ode to april

oh my goodness, who did what with april and how did is disappear so quickly?


i have always said that april is my most creative month.  (some proof here)


it seems that every april my creativity comes crawling out of hibernation and goes gangbusters*.  this april has been no exception.  luckily, this april also coincides with me doing the bulk of writing for my upcoming online class, and i can seriously tell you that it is going to be good. really good. yes, i know i am biased, but i've waited a long time to bring this dream to life, and i am over.the.moon. with how it's turning out if i do say so myself.


but i digress. yes, back to april and its inspiration.

 

today i type to you from one of my favorite places.  

here, inspiration oozes from the walls, as well as from the creaky old floorboards, or at least they add quite a bit of charm to the whole vibe.  i distinctly remember sitting in this same place last year, last april in fact, when i was just starting out again after my book was released.  i felt like a fish out of water, flopping around, not knowing which way to turn, and oh-so-sleep-deprived.  it got me for sure, that sleep deprivation, a creativity thief i tell ya.  i was struggling to figure out just how to be an artist again post-baby, and i remember not really having any idea where to start.  so i sat here, in this sunny spot by the river, (see top photo) at this same table in the corner, by the window in fact, and i wrote down some future goals in my sketchbook. it was a list of some basic creative ideas, most of which i thought were just crazy since i felt like i had no time or energy to pull them off, but, they were things that i knew i might want to be able to accomplish someday and i wanted to hold tight to them. the big problem i saw at the time was not knowing if i could ever pull any of them off now that i was a mom.  one of these hard-to-grasp goals was to finally figure out how to make an online workshop. at the time, all sleep deprived and weirded out about being exposed with my book hitting bookshelves and mailboxes, i sat here, wondering what, if anything, the next year would hold outside of baby/mama land. i felt like a fool for writing down grand plans when i knew i just couldn't make any of them happen. 

one year later and i'm happy to report that i was wrong about that. 

things are happening.

i have so much more to share with you on the subject, no, not on the subject of sleep deprivation and worry, but on the subject of how i worked though that stuff, though the unexpected stress of my book release, though the not knowing how to make it all work, and now i can look back and see how things all ended up so sweetly falling into place.  

but, all of that is for another day, perhaps for a {behind the scenes} post you say? why yes, there just might be a new {behind the scenes} post or two all about those sorts of things soon.  

okay, back to the current april for a moment.  i wanted to be sure to squeeze in a blog post today on this last day of april, well, because tomorrow is a big day.  yes it's may day, and my friend amy's birthday, (hi amy!), but it's also the official one year birthday of my book!  whoa.  

i keep thinking about the month of april and how two aprils ago thea and i were setting up the very first photo shoot just so i could figure out how to have some pink magnolia blossoms in book somewhere. (and they made the cover!  we used them to cover up my bump!)  also, two aprils ago i was SUPER pregnant, so much so that i could barely move around the studio when we had all of the photo equipment set up for our shoots.  and one year later, in the following april, the book started making its way out into the world and i had a crazy little 11 month old who could barely walk or talk. seriously, this is how she looked when she first saw the book.  fast forward to this april, to today, when as i left her to head here to write, she was sitting up at the table, eating her lunch all by herself, and she said "i love you, mama". i felt like i hit the lottery.  

oh and yes, just like my baby, the book came into the world early, and completely threw totally me for a loop. but, both continue to surprise me and make me happy almost every day so i can't complain. 

happy birthday painted pages, i've decided that a little birthday celebration is in order this week.  i hope you'll join me here, there could be a fun goodie bag in it for you :) 

and to april, thanks again for all you do... 


*gangbusters, who knew!?