Special little things + Feels like Home: Creative Prompts 7 & 8
Treasured Finds and the Comfort of Connection
Welcome to the month of challenges, creating around the theme of “These Moments Matter”.
Over the month, we will be setting four challenges a week that anyone can play along with.
Here are some finer details that we shared in the founding post to this month of challenges . . .
At the end of the challenge month, participants who have completed all 20 Challenges/Creative Prompts will be entered into a draw to win a ‘forever’ pass to access exclusive premium content and goodies here at Pixels, Paper and Paint - Life in Pictures by Lynn and Rachel.
Runners up and participants who didn’t manage to complete all of the 20 Challenges/Creative Prompts will be entered into a drawing to win spot prizes for passes with limited access to exclusive premium content and goodies here at Pixels, Paper and Paint - Life in Pictures by Lynn and Rachel.
In order to be eligible for the drawing for a chance to win exclusive premium content and goodies here at Pixels, Paper and Paint - Life in Pictures by Lynn and Rachel you will need to:
Ensure you are subscribed to this publication when the draw takes place in February.
Ensure that at least 75% of each finished page or project used digital art from either Rachel Jefferies Designs or Lynn Grieveson Designs. You can find our creative assets at The Lilypad and Oscraps.
Share your finished pages or projects within the designated ‘chat thread’ for each challenge. You’ll find the links for each thread where you can share your pages and projects posted with it’s associated challenge.
Please note that whilst our digital assets are available to purchase at the LilyPad and Oscraps, these Challenges and Creative Prompts are not associated or affiliated with either store, and so by sharing them in the designated threads here, we are able to efficiently keep track of your participation to validate your entry into the drawings at the end of the challenge month.You are very welcome to, and encouraged to share your pages and projects in our designer galleries at the LilyPad and/or Oscraps. Rachel and I will be checking into our galleries throughout January and awarding some spot prizes of coupons to spend in our shops! When posting your pages and projects in the galleries please note in the description box ‘Created for the ‘These Moments Matter’ Month of Challenges by Pixels, Paper and Paint - Life in Pictures by Lynn and Rachel.
New Release Friday
We have some new releases this week - see the bottom of today’s e-mail for items that are on sale and available to purchase!
SPECIAL LITTLE THINGS (a challenge from Lynn)
This challenge asks you to think about the special little things in your life.
Maybe it’s a precious keepsake, or something handed down to you that carries a lot of meaning? A small object that brings you an outsized amount of joy? Or maybe little things that you collect?
Record it on a page and include some journaling that explains why it (or they) is special.
My journaling reads: “My weakness is dried plants, this one is special. I love having dried foliage around -and my special favourite is the twig gathered after an island storm, before we moved here. We brought it back to Beaumont Quarter on the ferry - and a few months later carefully packed it in a huge box to be trucked over to our new island home!”
It was a no-brainer to use the colours of the plants, and also to include twigs, messy threads and scrawled lines that echo the shapes of my various dried plants. I blended one photo into the background paper on the left hand side, adding some extra depth and interest.
Meanwhile Rachel has been reflecting back on her old Junk Journal and has come to realise how much meaning this book holds to her.
Colour schemes convey emotions, heavy marks convey frustration, scrawled notes a cathartic release about everyday life but more than just that, these books are a record of what once was for her.
Rachel loves to look back on these at the start of a new year and ponder about what worked and didn’t work from a creative perspective. Carefully considering and noticing how her artistic style may have evolved, have any consistent new marks emerged, what were her favourite supplies and so on.
These books not only hold hidden stories and meaning for Rachel but become a visual map of preferences, growth and voice helping her to understand what is uniquely ‘her’.
FEELS LIKE HOME (a challenge from Rachel)
That feeling of ‘home’ can exist in places other than our main residence, it can be any place where you feel connected, safe and have a calling to.
For me, I knew instantly for this challenge it was going to be our series of favourite holiday parks that we have visited over the years. We have come to appreciate being outdoors amongst the trees and near water dwellings and we don’t need anything fancy other than the trees and the birds to feel connected and at home.
These holiday parks are places where we dated and hung out before we had our family, and now, we adore taking our children back to these same places that we call ‘home’ and making new memories with them all over again. In turn, reliving the experiences that we had there together in years past. Whenever we return it always ‘feels like home’.
My challenge to you is to create a page or a project that explores the emotions tied to a meaningful location (or space) other than your home that ‘feels like home’.
My journaling reads “Dad and I have always felt comfortable spending time within the trees and around the lake and have enjoyed many holidays here before you were both born. We have grown as a family taking holidays here at our ‘home away from home’. It’s so beneficial to spend more time outside and understand how it makes us feel healed and regulated. Nothing makes us happier than sharing this life and these experiences with you both.”
Meanwhile for Lynn, it was immediately obvious to her that she needed to create a page about Singapore, because it is somewhere that still feels as familiar as home, after a short but intense time spent living there. Not just the sights and the sticky heat, but the smell that hits as soon as you leave the airport - a mix of durian fruit and incense and rot that immediately tells you you are ‘home’.
She went with bright colours to reflect the bold and bright colours you see everywhere in Singapore, and used photos from various visits there. The jumble of photos also reflects the jumble of buildings and crowded streets.
Designated Chat Threads for today’s Challenges
Remember, in order to be eligible for the drawing for a chance to win exclusive premium content and goodies here at Pixels, Paper and Paint - Life in Pictures by Lynn and Rachel, you will need to share your finished pages or projects within the designated ‘chat threads’ for each challenge so that we can can keep track of them and validate your entries.
Share your pages for challenge promps 7 & 8 in the following chat threads:
To share your special little things pages post them in this thread here
To share your feels like home pages post them in this thread here
For help with participating in Substacks Chat feature see here, and if you get lost and lose these links, you can find all of our chat threads here.
A few of you have found a little quirk when you click through to the chat thread from the e-mail in your inbox and are welcomed with a message with an error saying the page is private. This is because you are not logged in when arriving to the substack platform. You need to be logged in before you can view and participate in the chat threads - let us know if you have any problems!
New Release Friday
If you don’t already own Rachel’s ‘Sweet December Stories’ it has been added to her Oscraps shop with discounted pricing for a short time. Save the most with the complete collection that has the deepest savings.
Not just for holiday scrapbooking, it’s large enough and versatile enough to craft many different types of documentation pages and has been carefully designed with ebbs and flows, offering both calm and serenity, but likewise, fantastic modern mixed media and colour pops.
With this collection you can choose to design in a muted organic colour palette, or you can add the colour pops for a more traditional and contemporary colour way.
It’s huge with an extra large sized kit and beautiful pretty little things and pocket cards to accent it.
That’s all from us this week, don’t hesitate to reach out to us with any questions or difficulties you may have and look out for our bonus e-mail on Sunday with more inspiration from our talented creative team members for this weeks challenges!
I have two housekeeping question. Will prompts 19 & 20 be released on the 31st? What is the specific time that you have defined as "the end of the month" for posting layouts?