one little word // an update.

So I kind of sort of gave up but not really gave up on One Little Word. Basically, I started to get backed up on the album and then it was all downhill from there. But if I know one thing, it's that I'm still completely involved with my word, grow.

I have made a lot of changes (in particular, this one) in myself this year, and if I think back to the me from January who was so excited about the year ahead and starting this project, I think she would be happy, probably a little confused, but definitely happy with the way this year has unfolded.

When I started OLW, I used this quote: "I just wanna go on more adventures. Be around good energy. Connect with people. Learn new things. Grow." That is exactly what I feel like I have done this year. I started the year in a very different place, but where I've gotten myself feels good. I have a new job, a job that I freakin love (though I still miss my babies every single day), I'm surrounding myself with people who are positive and alive and want to be around me, and I'm learning new things every day. I went on an epic travel adventure this summer, and I go on mini adventures on a much smaller scale all the time. I'm happy. I'm growing. Life is good.

So no, I haven't really been using the monthly prompts to keep creating a book with all of my progress made this year, but I have this blog, project life, and my memory to keep this time in my life alive. I am proud of myself and the strong person I have let myself grow into this year, and I'm excited for what's ahead in the rest of this year, and moving even further forward.

one little word album // march 2014.

Last week I posted my one little word vision board for my word, grow. There weren't any pages to print out this month for adding to the album, but I wanted to do more than just add my March reflection and a new intention. I decided to go ahead and take a photo of my vision board and print it at a full page size to add to the album so that the work I did with my word in March was represented.Because I used a square canvas, I had to print it to the width of the pocket protector I was using (about 8.25 inches), and then mount it on a piece of cardstock to add to the height (11 inches). I could have just trimmed an insert to make a square and then sealed off the cut edges, but in my head I envisioned cutting up the large photo to fit into the nine pocket page protector, so that's what I went with.After cutting the photo I added the date to the bottom right pocket and called it a night. I might go back in and add some journaling on the cardstock about my process, but for now, I like it a lot and I think it's a great thing to have in the album so that it feels whole and complete at the end of the year. On the back are nine squares of cardstock from the backing of the photo, so I'll have to see what I want to do with that as well as I start to work through April on the album.*To see the full page view of the reflections and intentions pages, see this post from last month.

one little word 2014: vision board.

March's "assignment" for One Little Word was to create a vision board that would be a few things: a reminder of your word, reasons why you chose it, intentions for the year under this word as a guide, motivation to keep the word in your daily life, and I'm sure plenty of others for all types of people who participate. For me, making this board was almost therapeutic. I enjoyed combing through magazines for inspiring phrases and words that clicked for me and my word, grow. In the beginning I had a thought along the lines of, "how am I going to find words and phrases that mean something to this project in a stack of old cosmos?" but man, I was wrong. There are so many ads and articles that contain words and phrases that could really be viewed however you want them to be. A surprising number of the cut outs I used were from hair product ads, which is hilarious to me that hair ads are so seemingly inspirational, but hey, whatever works.I didn't find the word "grow" in any of the magazines, at least not in anything big enough to capture my attention, so I decided to do what I did for my lyric canvas and add vinyl letters to the middle of the canvas to spell out grow. I painted in gold (with this) over the word and used whatever paint I had left on my brush to extend out to the edges of the canvas, which wasn't much, but because I knew most of it was going to be covered, there wasn't a need for it to be "perfect". Because of the way canvas sits, I knew that the paint was going to bleed into the cracks under the stickers, but instead of going in with white as I intended, I thought I'd leave them because I liked the whole concept of "blurred lines" and how this project can be interpreted in any way that you need it to for your own life. After the paint dried I used adhesive spray to adhere all of the little magazine clippings to the canvas. I thought about using a roller to just quickly attach everything, but I bought some adhesive spray a long time ago, and that's what Ali used so I decided to roll with it. I'm so glad I used it. This stuff is my new best friend, but a warning: make sure you lay down a newspaper or spray over something disposable because this stuff is no joke, it's very very sticky and will get all over everything if you're not careful.Once I was finished with it I was so pleased with how cohesive everything ended up being (in my own mind). All of these phrases and snippets of sentences have made me feel connected to my word in a much different way than the assignments of the past two months have, and I'm excited to have it up on my wall to look at whenever I need to be reminded of why I chose this word and why it's important to me. I hung it up with these, this, and this, and the wall that they're all on is starting to look really great. Eventually I'll have enough things up that it will be worth photographing, but this canvas filled a significant empty space that I've been staring at for weeks, so this project was a win, win.

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One Little Word is a workshop run by Ali Edwards in which participants choose one word to focus on for an entire year. Join Ali, myself, and many others on this journey by learning more and signing up for the class here, read about Ali's OLW here, and see all of my related posts for OLW 2014 here.

one little word album // february 2014.

February kind of flew for me, so I actually didn't pick up my album until a few days ago even though I had the month's printables laying on my desk all month. When Ali put up February's handout, I immediately jotted a few things down in the notebook I'm using to keep all of my OLW things organized, and I started to connect with grow in yet another new and fresh way.Basically, February was all about beginning the reflection process that will continue each month for the rest of the year, as well as the intentions process, which was introduced in January, but now completely put into action with the aid of intention cards to hold yourself accountable (visuals like this really help me personally with this type of thing).Each month has a reflection card, so January and February are now filled in. I put the rest of the months in the first and second column of a nine pocket page and cut off the last column. I tabbed that with "reflections", and rather than do the same thing on the next page with the twelve intention cards, I did what Ali did and staggered them. I printed out a few photos of me (#selfie) and a few quotes that I found on pinterest that are on my grow board for inspiration.I only filled out five of the intentions so far, because from the time I wrote down my intentions in my notebook in early February (I wrote down eight), I have already kind of accomplished three of them by the time I was ready to write them down on the designated cards. So I re-thought my intentions process and chose a few intentions that are year long (life long, really), and a few that are more of a one off type of thing.I'll leave the rest blank, and I have a feeling that within the next couple of months they'll all be full of great intentions that mean a little more to me. For now I am happy with the way my album is coming along and I am ready to jump into March's material.

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One Little Word is a workshop run by Ali Edwards in which participants choose one word to focus on for an entire year. Join Ali, myself, and many others on this journey by learning more and signing up for the class here, read about Ali's OLW here, and see all of my related posts for OLW 2014 here.

one little word album // january 2014.

This album is going to be a lot of fun to make, but more importantly, it's making me feel really connected with my one little word, grow. Writing down all of my intentions and wishes for what this word means to me and will continue to mean to me for the rest of the year has made me realize how willing and able I am to change the things I can control and keep moving forward in the way that I need to in order to be the greatest version of myself possible. I'm hopeful + excited.I'm using a we r memory keepers album and page protectors (these + these) by recommendation, and obviously all of the inserts are coming from the class page. (It's never too late to join in).This month's task was to fill out the sheets Ali made up for the class, things like filling in the definition of the word, why you chose it, your intentions for the year regarding the word you chose, and more. Another task was to use a transparency page to stick your word onto (easier to see it in the photo above, but it's backwards). The last things I did was the 'self portrait' which is pictured above. It is supposed to be a picture you want to use to start with to remember where you were at the beginning. Even though I just took that picture last week and not at the beginning of the process, I feel like I gave myself enough time to marinate in the word before snapping a shot.So far I am happy with what I have. Ali gave a lot of specific guidelines for the album this month, so I feel like I mostly just followed her instruction to give myself a good foundation for the rest of the year. As time goes on I think I'll be able to feel the project out a little more and decide where I want to go with this album creatively. However, I've never participated in the class before and am not completely sure how it's structured in terms of the album and tasks, so we shall see.February, come at me.

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One Little Word is a workshop run by Ali Edwards in which participants choose one word to focus on for an entire year. Join Ali, myself, and many others on this journey by learning more and signing up for the class here, read about Ali's OLW here, and see all of my related posts for OLW 2014 here.

one little word art canvas.

For one little word, it's recommended that you purchase something to remind you of your word - most commonly a piece of jewelry, or this year Ali recommended the word art she bought for her word, thrive. I love the idea of the recycled word art, but I didn't really want to spend thirty dollars on it. At the time that I saw Ali post about the word art, I hadn't even had a word picked out yet. I knew this meant that I would make something myself to hang up or put on a shelf so that I could be reminded of my word and this journey all the time. Then I went to Michael's for a couple of little things and the problem was solved for me when I noticed that all canvases were 50% off that day. I was going to simply paint the word on a canvas. I picked up some new paint brushes because my old ones were pretty kaput, and I put everything aside until I figured out the word that I was going to connect with.

I decided on a black canvas because I want to hang it over my desk where a few framed prints are going to be hung, which are all white and gold. The black would be a nice, neutral color change for the space, and the word would stand out on the dark background. I was unsure at first whether I wanted my word, grow, to be in white or gold, but after testing the two colors on a piece of newspaper, I was sold on the contrast of the white against the black canvas.

I really love the way it turned out. It's simple and big and exactly what I need it to be. I'll see it multiple times a day, and it's going to compliment the other things going on this (obnoxiously purple) wall. Having this piece of art has made me even more excited that I was before about this year and the journey that I am taking with this word in mind to focus, reflect, and meditate on.

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One Little Word is a workshop run by Ali Edwards in which participants choose one word to focus on for an entire year. Join Ali, myself, and many others on this journey by learning more and signing up for the class here, read about Ali's OLW here, and see all of my related posts for OLW 2014 here.

grow.

This year I am expecting a lot from myself. I'm not really one for resolutions if I'm being honest, particularly because it always makes me feel like I'm letting myself down when I don't follow through. This year I am participating in Ali Edward's One Little Word class, which revolves around having one word to focus on during the entire year that will help you as an individual to make a difference in your life. I could not be more excited to welcome this experience into my life instead of a resolution that you and I both know I probably won't keep based on most of the human species' track records.When I started to think of a word that I could use to define my desires and goals for this year, I went back and forth with a few, but just couldn't seem to find one that made me go ah-ha! Finally, it came to me while I was lying in bed worrying about the usual things. Grow. I need to grow this year. And not in the sense that I'm short (I'm not) or immature, but in a more profound way. I want to grow this year in all aspects of life: emotionally, spiritually, physically (I don't want to actually grow physically, but work more on growing my knowledge and understanding of healthy living and fitness), creatively, and within my existing and new relationships.For me specifically, this type of growth means rebuilding my relationship with God, doing more things that spark and nurture my creativity, applying healthy changes to my lifestyle, making attainable goals and going for them one step at a time instead of all at once and fearing failure, and becoming more patient in my everyday life. This also means less worrying, less distractions, less irritability (especially when it comes to the people I love), less trying to be superwoman and getting down on myself when I realize I can't be, and less time spent dreaming and wishing about what I want - more do.

I am so excited about this coming year because of this project. What I expect from this experience is to gain a better understanding of who I am and what I need to do for myself to change the things about my life that I can control. Once I start seeing small changes in myself, I can channel it to work towards my goals and be the person I want and need to be. I am so ready for this year to be great.

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One Little Word is a workshop run by Ali Edwards in which participants choose one word to focus on for an entire year. Join Ali, myself, and many others on this journey by learning more and signing up for the class here, read about Ali's OLW here, and see all of my related posts for OLW 2014 here.