I can’t believe that Christmas is right around the corner!  I’ve been planning my last minute gifts that I’ll be picking up locally, and thankfully (miraculously!) everything that I ordered in from Etsy arrived by last week. I’m looking forward to a night of wrapping presents in front of the fireplace channel and/or Breaking Bad, depending on how festive I’m feeling.

I’ve been looking for little ways to infuse this week with more holiday charm, and I thought it would be fun to share some here- from having a cozy PJ robe for Christmas morning (and after new years!) to using simple white candles and star anise as decorations, to painted peanut ornaments and a little sparkle. Most important, I’m making sure that my evenings are free so I don’t too many commitments and can enjoy some quiet, nesting time leading up to the big family dinners that are around the corner. A little reading & wine in a quiet home in the days before everyone gets together strikes the perfect balance for me.

One  DIY Washi Tape Star by Papernstitch at Creature Comforts / Two  Furry Wreath DIY at The Nester / Three  Santa Peanuts at RawBoneStudio / Four  Gingerbread House Tutorial at Not Martha / Five  Ribbon Bow at Lichen and Lychee / Six  Simple Star Anise & White Candle Setting at Hus & Hem via Kelly Ann / Seven  Opal Sparks Pouch at Anthropologie / Eight  Stripped PJ Robe at Top Shop

Do you have any tricks that help you stay balanced at this time of year?

I come from a blended family that gets really along well & we’ve recently decided to get everyone together for the holidays instead of having multiple pieces of our family getting together at different times on the same day. It’s been a lovely change that simplifies the holidays!

One of the things that I’ve been working on recently is setting aside dedicated time to hang out with Jesse. Owning Freckled Nest is my passion and the work that I do makes me so happy it’s hard to describe- but in day to day life, it’s like my business partner Leigh-Ann and I have a child together who we need to take care of from the moment she wakes up until she goes to sleep. It’s not really possible to balance that with the rest of my life- so instead I try to shape when I work around my life in a way that makes me as happy & energized as possible, and part of that means making sure I have lots of time to catch up with Jesse.

One of the best things for getting me away from the laptop has been going to Winnipeg Jets games this winter. We were lucky to get in on the public sale and split season tickets with friends. I’m not a big sports girl but I love live games, and being season ticket holders has helped me give more evenings to  hanging out with Jesse, along with Jesse’s best friend and his fiance. We’re going to Mexico for their wedding next month, and it’s been to hang out on a weekly basis and as a lead up to the trip!

This week Jesse left for Ontario on work & then returns for a night before heading out on a trip to his best friend’s bachelor party in Vegas, and all last week I was working really hard on launching client projects. We decided to make this weekend a time to catch up, so we spent Friday night on the couch watching our favourite show, chatting and goofing around, went to the hockey game on Saturday and ventured out early on Sunday for a big tasty brunch before his flight left.

With Jesse’s work meaning he has to travel to Ontario more frequently than before it was nice to have dedicated together time in the days before this trip. While I might not travel for my work, because I can work from the studio or home at any time, sometimes without realizing it I can slip into living in the Land of Online which might as well be across the country. When that happens, it’s good to know that simple things like brunch can be the perfect answer for bringing me back to earth.

And it doesn’t hurt that it’s a lovely excuse for yummy weekend meals made by someone else! ;)

The early winter is one of my favourite times of the year- the snow is fluffy & light without the world being too cold, it’s cozy enough to drink tea & read books all the time, and I can happily burrow into projects without feeling like I’m missing out on beautiful weather. It’s perfect for me!

Last week was the start of some serious crazy in our lives- Jesse started the first of three trips between now and Christmas. I’m not usually very sentimental about the holidays, but because we knew this would be a stressful time we decided to start celebrating the holidays early so we could have more time at home together with an “almost Christmas” feeling. We put the tree & mistletoe up before US Thanksgiving, and now every morning when I make my way down the staircase to make tea & breakfast I get to walk by a fully lit tree.

I know that it’s on a timer (thank you, husband) but there’s something about not having to turn on the lights on your Christmas tree that makes it a lot more magical. Even if that magic is brought to me by a tiny, timer shaped robot.

So the early morning drives to the airport and solo puppy tending are starting for me, but I’m working on embracing having a little rush & hurriedness as part of the holidays- and the dogs are learning how to manage having me as their sole care giver (who likes to sleep in more than Jesse does).

Case & Point: Last week when Jesse was away on his first trip, Mal developed two new “Get Kyla Out Of Bed” strategies:

1) He would whine until I rolled over to check the time on my iPhone, and then dive onto my pillow where my head had been, flip onto his back, and then wiggle, yip & kick me in the neck so I couldn’t put my head back down and fall asleep!

2) He would determine which pillow I was snuggling up to, and then burrow inside of its pillow case while wiggling around, yipping and wagging so I woke up to a pillow that was coming to life.

After hearing the stories of puppy badness, my mom dropped by the studio with something that might work even better than repeated kicks to the neck by a small dog…

An advent calendar aka. chocolate for breakfast!! And suddenly I’m completely fine with it almost being December…

With Black Friday coming up quickly and the Christmas decorations already up in my house, it’s been hard to keep holiday gifts off my mind and even harder to avoid thinking about the costs that the next couple of months will bring. It’s such a strange time of year- I love buying the gifts & finding just the perfect thing for each person, but at the same time it’s tough to feel good about spending the money when I’ve got a big list to get through.

I’ve tried to get creative about the holidays in the past, these are some of what I’ve tried & ideas that I’m using for this year:

Handmade Gift Baskets

For a few years in a row I pulled out my granny savvy with everything I could muster to make cranberry jelly, homemade truffles and give tea and tasty cheeses to my family. There was a lot of work that went into this, but it was affordable to buy the supplies and make them my own with some work. They were really well received- and I got to snack on the left overs. Loved it!

$20 Stocking Challenge

Jesse and I have made this a tradition, and it’s one of my favourites. Every year we both grab $20 for our stocking challenge, and head out into the local shops on the same day to get everything we need for the other person’s stocking. We make it a rule to not go over budget, and we try to pack as much fun stuff in as possible- and at the end of the day we wrap them up in different rooms while loudly trash talking each other about who will cry more tears of joy when they open their stockings.

Shop Ahead with Etsy

It’s so much easier on our budget when we can spread our purchases out over a few months, and Etsy is my favourite place to shop for everyone. Which you may have gathered from my rabid treasury making. Etsy is great because you can take the time you need to locate sellers in your country or in your city, which cuts down on shipping costs, and you can take as much time as you need to price compare and save on shipping by buying multiple items from the same seller.

Plus I love supporting artists & small business owners! Every time I purchase on etsy I feel like I’m making someone’s business dream a little stronger.

Use Credit Card Dollars to Boost My Budget- Without Debt

I love finding credit cards that have great benefits, and because Jesse & I don’t carry a balance from month to month (on penalty of death!)  we use our card for every household purchase all year round with the aim of getting a little back for the holidays. We have a dividend card that always gives us several hundred dollars back in the new year… just when our Christmas bill comes in! We got our reward total last week, so I started planning our holiday budget with the goal of only spending that money. Having a budget that lets that happen makes Christmas feel free, which makes it easier to have fun with spending.

Do you have any tricks that make your holidays more manageable?
Is Black Friday part of that plan?

I’m excited to learn from your tips in the comments- Black Friday isn’t really a thing in Canada,
so I just watch the news footage & feel thankful for that! It looks stressful- but like it could be an adventure too…

{image care of the lovely & talented Leigh-Ann}

 I remember that when my sister Lana was born I was fascinated by her. But after the first few days my two year old self was over the fascination and wanted things to return to normal, so as I was patting my newborn sister I said to my mom:

“Nice baby, nice baby… enough baby. Send her back.”

I soon got over my only child attitude and started having an incredible amount of fun with this new little person in my life. I could teach her the things I learned, dress her up, and have a constant friend with me all the time. Growing up with Lana was just the best- we were never apart and we were always each other’s favourite people.

In the past few years she’s lived in Canada, Australia & France and visited Thailand & beyond- and I’m so happy we have this year together in the prairies. Tonight we’re going out to celebrate and I can’t wait to see her!

Happy Birthday, Lana!

You’re hilarious, soulful & have a beauiful, adventurous heart
and you’re still one of my favourite people in the universe

Halloween is one of my favourite holidays- I’m a Halloween and Christmas girl. I also love using my hands and when I figured out that I liked carving pumpkins a serious seasonal addition was born! This Halloween was really exciting because after sharing photos and stories from opposite sides of the country for years, Amber came over and carved pumpkins with me!! And she rocked it. The girl is seriously handy with a knife!

I usually carve 2-4 pumpkins a year, so I’ve done a lots over the past five years but my favourite is to do a set of characters…

Twilight: so bad it’s good!!

Two of my favourite characters from such an amazing movie!

…because True Blood has been one of my big addictions in the last year!

It’s fun to have people get excited when they come to our house on Halloween, but I really love the carving process! I wish it was something I could do more than once a year- maybe I should try carving stamps and get into block printing…

Tonight, in keeping with our other Halloween tradition, Jesse and I are going to be eating Sloppy Joes & Sloppy Janes (that’s a Sloppy Joe with veggie ground round!) and watch The Evil Dead while the neighbours try to guess who the bucktoothed guy on my pumpkin is. I think it’s going to be a really good night :)

Do you have any Halloween traditions?

This weekend when Sunday morning came it was time to take Jesse to the airport so he could go out of town for a business trip. After I dropping him off at the airport I did some errands and stopped by Freckled Nest’s studio to get my camera… but as soon as I walked in there was a commotion at the back of the studio!

I couldn’t see what had made the noise, so I walked towards the back of the space. Nothing happened for my first few steps but then suddenly there was another commotion and I could see what was making the noise- there was a sparrow flying around the back of the studio!

I have no idea how she got inside our studio- but she wasn’t happy about the situation. She was tearing around the space as close to the ceilings as she could get, and I had no idea what to do. I couldn’t leave until I got her out, but our ceilings are high and there was no way I’d be able to catch her with a blanket like the internet was suggesting.

I wasn’t sure what to do, but it was clear she’d been inside for a while and was stressed so I got a bowl of water and granola bar, and placed them in a spot she’d landed on before so she would be likely to explore the food & be more comfortable because of it. It didn’t take any convincing to get her eating, just a little sitting still. After watching her eat for a little while I came up with a very simple plan- I’d interrupt her & open the door so she could fly out when she came back for more food!

It took a lot longer to get her outside than I expected, but it wasn’t for lack of her landing on the granola bar & snacking. She was very dear, but had a very one track mind. After 15 mins or so she landed on the granola bar again, but this time she looked out the door and saw the rest of the world! She took off with a big swoop up towards the sky and was gone before I could blink.

Leigh-Ann and I love having guests at the studio, but this is not what I had in mind! Maybe she saw the birds in my tattoo through the window last week, or maybe the name Freckled Nest on the window sounded inviting to her? :)

This is a fact that I’ve been enjoying this weekend- tonight I’m driving out to the country for my second Thanksgiving dinner of the weekend, and I love that there’s still American Thanksgiving to look forward to!

I hope you’re feeling happy, thankful & inspired today, even if you’re not having a big turkey dinner- or tofurkey in my case! If you’re having a rough start to the week, please consider yourself an adopted Canadian for the day & treat yourself to a pumpkin spice latte :)

On Sunday Amber and I went down to Grand Forks on a mini shopping trip to get her ready for her new apartment… which might have turned into a clothing shopping trip! We listened to Bossypants the whole way there and back, and had a really amazing time. We got a great haul from Target- including some really fun nail polish, cute oxfords and some amazing fall cardigans that are making me regret hoping for as indian summer in favour of an early frost.

It was really refreshing to have a little break and get out into the prairie sun.

Equally refreshing? Racing around the accessories section of most northern Target in North Dakota, trying on all the hats I could get my hands on :)

Recently a good friend of mine came to me asking for advice about how she could transition from her full time job into having a more creative day to day life. It gave me a lot to think about, because I think that especially online there is a lot out there about how much more wonderful everyone’s life would be if they quit their job and started working for themselves. Those stories are obviously extremely inspiring to hear about, and I’m not immune to that- in fact spent a lot of time over the past year daydreaming, planning and praying that I could make that leap myself- and when I did (part one, part two) I was ecstatic!

Here’s the thing: Being a freelancer or entrepreneur is not an option or even a good idea for lots of people, and I don’t believe that having a full time job in an office building means you’re disqualified from living an incredibly inspired creative life.

For Serious. No matter how high the air conditioning is cranked.

(It also doesn’t know where you work!)

I think that living a creative life is largely about attitude, balance, how you assign value and meaning to what you do, and making room for the unexpected. Even now, working for myself in my dream work environment I’m acutely aware that unless I make conscious decisions about how I structure my days and weeks, having a creative and fun life won’t just happen on it’s own. Can you imagine working in one of these creative workplaces if everyone worked through lunch and counted down the minutes until they barreled out the door?

It was fun to talk with my friend about if the content and hours of her work were standing between her and the type of life she wanted, or if there were choices in how she approached daily life that she could make to have more fun with the life she already has.

I thought it would be fun to share some of the things that have made my life a lot more fun and creative…

Take care of the boring stuff

This is everything that your mom nagged you about when you were growing up: get eight hours of sleep, eat simple healthy food that will give you fuel to run on during the day, and be active for at least 30 minutes a day. When I don’t have these things in place the likelihood of the wheels falling off and my week (and work!) taking a turn for the worse goes through the roof. Before you can go out there and consistently put your unique stamp on everything you touch or come up with your next big idea, you have to make sure you won’t have a sugar crash or nod off half way through your day.

Change your virtual hang outs

Virtual routines are just as impactful as offline routines, and if you check social media and read blogs it’s a good idea to make sure you’re not falling in with a “bad crowd”. If the news is dragging you down, listen to a TED talk instead of the news in the morning and just check the headlines at the end of the day. If it seems like everyone on facebook is complaining, hide those people from your feed. If some of the blogs you read are triggering jealousy or personal frustration for you? Opt out for a few days and see how you feel. Aside from just clearing negativity out, be active in exploring new and unexpected points of view. Try reading blogs in Swedish or French and translating them into English to see the world from a different cultural perspective- Google Reader will even do this for you automatically. Do you have an old Stumble Upon account you haven’t logged into in years? Go on an 20 minute adventure and see where you end up! Since we can tailor our experiences online to such an incredible extent, we might as well use that power for good & as a source of inspiration.

Book blocks of static-free down time into your week

For me static is any kind of communication or media that’s high volume, low quality content. That doesn’t mean that it’s good or bad, it just the background noise of life. You know can choose to leave it on and pay attention selectively or you can turn it off and enjoy the quiet for a while. My big “static” generators are twitter and e-mail, along with anything that has a noise notification on my phone. While I get important information through those sources, it’s in amongst a huge amount of other information, and when I’m working the tasks and leads that come from them never “finish”. The best thing about having time that’s free of static is that you can decide what qualifies and what doesn’t. For myself, knowing that in the evenings I’m going to be offline, without distractions, exploring unstructured time is a complete oasis that leaves me excited for work the next day. It’s exciting to discover that when you allow for time with no expectations, to do list or busy work you create room for playfulness, new ideas, and being spontaneous.

Separate dreaming up your ideas from analyzing them

Self doubt and fear of being wrong can be powerful roadblocks for working on any project that needs playful or inventive thinking to get off the ground, especially if you’re planning to share your end results. Evaluating and refining an idea is a natural part of any creative process, but whatever your passion is make sure you explore all parts of its biggest and craziest possibilities before you start picking it apart. Instead of brainstorming, think of it as dreamstorming. I do this about everything, from my friendships and marriage to web design projects and blog ideas. After all, what seems crazy to you this year might be the next natural step for you in a year.

Create pockets of the day where you’re immersed in what you love

It doesn’t matter if your calling is to travel the world as a volunteer or to stage your first play or be the best friend and partner you can be. To get to doing those things you still have to comparison shop for plane fares, apply for grants, and make sure your bus pass hasn’t expired, respectively. Basically, no matter how closely your work aligns to your calling in life, by necessity a lot of our time is spent on the periphery of the things we love. It’s important to make sure that you spent some focused time on what your passion is- and not just after you leave work. Why not wake up early or stay up late two days a week and spend two hours reading, researching or sketching? Could you trade taking a long lunch for working a little later in the day so you dive into a project you love in the middle of the day?

We each have so much control over our experience of life, but sometimes we get so caught up our routine that those choices become less visible. I hope that this gave you some new ideas on how you can make your life creative, no matter what you do for work!

How do you build room for creativity into your day to day life?

{image: Creativity Doesn’t Sleep by Yellow Heart Art}