What I learned from Illustrating a Children’s book
What do you like to create?
While I spend a lot of time helping others uncover their creative process and how that connects to the type of work that they create, sometimes, I forget to do the same for myself.
While studying Art Education at Messiah University, I realized that I enjoy creating beautiful function objects, which led to many years of designing and selling one-of-a-kind handwoven scarves.
2020 and 2021 were years filled with many unplanned transitions. Moving, changing job titles, and surgeries. These unplanned events seemed to take up all of the open spaces that I used to fill with creating, and as time passed, I forgot how much joy creating brings to my life.
Remembering my love for making
My older brother, Ashley, enjoys writing children’s books. Crafting stories was first inspired by his teaching, and slowly developed into a desire to write down and publish the stories to share with a larger audience, besides his already captivated elementary students. This meant that he needed an illustrator and someone to help with the self-publishing process.
Eventually, I said yes. After spending a day immersed in creating. Surrounded by piles of paper and paint, and I remember how much I LOVED to make things. Books, being one of the many types of objects I learned to create and love while in college.
Reflecting, of course, I would love to create a children’s book. It’s the perfect combination of creativity and function. And now that I’ve awakened my joy for creating, I’m planning for 2022 to be filled with creating beautiful and functional things.
What part of yourself have you neglected?
Looking for more inspiration?
- This post shares more about the process that my brother goes through to write a story.
- Listen to this podcast to learn more about what I learned about self-publishing.
- Check out How the Bear Met the Bee. It’s a great book for elementary students and comes with activities, making it perfect for sub plans.
- This is a great clip from Craft in American about book-making.