Crafty Ass Female Episode 179 - Daily Pages: The Life-Changing Impact of a Small Habit
8:01PM May 1, +0000
Speakers:
Kristin Tweedale
Ann
Honore
Kinjal
Keywords:
pages
daily
life
book
page
day
read
scrapbook
feel
notebook
andre
people
bit
started
scrapbooking
stick
good
april
watching
listening
Hey, and welcome to the craftiest female podcast, the only feminist scrapbooking show on the planet, where we discuss the amazing ways that people are documenting their lives today. I'm your host Kristin Tweedale. AKA Are you Christian feminist scrapper. This is the season of having brought to you by the Awesome Ladies Project community. Download our free app at the awesome ladies project.com/app. Hey, we're kicking off the season of habit with a three episode series all about Daily Pages. Daily Pages are a creative self documenting habit I created in the summer of 2018. They're all about pulling a small amount of paper, thoughts, photos, words or bits of life into a small notebook. Daily Pages are a creative habit for you to tell your stories. Throughout this series, we'll have different guest experts on each of the shows sharing the different ways Daily Pages have impacted their lives, creativity, scrapbook habits, and so much more. In this episode, we get into some great topics. We talked about the way Daily Pages have or haven't changed since we started creating. We discuss Daily Pages as a place for both practice and play. And we have an important conversation about the way Daily Pages community, especially the Daily Pages at noon, live stream and SHARE Community has impacted our lives throughout the last several years. Join us on May 7 funny for our free Daily Pages one on one hands on virtual retreat. You'll learn how to make all of my favorite Daily Pages as well as the tips and tricks the awesome ladies and I have for getting started with this amazing creative habit. Register for free today at the awesome ladies project.com/daily pages. We're right on the front page of the Awesome Ladies Project app. Hi, and welcome to the craftiest female Podcast. Today we have Andre kinjal. And and we're going to talk about Daily Pages. So I feel like I know you guys pretty well. I've spent a lot of time with all of you. We've hung out a lot during the pandemic. And I feel like that's not really something that you can say that often like who, who just hangs out a lot with people during the pandemic. I don't think that's really something that you get to do but through Daily Pages and through the Daily Pages live stream and share that we have inside the Awesome Ladies Project all access club. Monday through Friday, at noon, Eastern. We have spent literally hundreds of hours together. So I'm going to introduce you to all three of these amazing ladies. Andre, would you like to tell us a little bit about yourself?
Well, yes, I joined Daily Pages when you first offered it in 2020. I believe it's been that long. On April Fool's Day, right?
It was it was April Fool's. Which, right? It seems like a whole. It's just playing a joke on us over and over.
And as you said, it has been one of the highlights of my life. And that life has been very difficult over the past few years. But men an amazing community of women who are certainly very creative and inspiring and forthcoming and very sharing and it just makes you feel good. So I have been toying around with the idea of documenting my life for 20 years. And I'm still at it. That's not where I do.
I love it. I love seeing everything that you make. And all the different ways that you you choose to make Daily Pages is really cool. So we'll we'll get more into that later. Can you tell us more about you?
Like I was not as early as on our at the Daily Pages. And I thought, What is this? I don't understand what this is. This is too scary. This is not for me. And then I started doing it anyway, in the background before I joined your course. I did practice Daily Pages before. It just did it. What was it is the hubba hubba Nietzsche something or other. And then I think I joined late 2020 certainly before Christmas. And yeah, it's a little bit later in England. As you can probably tell from my accent. It's about 5pm which is perfect because I just signed off work early. So it'll join you You've heard the call, like if I hadn't had a great benefit, and it's been so, so good to learn more about me about you about everything and everyone, everyone's different perspectives, which is crazy to say in an hour phone call every day, right? To get to know someone, and like you said, it's been over 500 hours, which is crazy. It's really, really cool. I don't think I speak to my mom 500 hours a week, a year. But every day.
I know, you know, it's it's so funny is that so many of us who are on the call, are introverts like we are not. We're homebodies we're not, you know, people who are just like, okay, you know, what I'm gonna do for an hour a day, every single day, I'm just gonna go and hang out with like, 20 other people, and show them a thing that I made, like, most of the people who hang out and do Daily Pages, if you go up to them before they even think about joining the community, you have any idea? That's something that would just be like, No, nope, that is not a me thing. Nah, I am not one of those people who just is like, oh, yeah, I see 20 A group of 20 people, and I'm just gonna go right up to them and be like, No, this is what I'm doing. Yeah. But then,
and what is the background? Things got
personal if you want them to get personal quite fast. So here's my daily page about why life
is nice. Yeah, it's really, really good.
Yeah. And, and now it's like, well, how can I not do that? There's like a little hole in your day, when we
see as a weekend, so would you do?
I totally feel that I totally feel that you guys are so awesome. And tell us a little bit about you.
Know, I'm in the UK as well. And I joined the Daily Pages on the first of April 2020. My first ever zoom, I didn't know what zoom was I didn't know what Daily Pages was. And like you say, over two years later, it's just been amazing. And probably if there'd been a group to join, I would have thought, Oh, should I go? Should I do this, but doing it by zoom? It's amazing. And it just fits in so much easier. I think whatever you're doing, even if you're not at home, you could join the zoom. So I think for everyone, it's worked really well.
It's so true. We do have like, back when we started in April 2020. Everyone was home. Like it was like it was literally locked. It was locked down period. There were no you know, where you could do this, if you had this. And here are the restrictions, it was straight up, lock down. And it was like, Okay, well, if we all have to stay in our homes, Let's all stay in our homes together on the internet and make something. And it was supposed to be this thing that we did for 30 days. It was a 30 day class from the first of April to the 30th of April. Let's just do this thing. And I think Ian are very, very, very, very, very, very, very, we can say very 100 times, in our very naive minds. We thought maybe, maybe this COVID thing by the end of April, might you know there might be a light at the end of the tunnel. And we won't have to be stuck in our houses in May of 2020. Well, that proved to be very, very, very wrong. And at the end of April, nobody wanted to stop showing up at noon.
Yeah. It was so amazing to have a community because like you say you were at home. And you know sometimes if you had a hard day or everything just seemed a bit miserable, just log in on it. kinjal says five o'clock our time was great because suddenly you had you know, different faces to see rather than your family.
Well outside of my going to the grocery store or opening the door for grocery delivery. This is about the only contact I had with people in the outside world was through Daily Pages. Because I had a household member who was very very sick and so that precluded along with COVID anybody walking out you know just taking a walk around the block was on my period it was a lifesaver. It is a lifesaver.
I had absolutely no idea that that's that what it was back in April would have been anything like what it is now. Okay, so I have a couple questions. The first thing I want to ask is, do you think that there's a difference in the pages that you made back in the beginning of April versus the pages that you make now? And do you feel like you've gotten better? Do you feel like you use different things? Do you have more confidence.
And some ways, I think there isn't a big difference, because you're still playing in a notebook. And in other ways, you look at some of your pages, I think my selfies got a bit better. When I looked back at my old one, my first selfie, I thought, Oh, my selfie game has improved. But I think I think I'm more relaxed with it. Now that I know if I do a page that I think is rubbish, I'll be doing another one tomorrow, which will probably be better. And everyone always has something nice to say about your page. So even if you think it's rubbish, the colors are good, or you know, there's something
no one ever says anything negative, it's really good. Like a stick around, so sometimes everyone stick around me to validation.
Exactly. That's when you know, you found your community.
You know what I think that's, that's one of the best things about showing up to Daily Pages at noon, or noon community knows that if you show up. That's, that's what matters. And like, that's the most important thing about Daily Pages itself. That's what I've learned the most. Is that, truly what matters to me is showing up?
Well, there's something about the format, like I've tried to do similar habits for ages, eight is years and years and years. And it works for a little while, and then it stops working. But this hasn't stopped working. And I don't know if it's because I found a good pattern. I think a lot of us do the accountability. Coming back to the main question of have my pages changed a little bit in that I think I have less decision fatigue, because I stick something on the left, and I write on the right. And that is my formula. And you can see it in every page for the last, however long. And now I know that that that's really good, because I just turned off or something isn't left, rather than right. And I think many people do it that way. But that works for me, because I need some of the words, I need somewhere to do something creative, I only have to feel this much space. So my pages have changed, but not dramatically. So just that this pattern has become established.
That's one of the things that I really like about your pages specifically, is that you have the things that work for you. And you don't have to worry about picking out things from a giant room of things. And so you're not going to spend 20 minutes just deciding on your stuff. And still do
I still do. It makes me laughter you're the government of less because I just live in a small house.
Yeah, this is why Art section now because it's been taken over by other places and other people I started still takes me longer to make decisions. But I know the things on the left. And also there's the timer, I Daily Pages finishes at six for me at six o'clock. So when people invade my house, so I have to be done by six and start at 5am finished by six. So it was done, it's done.
That's the other thing is that you do finish. And sometimes you're sometimes your journaling is not all the way complete. But you're really good on that that time deadline. And you use your stencils to do the words, which gives your whole book a really cohesive theme, which no matter anytime you have a cohesive theme in your book. It just really helps bring your story together. And so like even when you make pages that maybe you don't love. The page itself doesn't actually matter. And I think this is one of those things that I really love about Daily Pages, like Anne was saying, you know, even when you make a page that you don't love. It's fine. Tomorrow's pages just going to be another chance to make one. That's great.
Yeah, that's very true. It's the stack of pages that easily mount up because you do so If 30 days, and all of a sudden, you've got a whole book in like, Whoa, that was slow, but fast. And very few other things give you that sense of accomplishment, especially in the last couple of years.
Yeah, seems that's really, really, really true. Andre, what about you?
Well, I got up and pulled out my first book. And there are a lot of unfinished pages in it. I think I was trying to figure out what it was I was doing. And I still don't know that I've come to a conclusion about that. But I can't say that in many ways, my pages have changed much, because they do change from one day to the next. But there is a cohesive theme. And so I looked at April 21, two years ago, and my title was how we spend our days is how we spend our lives.
Perfect. I love that you could go back exactly two years and see what was on your mind two years. Yeah, that is fantastic.
And I included in it a picture of my feet standing on a yellow circle that says, Please practice social distancing, and receipt from the grocery store, because that's where I was. And then I wrote a little bit about COVID, and how it was running our lives, I think more, here's what I would say about it. So it's, it's fun to go back and take a look at what I finished as well as what is unfinished. And that's the way life is there's so much of it that's unfinished until it is finished. Yeah. And so this is, this is some good, a good practice to have. In a way, what it does is we're showing gratitude for the moment, the small moments then add up to our lives.
Yes, in the scrapbook world, we have lots of like 30 days of gratitude projects, and 30 days of this project, 30 days of that project. And like those are awesome. Don't get me wrong. I love me a good 30 days of lists anything, give me give me all of that stuff. But that has a beginning and an end. And this is a very different thing. Yeah,
you still have to worry, right? Because every small moment, you'd have to then think, Oh, what about where am I going to capture the small moment, it just goes to the daily page, it's done. Move on. Next story. Or next thing, it doesn't have to be a story. It could be a picture, it could be a snapshot can be anything but it's got a home, I confess to sometimes stick your head through my day. It's really good for tomorrow. Or Tuesdays, I tuck stuff in because I don't want to forget about it or lose it or, or I'm not ready today, or three things happen that I want to capture. Like there's no pressure to be big or small. It's just fill the page move on.
Yeah, and you're really really, really good at collecting all the really cute things that are on like packaging.
The recycling, you're supposed to scrapbooking, it's good scrubbing the band.
Right. It's Reduce, reuse. And recycle is the last one.
It's also a great place, isn't it for put in, like when you have some when you have something new and you can like play with it for the first time in your Daily Pages. Yeah.
It's important. Yeah. Because I think that one of the things that we creative people and I use the term creative in quotes, we expect perfection on the first try. We no good well, it's not going to happen. But you can you can practice becoming perfect doing. However perfect looks for you.
That's true. It's one of the things there's less pressure in it. So if you do drop your black ink, you think okay, but it hasn't ruined the whole scrapbook page or something, you know, something you've worked on for ages.
Yeah. It's brilliant. They really?
Yeah, I'm learning to practice and have space for that practice. That's an ongoing thing. has been such a game changer for me because like you were saying, we think that we're supposed to be perfect at this brand new tech niq That, like, we either read a blog post about or just saw on somebody else's scrapbook or just like, watched Tim Holtz do for one time? It's like yes, I have Tim Holtz, who has, again, 100,000 hours of, you know, splitting things, and somehow they turn out to be like, the thing you pay $100 for at the Christmas store. And then you're just expected to replicate that, you know, in turn, and then we get older, we get all these things, we buy all the things, and then you get them and you're like, well, now I need to make an important scrapbook page that I care about. I can't possibly do that. But also, I don't have enough time to practice. Yeah, there's no there's no time in my life. Like, there's just no time in my life period. There's just no, you know, there's nowhere on the calendar to schedule when practice scrapbook.
Because you have that time you just scrapbook right that why would you spend the time practicing? So you take away the pressure of needing to be perfect at that scrapbook? Yeah.
And so when you have to have Daily Pages where you can just play? And like, who cares if you screw up? Like Daily Pages or not the thing that if somebody comes over and it's like, oh, can I see your scrapbooks? I'm not going to hand them Daily Pages. I mean, unless they know specifically, what Daily Pages aren't asked for them. They're gonna get like, the scrap box.
Yeah, it's interesting. You bring that up. And I think that's one of the reasons it's worked so well, for me is it is not a commonplace book, I it is not the place where by most inner thoughts. It's also simultaneously not an art journal, which was like, it has to be a certain way. That's just me, projecting my professionalism or what art journaling is. But it's not that it's not a scrapbook. And it's not insert 10,000 other things here, for some bizarre reason. It's not a memory planner. It's not a it's not a book journal. Oh, it can be all of those things. It's not a bullet journal, it can be all or any of those things. But it's not the thing that other people need to see, except on this call, if you want to share. And once you close that page, if you don't want to do that ever again. Yeah, absolutely. But it's also not something heavy and dark and full of angst either. Unless you want it.
It is what it is.
Yeah. Yeah. It's like all the overlapping circles with all of the facts. And like, you get to put it wherever you want to put it. Yeah. What what it feels like most to me, is like Da Vinci's notebooks, and all the notebooks that like, all of the famous men had all the male artists, they wrote all the things down in the notebooks. And then anytime you go to the museum's they're like, and we have all the notebooks too. And they have all of the really cool drawings in them. Like, you know, like the the drawing of the Vitruvian man wasn't like on a canvas. But that's one of the coolest things. And so this is, you know, it's not a diary. Again, I feel the same way it's not an art journal, although some pages are more art journaling. Some pages are more scrap bookie you know, some pages look like a planner. Yeah, some pages we just all stick down the Brandi Kincaid stuff, because how can you
that's gonna work out that's gonna come up with like, I'm gonna drink every time someone says
we should have made a brandy Kincaid bingo card. Yes, well, we
still can. When I was a little girl. And that was a long time ago, I had a book that I could pull out because it was filled with all sorts of things that I could do that answered the lament, the refrain, I would say, I don't have anything to do today. And my mother would say, well pull your book out. And so I pull out my book, and there would be some inspiration in there for me to do something. And I would do it. And I have looked and looked and looked and looked and looked and looked for that book, hoping it would show up again in my life, and it just won't. And I have to say Daily Pages has been perhaps the next best thing since that book. One of the things I learned in that book, although it's probably not the best thing was how to make paste out of water and flour, glue, that kind of thing. And so with Daily Pages, we're learning how to make glue and what to do with what we've collected or the thoughts we've had and the things that we do or don't do and it's just a neat little way to relive your day in a positive way. I'll do it negatively too, I suppose.
Yeah. Well, I was gonna say one of the things is, like when he was saying, it's not for anyone to say. And if you're having a morbid moment, and you think when you die and your kids come in to clear out your craft room and think, oh my god, it kind of makes me smile that they'll look at my currently pages. And think, oh, just like a tiny insight of, you know, like, mom was really fed up with work, she was really happy. She was watching this she was reading. It's just like a glimpse. So it's not some, you know, big heavy thing that they think, Oh, God, we've now got to find somewhere to store hundreds of scrapbooks. But it's like a little glimpse that you think, you know, relative that you have, like, my Nana would love to know what my nan's currently card with it like? Yeah,
yeah, I think it would have been interesting. So, so much of what I do, is all about your story matters. Tell your story. You know, what you do is important, and it's very much self empowerment. But it comes from this place of you don't, I really wish I had this stuff from my mom and my grandma. Yeah, I really like because they have the coolest stories. And I just, it would have been really nice to have just like so much more context. And so I don't know if anyone wants this stuff from me. But I knew I wanted it from somebody else. So I 100% feel that. And, and so like, if you want things from other people, I think you need to put those things out there in the world. And if all you need to do is stick a piece of paper inside a notebook, and just like write down a couple of sentences every day. It's it's pretty easy and fun. And I think one of the other things is like when you take that time for yourself when you're taking the time for yourself right now. And that's incredibly important. And we can talk about that. But also, then, like your kids and your grandkids know that you were a person who took time for themselves.
indicating why this is important. It's important, whatever, wherever it is, whether it's Daily Pages or into a hobby here, you're showing that it is important to find something for yourself, I was just thinking my page is actually from Anza is anything heavy. I've just he says there's a mix of stuff that's light and heavy, but what I can see is an entire human, a very flawed human nevertheless, but an entire human with 1000 different emotions. And a lot of the time you get stuck thinking somebody only has fewer emotions, especially if you're a child looking at a parent and not necessarily this only this relationship but you can only see what someone shows you sometimes and it would be really nice to know actually we're all very very similar as well as being different in ways we will have the same kind of worries and thoughts and anger and stresses and and joy joyous moments and find funny things funny and other things not funny and about a patient's history to WTF regarding politics
it's yeah,
thank you for that. Lovely thought that there is lots to explore.
Three we don't even realize it do we were doing
today's pages not dinner, I'm sure that no one cares about that until I
was worried about what we had for dinner that night. But the self
care aspect it's a it's a perhaps an overused word, but I think it's really really important that this is time to either reflect as much as you want to reflect or just have fun. The pandemic stole fun I think from our lives and this was a way to have fun and see people or not see people we don't always have to be a reader after your audio just feel connected in whichever way that means something to you.
That was one of the questions I wanted to ask so what does you know what does daily mean for you guys? What does when we talk about daily so I you know I've? I'm Monday through Friday? On a write what when do you do your Daily Pages
Monday through Friday, and sometimes I do them on Saturday and Sunday and then some Monday through Friday, I don't do them at all. I tried to show up, definitely when we have our 12 Noon session, because it's the best place to be on the planet as far as I'm concerned. And we have a great group of people who join in and you've just learned so much from participating. And very seldom will I go back and complete a page if I haven't pretty much completed it during the the time. But I do like to experiment, try different techniques and different sizes and different focal points.
Yeah, I really liked seeing you try out different sizes and methods and different experiments for a month here and there. That's always neat, neat to see from you. That's really cool.
Thank you. And it helps me because there are always things on my list of things to do. I want to try I want to create this ad and the other and so it gives me an opportunity to play with it. Yeah,
yeah, that's a really great point. Because right, we always have this list of as creative people. Well, I want to try this, I want to try that I want to try it. Here's the place to do it. You know, your Daily Pages don't always have to be in a tiny notebook. You know, you can grab a planner and try it in a planner, you can grab a traveler's notebook, you can grab a three month long thing you can do it on watercolor paper or index cards. Right? There's, there's no wrong way to do it. Absolutely. control what's daily for you.
I'm slightly different toner in that I always finish that reads I go back like three hours after the kids are asleep, because I just, I don't like the pages because I love seeing the end result of a book. And when I first joined, I did them daily like Monday to Sunday because I really appreciated having that 15 minutes of putting stuff down. Then I kind of went back to just Monday to Friday. But I genuinely seem to have a consistent formula even throughout the week so that I follow you on currently on a Monday I have my own Friday musings things and then Tuesday to Thursday is my stick stuff down stuff. So with that formula, as I've gotten more confident in my pages, I found that I've needed less days to figure out what works that's why I don't really try on Saturdays and Sundays anymore. Unless I want to sometimes I do just want to. But I've kept my size the same. I think all the way along. I'm trying to think if I've changed Yeah, I changed from Hobonichi to stay ology but okay, I've kept in B six all the way along. ASICs, ASICs, ASIC, sorry, I can't talk either today. I've stuck in ASICs, basics and my other journal. And that just works for me. And I love the idea of changing up but I also know, I'm my own worst enemy in overcomplicating things. And this is one of the very few things that I've actually managed to find a really good groove. So yeah, I'm about to the point days me is Monday to Friday, five pages a week, I will finish these pages, even if it just means sticking something in literally a coffee thing or whatever. But I I have a little habit tracker, and I love seeing that filled up and I love the book at the end of it, knowing that that's something every day.
I like the idea of using the habit tracker to that's pretty cool. You put that in your daily page, too.
It's a digital trackers. I could take a screenshot, I suppose.
Yeah, that's a really good idea for a page.
Well, yeah, put it in, okay, just create a page at the end of the book or whatever.
But to create a word or picture that was very behind all of you, when a patron
would like it, he put on like, a word or page and I was like, Huh, that's
just allowed.
It would just like to get there. It didn't just come to
when it came. And what does daily look like for you?
Um, usually Monday to Friday, and at the beginning, like so it was locked down. So it was easy. When things changed, and I was looking for a job. One of my biggest criteria was that I'd be home by five I was sorry, I'd have to work too hard five. Oh, no, I'm sorry. That job's not for me.
I haven't blocked out my calendar. Do not block picking up the children which actually
so I do I do try to do it. You Monday to Friday doesn't always work. And the beginning, like getting a page done every day was you know, it's kind of I had to do it. And now I just think it's just any page is just a bonus. So if I get to do a page, great, and if I don't, and I do have to do other life stuff, you think, oh, okay, I do have to do stuff. I'd much rather be doing Daily Pages, but sometimes.
Sometimes life does actually have to happen. Yeah. Yeah,
that's what that's when we use the Project Life cards. Surely, on a day where life has to happen, you just stick up. I've got it today.
winnow down the Project Life stack one by one. The stack keeps getting bigger, even though you keep using them. The digital stuff, though, as well, the digital stack does keep getting bigger, because even though you use them, they don't go away.
They don't lead toward you you go happy times, you're gonna be used me Hey, would you ever notice that you've used me three times? I don't know, I don't know cards not talking to me.
I love it so much. So I have another question. How does doing Daily Pages and showing up to to the Daily Pages session help your other memory keeping?
Well, for one thing, it's sort of acts like the old fashioned card catalog. You know, your brain doesn't forget any quiet as it's kept up there days, when we think our brains aren't working at all, your brain really doesn't forget anything. It's just that for whatever reasons, you haven't made the right connections for it to pull it up. But eventually it will pull whatever it is you're trying to remember up. And I think that that's one of the things Daily Pages does is it helps you remember, and as well as document, just something that's really rather small, perhaps considered insignificant, but it isn't. Because there is a connection there. And it all of these connections spell your life, what you're taking in and what you're putting out. That's one way to look at
I love. That's fantastic. That's a really great
thing. He is the only project that I quote unquote keep current with and keeping current with it. It's not a priority in the current chronological sense. But it is the only thing I touch daily in terms of scrapbooking, like I try and touch other projects daily, but it is what I want my quote unquote scrapbooking to be if that makes sense, versus always feeling behind or, again, behind the quotation marks on a lot of the other projects I do and or not and, or not having the immediate feedback of the digital products that I do, where even if I am up to date, quote, unquote, I'm not gonna get the book printed for the next X amount of months, so it's not as tangible. So it in a way it takes off the pressure of the rest of my memory keeping because it is something that is being done today. versus feeling like another project that I'll never get two or four weeks behind on because that's not what it is designed to be. It's whatever is today's thought is today's thought and that's that and like I said, some of these insignificant moments that you want to hang on to because you see there'll be great project that you get to project if you've forgotten anyway. Or you've you know lost the picture that you had or you've forgotten the meme or why it was so funny or the conversation that blah blah said or if you'll need the 10,000 bits packaging that you've promised your husband your recycling and then throw it into a particular entire flat but yeah, it's actually taken it makes me feel like I can take my pedal off the anxiety wheel of scrapbooking which they shouldn't be but there is sometimes although I do get a little bit stressed my husband says I don't understand we need any other projects
you have a general idea of a Daily Pages and you do these projects. Are they all the same?
I also need the Daily Pages community because we understand you do need all the projects.
Do you have all the same cameras he was like they all do different things. But yeah, it's really everything a bit softer, a bit lighter, a bit. bit less stress in capturing those everyday moments. I'd say.
I was gonna say this is the first year I haven't started doing a project life album. It just Yeah, I don't I honestly and some last points. You know, when you say most, well, not most in some years, you have a plan and you think, yeah, and for a few years, I did Project Life. And it worked really well. But maybe I'm just at a stage of my life where something like Daily Pages works. And when I want to remember what books I've read, I can have a look at my currently card. And like you say, you put different, I put some photos in mine as well. So you can go back and go, Yeah, that's what we were doing in the Thursday three as well. It's good for that sort of thing. And at the moment, I think a bit like Kindle says, it's just a more relaxed way of memory keeping, which currently suits me. And probably in June or something, I'll have a panic, and I should have done a profit scrapbook. And now I've got to remember everything that's happened six months. Today,
you have your Daily Pages.
at that party today, literally the 21st recording, and I made my first project life spread for 2020. Do today is the latest I've ever done that i April, right. And I solely hold Daily Pages responsible for this in a good way that it's not be there. It's not been a concern. I was finishing put it like 2021. So let's be talking about. But
yeah, I really, really do think that it's
like you said that. He just it works. If you works for whatever you want it to be if you want it to be memory planning great. There's a couple of our community that do such a good job with their holy spot planners. And there's some people that do a great job with the most beautiful paints, and die cuts. And I love the way that you put your Tim Holtz people on the page. And I always look at your page, just go, I wish I could do that. Everyone has their own style, which just comes out on these. When you just think again and again, Kristen, you said this time and time again that you discover your style, whether it's accidentally or on purpose. And I think now if I got a spread of people's pages, I didn't know who created them. I could probably say that one was always that always ads that always relied off.
Yeah, I think that's one of the most fun things about Daily Pages is you whether it's on, you know, on purpose, or by accident, just by the fact that you're doing something over and over again, each day. You discover what you like and what you don't like. And then that's your style. And like your style is going to change over time. It's going to be influenced by trends, but like, so is everything. You know, product availability, you can't be a creative person in a vacuum. So you're always going to be influenced by other things. And I
think we've all done flips since.
So onpoint it's like, it's also so much fun, right?
Hmm. Sometimes all of us get the same kind of subscription. Sometimes we all
unintentionally convince each other to buy things
that we really don't want to. But one of the best things we've already touched on is brandies kits are made up. Everybody has the exact same stuff. The way that people make a page or put those stickers in that place or cut up things it's just phenomenal to see it's it's an endless while of inspiration but there's no competition and there's no worry that your page is not as good as anyone elses or that you spoil something or that you know it should be it twice ed or ever always encourages each other to use the stuff which I really love about our community is that there's no you know, you shouldn't use that you should save it for a special occasion today is the special occasion use it on an honor the item you've got and you know if you don't have it make do something else and it's fine. But yeah, I just I think we spoke about this before but I love the fact this is not a competition there's no My page is better than your page or your page sucks or anything like that. It's such a positive place and it's whatever you want to do, whether that's bondstar or you know stickman whatever it's the person sorry stick person. We all females Okay, I'm gonna get a doctor
we're gonna have to send HR after UK
it's hard raising small children in this world as well. I tried that green person not very bad at the traffic lights. Yeah. Before we digress. And we always digress. That's one of my favorite things as well. We digress from football to whether to, you know, the tomatoes are great in your back garden and the CSA. And I feel like we learn about life through these courts, even if they are just nothing to do with the pace that we spend time on. It is so amazing to hear little snippets of everyone's day. And that does a little snippet of a person who then has another life who lives across the world from you. And you just learn about their culture. And what was the thing about jello? There was some sort of, Oh, yeah.
The Midwestern jello salad, let's not it's so the things that the Midwest does with food is is kind of heinous.
Everyone is such a good way. Yeah, so thick and thin. We've been there to everyone. It's just been really good. It's been really good. What was the question?
This was what it's like to be on a Daily Pages call at noon. We are a group that digresses.
Yeah, apologies, it's mostly Wi Fi. It's
five o'clock. Usually this character at this point. So maybe you
can answer this question for us, Kristen. How do you decide? Or when do you decide what you're going to demo?
Because we want usually when I turn around at the desk when we were talking about decision fatigue, earlier, decision, fatigue is one of those things that I see with my headaches. Making as few decisions as possible is usually in my best interest. If I if I got something new, I'm usually going to open that up. And I will know that in advance, usually. Because I really liked playing with new things. Daily Pages has cured me of being afraid of the new thing. And putting it over in the pile and like, Oh, I'll get to that. When I feel like I'm adequate enough to touch those things that I'm not going to screw up, I swear. But now I feel like oh, okay, I know how to do this. And so if I get something new, I will open that up. And I'll probably use that. Monday, I always do currently. But most of the time, I don't know until I turn around. And not having that in my head. Makes it really easy. Because then it's, it's nothing, I don't have to think about it at all. And then it doesn't take up any space in my brain. And having that clear space in my brain means I can do with my head, everything else that I need to do. And I know that inside of the time that we have, I'll figure out something and put it on the page. Whether that's something that turns out to be awesome. Or it's something that turns out to be just mediocre. I very, very rarely make terrible pages now. Usually I can pull something that's at least mediocre.
I have two follow up questions in that case. First one, do you as you go about your day? If not, if not doing what Andre said ie think about the page ahead of time. Do you ever see something and be like, Oh, I'm gonna grab that and stick it on my pile so that I know I want to get to that later. Or is that? Even that doesn't? I kind of enter your headspace?
Yeah, I'll put things on my desk.
Yeah, cool. Okay. And then second point. Second question, brother. What's the longest Daily Pages you ever taken when you started? Did the pages take you longer? Or have you
felt like I know when I started my pages had to be five minutes because I only had five minutes in my day. But I've definitely had pages take me an hour.
Okay. Yes, but and I was pretty much the longest you'd say yeah, I
don't think I've ever I think like an hour and five minutes was my max. And that was like a very complicated stamping layered, like multiple ink color. Like I don't even know what you call them like a like a scene stamp scene. And, you know, that wound up being one of my favorite pages. Yeah, fair enough. And like, you know, I would have been mad if I spent an hour and five minutes making something that wound up being garbage. But you know, that day I had the time I was having a good, you know, I was enjoying what I was doing. And why not? Because in that same in that same idea of, you know, this is time that we set aside for ourselves. I think this was before. The one that I'm specifically thinking of was definitely before we started doing Daily Pages at noon. This one specifically, I knew what I like I knew what I wanted, I was having a really good time. And since this is about this sacred time, if you're outside going for a walk, and it's a gorgeous day out, and you know, you see something interesting in the park, you're not going to be like, Oh, nope, I said, I was only gonna go for a walk. And I only be out for an hour, even though I have absolutely nothing to do for the rest of the day. Don't be a rigid jerk to yourself, just because you decided that you were just gonna go for a walk around the park. Like, there's no, there's no reason to, like, be a jerk to yourself. Just because you created some type of arbitrary rule in the first place when you didn't know this cool thing would be there.
I was gonna say, which I think I know the answer to but do you ever set out with one idea in mind and then go in a completely opposite direction?
Constantly?
I feel like we watch your pages evolves
constantly. Sometimes it's because I screw up. Sometimes it's because I start and I'm like, No, this is just a much cooler idea to go in this direction. And sometimes it's because I have no idea. It's happening at all. And it just, it just happens. And it's like, okay, well, this is this is what happens now. And there it is,
as your brain making that connection.
And, and sometimes it's very cool. And sometimes it is not. Yeah. And then that happens.
Well, sometimes this is hiding underneath something on your desk. That helps me that's not me judging. I'm looking around trying to find my scissors right now.
Things tend to roll behind my desk and my arms are unfortunately not long enough to reach under and behind all the way in my desk. So yeah, there needs there's there's not an elegant solution to that. All right, so we're going to wrap up our session with Currently List but before we wrap up with Currently List. Do you guys have anything else to talk? Yes, you guys have anything else to talk to you guys have anything else that you'd like to say about Daily Pages? All right. Try it?
Try it, you'll like it. You'll love it.
Can you tell how about you?
You can't go home. There is no rules. And if you want there to be words, you can put as many of the rules as you want in as well. So the page is yours to play with. And also no one will ever say bad thing and point that she said earlier soldier. I'm trying to think about any kind of a constructor, Chris? None at all, unless you want people to see knows.
And what are your thoughts on Daily Pages?
Yeah, Simon's on right, try it. But one of the things I was thinking about when we were sort of thinking about Daily Pages when you were going to do this, it hadn't really occurred to me before, but I thought actually doing Daily Pages is one of the few times when my family know that they have to leave me alone. No, I cannot help with anything. Unless it is obviously life or death. interrupts me. But it's one of the few times because I'm actually on the call, and they will get caught on camera. So don't be wandering in. So I thought if you think about it, normally when you go to craft, you know, and someone comes in and they need something. There's not that many times you can say, No, I'm too busy go away. Daily Pages, you can say sorry, between five and six. I'm on a call. That's my time. And it's important that I take time for myself and my kids are older now. So it's easy to do. But until I started doing Daily Pages, I didn't really have a time where it was my time. And I say unless it's life and death. Leave me alone. I'm going to create
we laugh but it's it's very, very true. When I was at work, it would be my five to six o'clock in my calendar. Do not book do not block like I wouldn't accept meetings and maybe make a call every now but you It's certainly just about the recruitment. Sorry, I can't I'm busy, I wasn't able to do and I didn't tell him what it was. But it was you know, my lunch break essentially it was my time for sanity and I didn't feel like I needed to justify it. And then since we moved out of the pandemic, and I'm on maternity leave right now my husband knows it's really important to me and whilst we go make it work every day. We do make it more days than often he will try his best to be around or cook dinner and you'll always see him in the background trying to scare me with the children sometimes he loves the job the children interrupting I date and now my toddler says mommy Where are your friends friends on the screen
I want to say hi to my friends
probably even more important kinjo because your kids at the age they are you have very little time really that's your time. Oh yeah.
Yeah, I'm just grateful that there is this very clear boundary and whilst was like it's a chance we can also to change the government. Sorry.
Sorry. To just deal with
it I don't know how long this will continue for I hope for a very very long time, but it is a great and you have to come for the whole court right like 10 minutes here. 15 minutes barely, barely talking.
We know they can draw but our family do not.
The door closed and my son will be like mom is a cool finish. Like no, he's like, Mom, I can't hear anyone else.
This is true that there have been times where we finished at like 25 the hour and I be like, No, we're still going to just finish it by page data.
You guys are hilarious. Beyond six months.
No, darling. Sorry. We just had an extended chat today. It was me but
you guys are fantastic. Okay. So in Daily Pages and on the podcast, Mullen, Daily Pages. We do it on Monday, but in the podcast, we do it on the podcast. We're gonna go through our Currently List. And everyone who's listening you can get the Currently List at the awesome ladies project.com/currently. I'm going to ask you what your currently blank. And we'll go around. I'm going to the room would by just feels weird. We'll go around the room. All right. So what are you currently watching? Let's go this way. And what are you currently watching?
The thief, his wife and the canoe, which was on ITV?
Oh, is it good?
It is and it's a true story.
All right, I'm gonna have to check that one out.
We did see a review of that in the guardian. Actually, I will add it to my list.
kinjo What are you watching? currently?
Not right this second, but I am watching my five month old child trying to get across the room on a regular basis. Right to escape. But I'm watching reruns of community which I started watching in the first lockdown. So I'm like, wait, April 2022 or April 2020. Because I'm very confused because that was one though. And wished in season two. I'm watching like five minutes a day off and not getting into it. But
we shall pass it a little bit of slow start. Okay, okay. It was a little bit of a slow start. Um, Andre, what are you watching?
I'm not watching television at all. Yes.
Are you watching anything else?
I watched the days evolve. I watched mother nature do her thing. I watched the birds and the bees and the flowers and those kinds of things when I'm not watching television. I haven't watched television in a couple of months.
You always tell us about the cool things you're watching out your window, the turkey the traffic soap
those kinds of things. I watch the seasons come and go the trees bloom and unblu Whatever they do, you know the animals forage the clouds and love to watch the clouds.
I love to watch the animals. They're my favorite. Um, what are you currently listening to and
radio for? Which is a little bit depressing because usually morning when I could drive to work it's a news and that you think you do need to know these things.
Yes, yes. kinjo What are you currently listening to? So
many podcasts? I just spent my day this podcast with the baby. scrapbook your way. Your Podcast obviously. Parenting health by Rob Beckett and Josh would have been hilarious even if you have kids honestly the most hilarious thing Well, recently. I was listening to my toddler tell me all the things multiple times, all the time.
So many words. So many words.
Oh, no. What are you listening to?
I listen to podcasts when I'm out walking, and I try to walk at least once a day. My favorite podcast was happier with Gretchen Rubin. In terms of that, I will I listened to Audible books. I've been listening to braiding sweet grass, and I decided that I wanted the print version. So I bought that and it just came I haven't even opened it up. So I listened to music. I listened to Baroque music a lot. It's one of my favorites. So
awesome. I love it so much. I skipped reading and what are you currently reading?
So cuz journey I don't know if that's how you say the name see ilk a journey.
Are you enjoying it?
I am. It's about somebody who was in Auschwitz and now is in Russian camp Siberia. So enjoying might be the wrong word, but it is yes. Good. So far.
That sounds heavy. Yeah.
An ideal before you go to sleep read.
Yeah, totally. I kid you. Oh, how about you? What are you currently writing?
I've just finished dot A for aunties, which was recommendation in Daily Pages. I think that was alright. It was good. It was it was a little bit hard to read. I'm also reading my mess is a bit of my life, which is supposed to be my life is bit of a mess. But the title of the book is my mess a bit of my life. And also what mothers do, especially with those that they're doing nothing at all. Which I can only read a page at a time without reading the entire thing to my husband. And then go okay, we wish him Yeah, I need I'm always up for new book recommendations, actually. So chuck them this way if you have any.
Yeah. was good. That was one that was from Daily Pages. Somebody the Paris apartment. I read that last I thought that was good.
Yeah, I must add that to the library list. Thank you. I'm writing that down now.
Andre, where are you currently reading?
Well, let's see. I just started reading high performance habits by Brendon Burchard. I like to read about habits and habit formation and habit breaking. I am also I just also got a copy of Alice Walker's journal. She actually kept a journal. It's a huge Tome and started it. So that's interesting. She had a very interesting life. She still has a life so that I have I'm not much of a fiction reader. I'm reading right now. Louise Erdrich Ste book and it has two titles and I can't recall what it is. I think the sentence might be one of them. So it's downstairs. I read a lot of different things, but I like nonfiction better basketball. Same
Okay, what do you guys make it? And how about you?
Because we had like the bank holidays, I made a few BOOK OF ME pages. Oh, nice. Catching up with those.
That's fantastic. kinjal How about you?
I've just started what I'm calling Project Life 2022 But I'm not sure what the format and we spoke about this at length so we did with that. Like I
always love it. I love your Lego. Um, I live vicarious sleep through your Lego. Alright, what are you making?
I am in the process of trance, forming handwritten notes about things that I remember throughout my life to day one, which is a program that allows me to put it on the iPad and attach photos to it if I want to. And eventually it will become some kind of book of me but much bigger than what we're doing.
That's awesome. That's
so that's what I'm making all these words into some kind of cohesive format. retrievable.
That's really that'll be really, really great. How are we feeling? And how are you feeling? Are you currently feeling
good? Because I've just done my first ever podcast. Which is not something I ever thought I'd say. And what I was also thinking was, oh, for my one little word this month, I can write Oh, I did a podcast get me
so good.
What's your wording?
Explorer? Explorer? Yeah. Great. It works. Yeah.
A new adventure. Yeah. Can you tell how are you feeling?
I'm feeling oddly energized. Because it's really it's 10 to 10 at night here and I'd be in bed by eight. The children go to bed that I go to bed. So this is like two hours beyond my bedtime. I'm about to the buzzing. Thank you for a wonderful conversation.
You are very welcome. I'm so glad that you could be here. I don't know how you feel them.
I'm feeling quite relaxed. I've had a busy day. And I've enjoyed this. And I think I have a renewed energy for it today. It'll probably dissipate by six o'clock. Yeah.
I'm excited. That's delightful. No. What are we currently planning and what are you planning?
My best day which is tomorrow? Oh, happy
birthday.
Yeah, if the weather's nice, hopefully we'll get out tomorrow.
Oh, that's. That's, that's that's yes. That'll be awesome. Can you tell what are you planning?
I think the weather's 17 tomorrow. So I think you're good. I'm playing Italy. Oh, yeah.
Italy will be delightful. I'm so I'm so excited for you.
I've decided that I might do a journal
of adventures in pasta. Yeah. When I read all the different pasta shapes.
Oh my god. That's so good. If I ever go to Italy, I will definitely have a pasta journal. Yes, right. Yeah, absolutely.
Absolutely not having to spell any of the pasta shapes though. So I've just got to call it bow tie pastor and a pen a pastor and you know,
the one lovely pictures.
Yeah, right. Like you could just draw it and like be like, this is good enough. The one that squiggles squiggles
squiggle, squiggle to
the straight one, the other straight one
I like Yeah, well, I'm from North Jersey, I have to like Italian food. Otherwise they kick you out. honoree, what are you planning?
Oh, I'm planning a trip to the West Coast. Getting closer. So I need to do something concrete. And I'm also trying to create some new pathways. We're making some progress on some things that I've hung around too long and I need to do something with it. So you know, those crazy things in life?
Absolutely. 100% And finally, what are we currently loving? And what are you currently loving?
Obviously awesome. Ladies Daily Pages.
Thank you very much. I love currently I love I love Daily Pages too. I really do. kinjo What are you currently loving?
I wouldn't say like a typical. I'm obviously loving the Daily Pages. I am loving the fact that I haven't given into lipsticks yet, but it's gonna happen. It's gonna happen. My cart is filled. I just have to kick the cake. I was solely all order other database
there. I resisted for quite some time but they are very, very cute stickers and like I am I'm a firm believer that if you buy something and you use all of it, then that's a good purchase.
Do I have to use my other stickers before I buy for lipstick?
No, but if you are getting other subscriptions and you're not using those then you should cancel those.
I have no other subscriptions beyond brandy Ali Edwards. That's it. That's it. Like I just say like I that's not true.
As long as you use something and get good use out of it, then buying it is a
good choice.
And as long as you're not going to like become destitute, and they're going to take your house away, then it's okay. Like, hold the police. Right, hopefully, you know, $20 of stickers is not going to do that.
Take my house away from Lego bricks. I want to dig me out of why.
Yeah, you might have to just make your entire house out of Legos. Your house is going to be built of Legos.
Yeah, it depends. You did that. In the UK. They built the Lego house like a life size Lego house. It was not comfortable.
Yeah, I was gonna say the plumbing might have some issues also.
Hey, yeah, fully functional plumbing and a bed. But
you'd have to wear shoes all the time, too. So now I'm alright. What are you loving?
I wrote on my currently page for this week that I was loving the idea of the page I made. But I didn't like the stamping. So I have been deliberately trying to improve my stamping practice this week. But I don't have any main complaints other than other than other than the days are short and the nights are shorter. I think
the nights are getting shorter. It snowed here on Monday. But it was also laid out until 845, which was a very weird combination. That was a very strange combination. I didn't really like that that much. It felt a little just untethered. Yeah. But yeah, this has been an absolutely fabulous conversation. I have loved talking with the three of you about Daily Pages. I love spending my my noon and kinjo on ends early evening. I have loved spending this time with you. Thank you so much for being on the show. Thank you. If anyone out there wants to learn more about Daily Pages, you can go to the awesome ladies. project.com/daily pages. And thank you so much for listening. We'll talk to you soon. Bye, everybody. Bye. Take care