The brain has a fantastic way of overriding itself to help us get what we’re lacking and wouldn’t ordinarily be able to get because we’re neurotic and perfectionist and…well you get the idea.

Laziness is what I’m talking about here. R&R. Leisure. It’s probably as critical to a person’s well-being as, say, Vitamin C or Riboflavin. I find that every now and then, I find myself faced with a weekend full of things that should get done, and my mind just goes, “Mlaaaah.” And before I know it, I’ve spent hours miraculously devoted to one quiet task at a time: reading — reading — a stack of magazines, standing at the back door admiring the garden for the duration of a cup of coffee, catching up on episodes of Bones, lying on the couch with my legs stretched across my husband’s lap and listening to music with my eyes closed while he works on his laptop, enjoying an impromptu Netflix double feature. And all the while I hear not a peep from that nagging voice, which expects me to get myself busy doing something useful. It seems the nagging voice gets worn out sometimes, too.

Most of the time I hate myself afterward, thinking of all that hath gone undone, like having one too many doughnuts if such a thing is possible. Once in a blue moon, I look forward and think, “Ahh, that was just the thing.” My guess is that it’s just as important to sometimes give into the craving for calm as it is for that glass of milk or carrot sticks with peanut butter or a doughnut. Not too much — just enough to feel whole again.

Who knows? It might help you tackle those nagging to-dos with enthusiasm and energy. And start new projects with gusto.

Two questions typically race through my mind when I hear of an impending major do-not-leave-your-home weather event: Do I have enough craft supplies? and Do I have enough flour? In other words, when I’m trapped inside for a weekend, there’s a 2 in 3 chance that at any moment you can find me doing one of two things — making or baking. Crafting or cooking.

So you might find it ironic (as I did do) that my personal recipe collection is so haphazard. And ugly. Scribbled notes on the backs of receipts, in notebooks, on index cards of various sizes. Printouts from the Web. Pages cut and torn from magazines. Most get stashed in a pile or stuffed in a book. Do you know that one year I developed the PERFECT dairy/egg-free pumpkin pie, and no sooner than I had licked the pie plate clean I had LOST THE RECIPE? All thanks to my brilliant recipe filing system.

I know it makes no sense, and its nonsensicalness is twofold because I am both a designer and one of those neurotic people who panics if her shopping cart isn’t organized right. This is someone who should be capable of devising an organizational system and making it pretty. And yet, I’ve found no method that really appeals to me.

Until now!

I whipped up these simple recipe cards one snowy weekend, and boy howdy do they fit me just right. I can have my recipes just the way I like them: neatly typed and nicely designed — with the ingredients section clearly separated from the instructions — low maintenance, not overly cute or pretty or frilly or decorative, and subtly humorous (to me, at least). I suppose after years of cooking, you would develop a better sense of what works for you. Still, it’s amazing how after all this time, the right solution could be so quick and simple.

Eventually, I figure, it will come. I will discover the secret to just making stuff up and designing it and planning out the production. Jen will get more phone calls or e-mails from me begging to borrow her love of repetitive, tedious projects. And Oomphasis will churn out lots of stuff. To go in the shop, which is incredibly fun to say. Eventually, every few weekends will be like last weekend, when we sat down for a few short hours and made Valentines. (Which will be in the shop as soon as I remember to photograph them by the daylight.)

If you’re thinking that it looks like something designed under the intense pressure of a loyal helper’s eagerness to get crafty, spontaneously, within about five minutes, well then that’s because it was designed spontaneously, within about five minutes, under the intense pressure of my loyal helper’s eagerness to get crafty.

I had a pile of eucalyptus leaves left over from some flower arranging I had done earlier. Eucalyptus leaves are a bit pointy at the ends, and fairly round otherwise. As it turns out, they make excellent little hearts, which, naturally, make excellent, un-red, un-pink, Valentine cards. I like it that way: un-red and such.

I was cutting the stem end off. Jen cut them from the other side and we ended up with a bunch of little leaf heart “balloons.” Silly me; as everyone knows, stems make for far more endearing leaf hearts.

And if you’re thinking that it looks like I still haven’t taken down my Christmas tree, here, over a month past Christmas, I implore you to look again.

Because a Valentine tree might look uncannily similar to a Christmas tree at first glance, but as everyone knows, they’re completely different.

I want to come clean: I regularly read wedding blogs. Of course, by “read” I mean “mostly just look at photos.” Aside from a general penchant for hyperbole and overuse of words like, “gorgeousness,” “gorgeous,” and — God help me — “lovely,” I find that they’re often a good source of inspiration for everything from graphic design, to interior decorating, to photography.

One such blog, Style Me Pretty, offers a tool for creating your own inspiration boards. For day-to-day design, I keep something more like an “inspiration scrapbook” (I like a hard copy to flip through), but using the SMP inspiration board tool sure is fun. And, as it turns out, it’s exceptionally handy if you’re planning any sort of special event, even one that’s not related to weddings. A special event like, oh, I don’t know…

]]> http://oomphasisdesign.com/2010/01/inspirationpalooza/feed/ 0 http://oomphasisdesign.com/2009/11/once-upon-my-mind/ http://oomphasisdesign.com/2009/11/once-upon-my-mind/#comments Mon, 23 Nov 2009 20:14:08 +0000 Sarah http://oomphasisdesign.com/?p=222

Not long ago, I made a pact with myself to be more brave with art and design, and life in general. I think I’m making baby steps — decent psychological progress toward standing more confidently behind my own ideas when presenting them to other people. But what’s struck me lately is the sting of disagreement, uncertainty, or rejection; even though I think I’ve got a pretty thick skin when it comes to criticism of my work, I guess when you start putting more of yourself into and behind it, you still bleed when someone else comes along and says “I don’t think that’ll work,” or “I don’t get it,” or “Yuck.” Ouch.

It looks like I’ve reached Be More Brave, Stage 2: shake it off and get back on.

You know what’s tough? Collaborating with non-designers/artists, which is not to say non-creative people, but people who tend to visualize things in black and white. Which is to say, they are quite literal when it comes to designing and decorating. Which I suppose is the opposite of imagination.

Normally, I can deal with this. It’s easy when they accept that you’re both creative and smart, and they trust your creative instincts to pull everyone’s ideas together in a cohesive, tasteful way. But some people get blinded their own perception, and they go and take your description of (blank)-inspired and interpret it to mean (blank)-themed. And they tell you so! You say, “I was thinking of a nautical-inspired design,” and they come back with “Yeah! I like the idea of a nautical theme!” MEGA-CRINGE.

I mean, I’m thinking about a design that layers textures and patterns and colors to evoke the idea of something, and they’re picking and choosing from every motif known to culture and making it fit a predetermined color scheme, which MUST NOT deviate from tradition. I just — it doesn’t… no.

And that’s why I’m suggesting that we take the word “theme” and burn it in effigy, and then forget it ever existed. Ever. Can we?

Still, I’m not sure whether it’s harder to work with someone who’s stubbornly fixed in one creative direction or someone who passes all control off to you because, to them, you are a creative GODDESS. I’ve always been one who liked working within parameters. I like the challenge of meeting a set of requirements in the most creative way I can think of.

The total lack of direction tends to throw me off; the total refusal to have anything to do with coming up with a direction makes me want to tear out my hair and jab out my eyeballs and run screaming like a banshee through the countryside. I’m not magical. Even mediocre design isn’t as easy as an incantation.

And yet, I suppose it ought to be flattering because is it not the hallmark of greatness to appear effortless and completely natural, as though what you have created was always meant to be just as you created it? That would be fantastic and also weird because very often, I believe I really have no idea what I’m doing.

To be trusted completely or hardly at all? To be free to roam about or to be met with resistance at every turn? It probably doesn’t matter: both are equally challenging. It seems the most important thing is to remember that thing about being brave. Shake it off. Get back on. Kill “theme.” And live creatively ever after.