My gratitude journals are now available on Amazon!

- Life is Short, Make it Sweet Gratitude Journal

- Life is Short, Make it Sweet Gratitude Journal 100 page

I'm super excited to announce that my gratitude journals are now available on Amazon!

What began as an experiment in book printing turned into adorable journals!

Publishing a book has always been a dream of mine & I love that I started with journals!

I made not one but two journals & I love them both!

They're basically the same journal, but one is in beautiful color & the other is plain black & white.

I made two journals because even though the color journal is gorgeous, it's also pricy to print.  I wanted to make a cheaper option available.  While the full-color journal has 66 pages, I could put 100 pages in the black & white one & still be more affordable than the color option.  I honestly think my favorite is the black & white version because I love to doodle & that one is a blank slate!  

Both journals are beautiful & are great for keeping track of everything you're grateful for!

I have some exciting news:  I'm releasing a gratitude journal!

What started off as an experiment in book printing quickly turned into the side project of my dreams!

It has definitely been a learning curve for sure.  This is actually my second attempt & I still need to adjust some things!  I had no idea book printing was this difficult!

I'm doing everything on my own except for the printing part.  For this journal, I'm using Amazon KDP for printing.  I also used Blurb & I love them both so much.  The quality of the books is fantastic.

I'm going with Amazon because they offer it for sale directly on their website.  Someone can simply purchase the journal from Amazon & have it shipped straight to their house.

I didn't really sit down & make an actual comparison, but I think they are both around the same price for printing.  I'll do another post soon with more details on book publishing because I know a few people are interested in how it all works.

When James & I were remodeling our home, we splurged on stainless steel appliances.  In our old place, we just had hand-me-down appliances.  I felt like we 'made it' by getting the stainless steel.  I absolutely love our colossal refrigerator!

I always kept the refrigerator clear.  After all, I wanted to show off the stainless steel...even if it was just to myself!  I was so upset the day I found scratches on the fridge!

When we started fostering our son, he would bring home papers from school.  Instead of putting them on the fridge, I found other creative ways to display them. I still needed that distinction of the fancy refrigerator.  The thoughts I hold on to are so silly sometimes.

After everything we've been through in the past year, my mindset has completely changed.  I almost always look at things with a 'Would this really matter in the end?' mentality.  It's a wild way to live because I've found out approximately 95% of things don't really matter in the big picture.

My son has really gotten into creativity this year.  Last year, he would do papers where he wrote a story & would draw a picture.  Most of the time, he didn't draw a picture at all.  The rare times he did draw a picture, it would be super simple.  His creativity absolutely exploded this year & I'm getting pictures all the time now.

I watched the absolute best video on TikTok last week.  I'll post it below but here's the cliff notes:  An 8-year-old girl wrote a book & wanted to get it published.  Her mom, like most of us adults, are working in the confines of our adult mind so things like publishing a book seem super difficult.  The girl really wanted her book out in the world so she asked her school librarian if it could be put in the library.  The librarian then put a barcode on it & it's now available to be checked out!

I feel like we need more of this energy in the world.

Around the same time I saw this video, my son was talking about maybe writing a book.  He's hit a super creative streak recently & coincidentally, I have too.  I've been working on so much media stuff recently & I'm absolutely loving it.

Technology has come so far since I was a kid & the possibilities are pretty much endless on what you can do media wise.  Everything used to be clunky & difficult but now it's an absolute breeze to make my dreams come to life.  I was a super creative kid but I can only imagine how creative I would have been if this was all at my fingertips back then.