I spent at least two or three hours yesterday writing down all the questions I want my new nanny to know the answers to before she starts working on her own (she has a hand over period of about two – three weeks). Once I finished the list was about 4 pages long:-) Do you think she’ll run away if I ask her to spend her first two weeks filling in all the blanks (answers she doesn’t have straight of the top of her head now)?
Here is my mega list! What do you think? Continue reading
Now, to tell you the truth, I’ve skipped at least two topics I was planning to cover. At first I felt quite bad about it. You know, usually I really like to stick to my plan, but then I thought … “It’s MY parenting book, it’s OK to change and mould it as I go along”. I am so preoccupied with my pregnancy and all the changes that it brings into my life now that I couldn’t wait another couple of weeks before I could write about how it feels and what am thinking and planning to do – I wanted to talk about it NOW. The chapter 6 layout is a compromise between the planned topic and what I’m actually wanting to write and talk about.
So, the idea was to draw kind of mind map listing all the areas you receive support from other people and collage their photos. on the next page you then would list out all the areas where support is lacking and write down where you might actually get it from.
Well, my version is way less reflective and soul-searching. I only listed out the positive side, people who help and nurture me and I used the other side of the page spread for something totally unrelated:-)
My biggest achievement on that spread is the tiny poem in the left top corner of the right-hand side page. It’s called cinquin and is a five-line poem or stanza.
I’ve picked the following template to create one:
Line 1 – a one word title
Line 2 – a 2 word phrase that describes your title or you can just use two words
Line 3 – a 3 word phrase that describes an action relating to your title or just actions words
Line 4 – a 4 word phrase that describes a feeling relating to your topic or just feeling words
Line 5 – one word that refers back to your title
So, my absolutely ever first poem in English goes like this:
JOY
Beautiful Present
Comes and Goes
Delighted Excited Over the Moon
Precious
Here is another example (by Miki):
River
Clear, wonderful
Slapping, whirling, flowing
The river is cold.
Water
Oh… what a layout. I mean… I was very brave this time:-) I made something with my own hands… I created a collage, made of magazines cuttings and 3D elements cut off the cards I bought. Nice morning spent in a café cutting paper and glueing elements together! I wonder what people around thought about me:-) I then scanned it in my local photo shop and at home erased the background in PSE (just a bit here and there) to make it look a bit more real rather than just being an imaged inserted onto a digital page… Now I know – creating your own embellishments to use for scrapbooking (2 and 3 dimensional) is quite easy (though – at least in my case) buying digital once is way cheaper!
I really liked this part of this journal! I had to create a job ad describing what kind of parent I (as a child) would be looking for. I had to describe the job, what qualifications ideal parent would need to have, traits they need to posses, experience and references:-) And then, on the opposite page I had to write my letter applying for the job and create a collage that would represent what family means to me, what an ideally family would look like. LOVED IT!:-)
Huh… this was a tough one. Not so much the content of the pages, but rather the layout… In its essence, this chapter consists of a number of gratitude letters addressed to the members of your family, to people who raised you. You suppose to put in photos of all of them and address the individually in a personal letter outlining what it is you are thankful for. For all the less pleasant bits there will be another chapter, this one is just to say thank you.
Now, my first challenge was the language!
There was no way I would have written those letters in English in particular as my grandparents didn’t speak English and we only used Russian in our family… So I wasn’t sure how to combine two languages in one spread and what will get more space and prominence. Should I write the same letter in two languages? At the end I decided that if anyone (like my children) would be particularly interested in the content of these two pages they will figure out how to translate/understand what’s written there. (Part of me hopes, that they will grow up speaking Russian, but you never know)
Another challenge were the pictures. I only have a handful of old photos so I keep using them in all my projects and am getting tiered of them… Overall I wasn’t sure how to design/decorate the page. This one would have been easier to complete in its paper version, in particular as I was supposed to draw a representative picture of each relationship – this is quite difficult (I found) if you are not truly familiar with all the Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and what ever else is there. So I went for something more generic.
On a positive note – this layout is to nearly 100% built based on the Jessica Sprague lessons (in particular #20 & 18). I got a bit carried away and applied those techniques on both pages, and the layout is a bit … boring:-)
Anyway – here it is, and sorry, the journalling is in Russian:-)
I recently enrolled in a Doodle 101 class run by Steph at homegrownhospitality. And just wanted to share with you my very first own creation:-) I am not sure how to get the digital version of the doodle to look as pretty as it does look in the real life though… I will work on that!
This theme is all about family values, rules and how they made you feel when you were growing up. I broadly followed the instructions in the book. I don’t use the nondominant/dominant hand approach, I just type everything on my laptop.
If you want to do it more like the book suggests, then here is a quick run down of the original instructions:
This time I merely took the exercise in the book as an inspiration. If you want to do it more like it is suggested in the book, here are the instructions:
So, and below my take on this exercise!:-) Continue reading
So, here is my first topic and my first layout!
It was quite interesting to see how my journey through layouts, papers, styles and templates made me reconsider my initial ideas about this journal. At the end I decided – this will be a “doodle” style, very light and airy journal. Simple, with a lot of hand drawn elements but still, quite story driven and hence word heavy.
Another discovery made me change my approach to how precisely to follow the instructions in the book. I started to complete the first topic and realised very quickly that this journal may become quite heavy, emotionally challenging reading, one that you not necessarily would feel comfortable sharing or other people might be uncomfortable reading. So I’ve decided to journal it as an interview where by my children will be asking me all the questions and I will be having a conversation with them – there and then on my pages. This, somehow makes it a happier journal.
I’ve picked a double-page 11×11 layout. I will keep most of the journalling on the left and use the right page for a photo, doodles and a bit of “overflow” journalling. Part of me thinks, that by the time I’ve scraped to the topic 10 or so I would probably change some of my approach as I will become more confident in what I do:-)
Here is the first topic and my fist attempt! I feel there is still something missing and something needs tweaking to link the two pages together. I am certain I will change the layout slightly later on! Continue reading
I’ve picked topics that are most current for me as well as some that should help my children to understand why I am the way I am… (if they will ever be interested in it:-)). I also kept in mind the size of the book when printed. I am going 100% digital so 20-40 pages at 12×12 format should be my limit giving me anywhere between 10 and 20 topics to work with (which is plenty for me).
My topics are:
1. What Parenting Means to Me: to reflect upon my beliefs, expectations, and feelings about being a parent
2. Return to Childhood: to get insight about the values of my family of origin
3. How I was raised: to examine the beliefs and expectations of my parents about child rearing when I was growing up
4. Paying Tribute: to identify what I liked about the way my parents raised me; to express my appreciation
5. To Tell the Truth: to identify what I didn’t like about the way I was raised
6. Wanted: My Kind of Parent: to identify and articulate my values; to shape my own style of parenting
7. The Time Pie: to simplify my life; to manage time according to my priorities
8. My Prayer: to cultivate the practice of prayer, to create my own prayers
9. Caring for Myself: to identify people, places, things, and activities that nurture you; to expand my repertoire of nurturing elements in my life
10. Pregnancy and Me: to become aware of my beliefs, attitudes, and experiences associated with pregnancy
11. Picture Me Pregnant: to develop an appreciation of my pregnant body image; to become aware of my own personal style during pregnancy
12. Heart-to-Heart: to create a partnership with the unborn child; to establish a rapport with the spirit of the baby I am carrying
13. Prayer to the Creator: to write my own prayer to the Higher Power or the Divine as I experience it; to have faith in and surrender to divine providence
14. Parenting Together: to become aware of my current needs, my relationship needs, and needs regarding the care of my child
15. Where we’re Going: to become aware of our short-and long-term goals as individuals; to become aware of our relationship goals and family goals
16. Baby and Me: to become aware of my feelings about having a baby and about caring for my baby and toddler
17. Getting to Know You: to become aware of my children’s development and needs; to cultivate communication with my baby
18. Time Together: to become aware of my response to my children; to revisit my values and concerns about parenting at this time
Today I’ve finally received the book on guided parenting journalling written by an art therapist Lucia Capacchione! A very interesting and inspiring book. It guides you through your complete journey as a parent.
From looking into the past and identifying your family values and rules, through pregnancy and birth, up to the time of teenage kids and beyond. It is written for all kind of family constellations: natural parents and children, parents who were adopted or in care as children with natural children, natural parents with adopted children (not sure it’s the right way to call the types of parenthood, but I hope no one takes offence and the idea of what I am trying to say is also clear)!
Each phase of your parental journey comes with a list of exercises, instructions and examples. I strongly recommend to read though the book and follow the instructions while creating a very personal and quite a therapeutic art journal. This intense form of self-discovery through would be too much for my scrapbooking project. It would be, in my opinion and for my taste, a bit too personal to share with anyone (at least not in its entirety). Instead I am going to take the book as a guide to topics that I want to talk about to my children.
I will loosely follow the instructions and where it suggests to draw something I will use photos and may be some sort of digital collage. I also decided to use creative Continue reading
