Creative Every Day 2008

Here's the new page for Creative Every Day in 2009!

Here are the basics first! "Creative Every Day 2008" is a new challenge I've started to help infuse my life and lives of others with daily creativity.

  • Creativity is meant in the broadest sense, so it doesn't have to be something art related. Your creative acts could be in cooking, taking pictures, knitting, doodling, writing, dancing, decorating, or making art in the form of collage, paint, or clay or whatever!
  • You do not have to post every day! I know for myself that having to post every day for a year would be too much. You can post about your creativity in whatever form you like, whether that be once a day, a few times a week, once a week, or once a month. Do what works for you!
  • This is a low pressure challenge, with the idea of bringing more creativity into our lives. I will not be the creativity police. I hope that we can all find ways simple and grand to express our creative selves. Have fun with it!
  • If you'd like to join in, leave a comment on my blog or email me and I'll add your name to the list of participants which is in the sidebar of my blog.
  • If you find this challenge after the 1st of January, you can still join in!
  • There's info below on how to post the CED button to your blog.
  • There's a flickr group for this project where you can share images of your creativity (it's not required, just another way to share and see what others are doing.) You can sign up for the flickr group for free here: http://www.flickr.com/groups/creativeeveryday2008/
  • You can post about your creativity in whatever form feels best for you. You can post about it on your blog daily, weekly, monthly or however feels best. A blog isn't even required to participate! You can also share what you're up to in the comments on my blog or on the flickr group.

Here's the background:

I'm planning a new challenge for 2008 called "Creative Every Day 2008" and I welcome anyone who is interested to join in! Every year, I love the way the "Art Every Day Month" challenge (AEDM) creates a great sense of community, brings together people with different styles and backgrounds, and gives me a kick in the butt to keep on creating when I might otherwise do nothing. I've been wanting to find a way to extend the process, but as much as I admire those who create and post a piece of art every day of the year, I knew that would burn me out. Besides, it's not really my goal to create a piece of art every day. But I do want to be creative every day.

Originally, I was going to call my blog, "Everyday Creative" which to me means a person who is creative in their day-to-day life whether that be through making a piece of artwork or doodling on a receipt or cooking something or taking a walk to gain inspiration in the colors of nature or re-decorating a room or knitting or whatever! That domain name was taken, so I went with CreativeEveryDay.com and included Everyday Creative in the tag line. One of the things I aspire to is to be creative every day and also to inspire creativity in others whether that be through my blog, my art, through leading groups like AEDM, or through someday leading workshops or writing a book. I know that challenging myself in specific ways helps to keep me productive, so I'm hoping this challenge will serve as a daily reminder of what I want for myself.

2007 was a wonderful year for me and I want to keep up that momentum and kick it into a whole new gear with a year of being Creative Every Day. I've made a logo for it which is at the top of this post (simply right click and save to use on your blog.) It will also be in my sidebar along with a list of those who are participating. You don't need a blog to participate! Again, this will be a very low pressure challenge. I won't be the creativity police with you (or myself!) The idea behind it will be to encourage myself and others to find creativity in every day and in the everyday things of life. I won't post daily because I think that would be a bit too much of a burden for me, but I will post about every day's creativity in some form or another. And I'll encourage others to do the same, whether that be every day, every few days, once a week or once a month. Throughout the year, I'll also be posting creativity tips that help me and hopefully will provide some inspiration to anyone looking to infuse their life with more creative goodness or who might need a little push to get out of a stuck place. If you have questions or want to join in, feel free to pop me an email or leave a comment on any post on my blog here.

Thanks and happy creating!

Quick notes: in order to use the Creative Every Day button located in the sidebar (and below), simply right-click on the image and save it to your computer. Different blogging applications have different ways of adding images to your blog, but all have help sections which should be able to direct you to instructions on how to do it.

If you use typepad, I wrote a quickie tutorial for posting blog buttons for a different group here. And here's a tutorial from another blogger on adding a picture to your sidebar.