What inspires you...sharing my Inspiration Notebook

Let's chat about what inspires you. What gets your creative juices flowing? What makes you want to dive into your art supplies and create something wonderful? Are you not inspired? Do you start our creating by sitting and staring at a white sheet of cardstock?

It's time for you to take a journey with me...a little walk right into my creative soul. It's gonna get deep people so prepare yourselves. Oh it won't be that bad, I just wanted to sound all artsy fartsy today.

Let me share with you a little bit about my creative process and my job as a paper crafter. I never just sit down and start creating without some sort of inspiration. I need something to work from, something to look at, something to make that light bulb brighten up in my head. I feed off of inspiration. Where do I get it?

Ever since I was a child, I have been very curious about my surroundings. I prefer the country life, nature, flowers, old stuff, etc. I think having this simple life has allowed me to just look at things around me....break it down into little pieces....pay attention to details. I can remember laying in the grass and watching ant hills...the tiniest of things intrigued me. So when I look at flowers for example, I don't just see a pretty bouquet. I see colors, textures, shadows....I smell scents that evoke memories of Grandma or other places.......I think about how I can re-create that look in my own house, what I change.....and a lot of times I think about how I can interpret what I see and put it onto paper.....onto a card, etc.

If you want to live an inspired life, you have to really look at things in different ways. Be aware of your surroundings...think outside the box....take photos....take notes......think deeper about things. And the biggest thing to do is to stop having an *I could never do that* attitude. You can do whatever you want if you put your mind to it. So whether you want to make better cards, become a better painter, decorate your house in a really cool style, sew up some funky quilts, arrange flowers, write poetry.......whatever it is, you can do it. You just need to be inspired.

So here's my big secret to being inspired. I have been taking photos, ripping out pages from magazines and scrapbook magazines, looking at blogs, etc......lots and lots......and I have finally organized all my ideas into what I'm calling my Inspiration Notebook. It is priceless to me...I look at it and add to it all the time. Actually I have several Inspiration Notebooks filled to the max with inspiring ideas.
So what's in my Inspiration Notebook? I have my notebooks divided into sections which includes titles like.....gardening/flowers, vintage finds, quilting, organization, gift wrap, table settings/parties, colors, holidays....and the list goes on.

Every time I get a new magazine or find some good ones at the library give away section, I flip through and find photos I like. I rip them out and into my Inspiration Notebook they go. I then keep my notebook handy and flip through it often. The tiniest thing might catch eye...maybe a color or a pattern or a certain flower. It just depends on what I'm in the mood to find.

How do you start your own Inspiration Notebook? Just start collecting items that you like and shove them into a notebook. I use simple 8.5 x 11 page protectors and whatever 3 ring notebooks or scrapbook albums I have laying around. You don't need to spend a bunch of money to get inspired.

And guess what? Have you always wondered what your *style* is but could never figure it out? Once you start compiling your notebook pages, your style will jump right off the pages. It will just all fall into place and it will come to you. What's my style? If you were to look at my notebook, you would see that I like things that have to do with nature...the country life...simple things....flowers....vintage finds....repurposed items.....quilts and items that remind me of home....cooking......colors that derive from nature....family. I don't know what you'd call that style and it doesn't really matter to me. It's not about putting a label on yourself, it's about what inspires you....what you like at the moment...what something means to you.....how you interpret it.

I hope you've stuck with me. Have I scared you away? I hope not. I hope to have inspired you to dig a little deeper...live the inspired life....create something wonderful. Let me know your thoughts. I'm working on my next post which was inspired by my Inspiration Notebook. My hopes are to share my inspiration photos with you and my finished projects. I hope you enjoy my little journey.