Sunflowers & Dragonflies

Have you Caught the (writers-block) Bug?

Have you caught the bug?  You know, the one that takes away your enthusiasm for studio time, or even a lack of direction for inspiration?  Well, there’s help on it’s way.

Today I thought it would be fun to share a number of ways to jump start your next project.

Top 10 sources of inspiration

1.  Walk away from your studio. It sounds simple enough, but sometimes we get caught up in the “I must create” mode.  Everyone needs a break from being creative.  Take a walk, or grab a cup of coffee, then come back to where you left off.  Sometimes a small break  is all you need to get your mojo back.  Leave your project and come back to it the next morning for a fresh view.

2.  Turn off the TV and turn on the tunes.  TV can be distracting.  Turn on your favourite music, dance a little jig, and sing along while colouring and cutting.  Trust me, it’s fun.

3.  Turn to a sketch site.   Sketches are designed to jump start your mojo.  Flip the sketch, turn it around, do whatever you want with it to make it your own.  Here are five sketch sites to jump start your next project:

• Splitcoast Stampers
• Card Positioning Sketches
• Pencil Lines
• Sketches:  Creatively Yours
• Stampin’ When I can.   See daily web posted sketches.

4.  Grab one of your favourite cards that you have laying around in your studio.  What do you like about it?  Is it the layout, the colours or even the image?  Create a new card by changing out the colours, using new designer paper or Cuttlebug template, or even a new image.

5.  Digital Stamps are the rage.  Tired of all your stamps?  Never mind that you have 100+ stamps; everyone can use a new one.  Have you thought of going digi?  Digis are inexpensive and a good way of adding a new image to your collection at a low cost.  Here are five popular digi sites for you to check out:

• I Brake for Digis
• Squigglefly
• Mo’s Digital Pencil
• Some Odd Girl
• My Favourite Things

6.  Have you had something on your mind in the last week? Why not blog about it.   You can match up your blog post with a photo at one of the many free I stock photo sites.  Sometimes one needs to get away from the studio table, and just write about what is on your mind.
7.  Look around you for inspiration. Look at the clothes in your closet.  Notice a colour palate?  Look at magazines for colour inspiration or for layout ideas.

8.  Challenges are popular. No matter what style you like to do, there is a challenge site for you:

• Cardvarks
• Dutch Dare
• Splitcoast Stampers
• Small World of Inchies and Twinchies
• Tilda and Friends ATC Challenges

9.  Need colour inspiration? Here are some fantastic sites:

• My Create Ink – Hurray, a new SU site has been opened by the original owner of the old site, and now her brother is aboard too.
• DeGraeve is a powerful site that allows you to upload a photo and creates a colour palate
• COLOURlovers has lots of colour palates to pick from.
• Color Scheme Designer allows you to click on the wheel to see colour combinations.  Click on the very top of the page (to the left) to pick what colour style you are looking for.  Pretty cool.

10. 5 popular blogs

• Hero Arts
• Moxie Fab World
• Teesha Moore
• LilyBean’s Paperie
• Thinking Inking

Not only do I love to share, but I loe to learn from others.  Please let me know what you liked, and what I missed.   I would love to visit the sites you send me too.  Who knows, maybe I’ll blog about it.

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