2015 will be my third year of making something every day. I started in 2013 with the idea of making things to increase my creativity and to work on my art skills and to start building a portfolio. I wanted to call myself an artist but in order to do that, I had to be working as an artist. I’m more comfortable calling myself that now but it still sometimes sticks in my throat when someone new asks me what I do. That’s probably a topic for another post or at least a session with a therapist, so onward to the 2015 Making Something Guidelines!

In November, I started brainstorming how this year’s project would look. I need to be able to stay accountable/on task, so every day is still a great plan. I contemplated word of the month/day/quarter themes. I contemplated 40 questions I wanted to answer/explore in 2015. As in I actually wrote down something like 60 questions to choose from. I wondered if I wanted to focus on a particular medium or type of project. I don’t want to limit myself so much I get annoyed but having a focus seems like it might be useful. Concentrating on finishing a certain number of canvases/larger pieces last year seemed to motivate me pretty well. It was flexible but still gave me a bit of focus. So I spent a lot of time thinking about what I could do that would be similar.

So here’s the plan!

2015: Year of the Book
• Every day.
• 20 minutes.
• Post a photo.
• Finish 8-10 books this year.
• Keep the yarn posts to a minimum.

What will these books look like? Hmm, I’m guessing lots of blues and greens, gelli prints, and my usual business. I have a list of ideas I’ll be working from. I’m hoping to explore some different types of bookmaking since that has always fascinated me. I don’t know yet if these will be items I’ll sell as one of a kind finished art pieces or if they will be blank books for someone to use. I don’t know if I’ll be writing more or using more quotes. I’m interested to see where the year goes. I’m hoping you will join me for the ride!

As my second year of making something every day comes to a close, I wanted to take a few minutes and bask in the glory of things completed and post a few stats to remember from the year.

I posted 273 days of pictures of things I made. There is a week by week log of the year here on the blog.

I made: postcards, pages in various art journals, scarves, gloves, arts and science projects with the kids, cakes, dishcloths, shawls, art boxes, so many, many gelli prints, books, project posters with Eli, canvases: ranging in sizes from 3×5″ to 3×4′, amigurumi superheroes and a monkey, blankets, Easter eggs, ATCs, scarves, messy art projects for the kids at church, sweaters, greeting cards, art tags, and a couple of hats.

I learned to knit and to Tunisian crochet this past year. I judged a craft competition and crocheted at the top of the space needle.

One of my goals for 2014 was to complete some larger pieces. I finished around 25 pieces of canvas or large paper work. I sold seven of those for actual money!

Since I tried not to let the crochet take over the 2014 making, I didn’t always post what I was crocheting or what I finished. Here’s my crochet year from Ravelry:

To wrap up this year, here’s a look at my very messy space that I must clean out in order to start the 2015 project! Usually the messy side of the desk belongs to Stephen but this week, it’s all mine!

I’ll be posting about the plan for 2015 soon. It’s gonna be a bit different from the past 2 years and I’m pretty excited about it.