touchstones are what bring sustenance and color to my days.

Some of my favorite "creative flowers" of late:

Blogs:

Dancing Mermaid:  Beautiful musing and raw and real words of wisdom and encouragement for all of us on a creative journey. Lately, I'm very inspired by her feel-good rocks and her art camps for young girls.

Christine Mason Miller:  A talented mixed media artist with a gift for inspiring and giving permission to our creative dreams. She also publishes another inspiring blog called Sparkletopia. She recently self-published a book — Ordinary Sparkling Moments. I'm eagerly awaiting both the book and a print I ordered from her; it says: 

At any given moment, you have the power to say: This is not how the story is going to end. — Christine Mason Miller

Books:

The Wild Braid: A Poet Reflects on a Century in the Garden by Stanley Kunitz:  Part meditation on gardening, part mediation on the nature of poetry. Insightful and profound throughout. One gem: "In a sense, all creativity is a process of giving measure to what is on a universal scale meaningless. The plant and the poet and the gardener collect these disparate, disorganized raindrops, sun rays, passing birds and make something formal."

Taking Flight: Techniques and Inspiration to Give Your Creative Spirit Wings by Kelly Rae Roberts:  Such a generous book — both in the step-by-step guide to creating wonderful layered works of art, but in looking at the creative process. I especially love the fill-in-the-blank questions peppered throughout and in her honest sharing of her journey. (BTW, her blog is great, too!) 

Supplies:

Niji Waterbrush:  I use these with Peerless Watercolors for highly portable, no-spill, and no-fuss art journaling.

Clairefontaine Writing Notebooks:  Smooth vellum finish has my pen glide with ease. (Paper — and how it feels — matters dearly to me.)

Beeswax Block Crayons:  Luminous colors that smell great and get softer as you use them. (Soon, i hope to upgrade to the 24-color box!)

So, tell me, what are the creative flowers that you are drawn to again and again?