3 Creative Summer Things

In my most recent personal newsletter (#11 pandemic slide) I wrote about lowering the bar in terms of summer planning, and also my nervous system’s desperate need to replace crankiness with creativity. Because OMG I have been trying so hard to not be cranky and keep my spirits up but June pretty much broke me and I was so cranky and disheartened through much of it.

In that newsletter essay I shared about my very short creative summer bucket list; notably there were only seven items on it (yay for lowering the bar!) and I wanted to share about three of those things with you today in more detail because, wow, the delight factor has been wonderful.

1. Read a novel out loud with Violet

Violet (9-years-old) is a voracious reader and given that I love reading too, once she started chapter books I basically stopped reading to her so I could do my own thing. Especially with the addition of our puppy James and the demands that come with raising a puppy, I know I haven’t been giving her a ton of connection time so I decided that this summer I wanted to read a novel out loud to her. Over the weekend we started reading Wonder by R. J. Palacio and wow, has it been lovely to read together. I can see why the book is a bestseller, and the cuddly reading time is totally filling Violet’s tank (and mine too!). If you want to follow suit but have already read Wonder, here are some other read alouds.

Wonder by R. J. Palacio; image via Bookshop

2. Create art with my kids

Again, like many parents, when my kids get into an art project (or any kind of independent activity) I usually scramble to do my own thing. However, especially given how much my life is centered around the Internet, I know it's important for me to do creative things with my hands. It always feels so good yet I quickly lose sight of that fact, you know? I signed up for this Simplified Classes watercolor class and it’s been so fun to paint with the girls! There’s also a kid-specific watercolor class and I’m thinking about trying the lettering class as well!

3. Launch a new podcast

I love creating things and developing new projects and, well, yesterday I launched a new podcast! Hello Relationships is a podcast designed to help you focus on common issues in relationships to stop small aggravations from becoming big problems so you can learn to grow and communicate better, whether that’s with a partner, your family, friends, or co-workers. I’m co-hosting this relationship with my therapist husband, so that’s also new and different and it has been so fun!

I hope you will carve out time for creativity this summer. Everything is so challenging right now. It really is the case that we need to find the little pockets of joy to help us through.