Artistic Craft pages for Emotional Self-Care and Well-being

1. Self-care Crafts - Introduction: Are you seeing the need and importance to pay more attention to your self-care lately, both for your physical health and for your mental well-being. I've been there and I'm still on this amazing journey. Self-care, self-love is a continual process, a lifelong journey. But it's wonderful to have some tools in hand to best get through it. My name is Anne Yes, to be snack. And I'm an artist and author from France. I have found so many benefits through combining my love for art, the self-care journey. Not only does it create an outlet to express feelings and emotions, but it also has a way with making me feel more whole and alive. Also brings a sense of peace and calm. Plus loads more clarity and understanding of myself. And not to forget a big extra dose of joy. This course we will delve more specifically into three aspects of self-care. Covering some of the more intangible topics, which are emotional self-care, mental self-care, and spiritual self-care. I will share a few tips and techniques where the artsy side of creating these craft pages, one for each of these topics, as well as some examples of how I practice and grow in my emotional self-care, maybe through certain habits or rituals. But most of all, I encourage you to check in with yourself to personalize it just for you as you incorporate your preferences and what you feel would bring you the most joy. And meaning. These pages will be something you'll be able to refer back to whenever you need a little booster or emotional pick me up as a gentle reminder of how you can take care of and pay attention to in healthcare. At the same time, you'll have a toolkit in hand to use for handling many different emotional ups and downs that life throws your way. I have enjoyed creating some of these with my teen daughter, has a way to connect and bond together with something we both enjoy art and we have loads of fun together. Plus we grow in our communications. I'm looking forward to exploring this journey of artistic wellbeing together. 2. Emotional Self-care Crafts: Welcome to the first part of this course. For this one, we're going to focus on our emotional self-care title. Well, I have gathered here lots of letters from old magazines and newspapers. Some of these are more old-fashioned and I have another one, another pile sound that have a little bit more color and maybe a little bit more modern. That way I can decide what look I'm going for. I'm going to go ahead and cut the letters out to spell emotional. I'm looking for sort of my color theme, which is a little bit pink and brown, fine with black as well. I might stick with these. You decide your style, what you prefer. I might go with a really big to start off my word. Then what you do is you just cut them out. The size that you need. I sort of have my size in mind. But it also helps to bring along your sketch book that way you can in place them in the area where you want to put them. I'm gonna go with my title at the top here. Now I'm going to find an M. I like using lots of different varieties, different types of lettering to meet the most variety and a little bit of color. It was fun as well. Take the end from here. Notional. I have a few others that I've already prepared. You just go ahead and place them where you want them. Emotional. It is taking a bite of my space. I can decide if I want to go bigger like this, take up the whole spot there, or if I want to go smaller and maybe just make a little smaller title here. But because all my letters are sort of big, I might just choose to do this for this one. Now that all my letters are cutting place, I just put away my extra extra ones. We will go ahead and glue them. You can place them however you like. You can be. They can either be totally straight or they can go to the side a little bit vertical. I liked the playful look of a, the little up and down. Remember this is our little time to play. This is special, undivided creativity, fun, reflection time. If you're doing this with somebody, then that's even more fun. I've planned this out with my daughter and we've made this page before as well together. Wonderful way to connect. As well as learning something and growing an area of emotional self-care. For this next part of this class, you're going to need lots of different magazines or cards or pictures. Here's some of the things that I've been collecting, saving for some rainy day says part of an old calendar. I just love these pretty pictures. Sometimes there's an old kids book that I'm not using anymore. I'm going to see if, if anything sparks some little inspiration or idea for this self-care page that we're working on, since it's about our emotional well-being. I'm looking at anything could maybe fit that. You can go through magazines, some old newspapers. Very often you'll find what you need. Some of those places. If not, you could even just go ahead and print a page out. The combine for something that would be fitting to you, something that would put him picture what you want to say. Or what it makes you think of when you think of your emotional self-care. I found one KIA that I like might not have to do exactly with my emotional self-care, but I liked the fact that she's taking time for reflection. She's pausing, She's relaxing. To me, that's a big part of my emotional self-care. Taking time to do that. Because then I learned how to express my feelings. Emotional self-care is all about feelings, emotions, or activities that helped me connect and process and reflect on my emotions, which is why I've chosen this picture. She's taking time to reflect, could be on a range of emotions. Somehow doing things that enhance my emotional well-being. Maybe an increasing positivity, learning to manage stress effectively. So all of that takes me sitting down and reflecting. I like this picture because it reminds me to do that. I'm going to see how it fits best on my page. Maybe I'll cut it just a tad. I love this activity because it sort of makes it concrete for me what emotional self-care is for me. First of all, we're just gonna do the look. Now that we found a picture, we can kind of decide where we want to place it. You can put it up here or in the center or down here. Just personalize it and do whatever suits you best. I'm also going to take this lined paper and prepare it for a little reflection time. Just going to cut it to the size that I need. Then I'll cut it out. Actually, I might even rip it out. I loved the look. The old brings variety to my paper. Due to this side as well. Reminds me of an old antique piece. I'm starting to bring the mix of the old and the new. She's dressed modern. Going to place it here because I'm also going to take the time to write something about my emotional self-care. Just to jot a few reminders down for me. This is what our pages all about. It's not just for right now, it's to refer back to sort of like little self-care toolkit for ourselves. To remind us about our emotional care. How we can take care of our emotions. The best way possible. For this part, we're going to focus on creating little speech bubbles. I'm just going to draw one out in paper first. If you have your white sheet of paper, maybe it helps to have your book along so you can decide on the size that you will need. To be placing a little speech bubble right here. I'm placing my papers so I can sort of tell where it's going to be because I don't want it to cover her face. I wanted just above. Then I could make her little little curved line like this. I'm going to go ahead and try it out with pen so you can see it a little bit better. The reason I'm creating drawing little speech bubble, because I really like to be reminded of questions to ask myself. When I start to feel. Extra emotional, maybe a little moody, maybe a little anxious, frustrated, overwhelmed. Sometimes just a little question to check in with myself is all I need. Because I'm probably not going to be able to fit everything into one speech bubble. First of all, I'm erase. My pencil lines. Have a nice clean look. I'm going to fold it so that I can cut out a few at once. You can have two this way. Another one this way. I'm going to take my scissors and cut around. I don't mind leaving a little white. Sort of makes it look like a sticker. It makes it easier than to just have to cut exactly on the black line. Let's see how many we have. If you folded it like me, you would probably have 1234566. It'll speech bubbles. I'm going to keep my little speech bubbles together with a paper fastener. I find that to be even easier than glue. I sort of decide where I want them to open. I could open them from this side, or I could open them from this side like a little book. Maybe I'll do that. You've put them really tightly it together, make sure they all fit well. You start by poking. It's easier to poke one paper at a time, but you sort of want them all at the same place. I'm going to just make sure I have a cold surface and I'm going to poke up all with my exacto knife. Sure that it's on both sides all the way through. That way it makes it a lot easier for the paper fastener to go through without bending or ripping your paper. It's still a little bit tough, but Here we go. Hold it down. These are such amazing little things. So many different uses for the paper fasteners. Sort of have our own little speech bubble book. I'm just folding each one so there's a little place for the fold. Makes it a little bit easier. There we have our cute little speech bubble. Has a little title for my speech bubble book. I'm going to write. How do I feel? Part of helping our emotional care taken care of our emotional self-care is asking ourselves about our feelings, about our emotions. So here are some of the little questions that I like to check in with myself very often, which is why I'm going to include them in this page because I wanted to be reminded of them. How did it feel to do such and such? I like to ask myself after any accomplishment or any finalized project, just to check in and reflect on how it went. What made it good? Even how can I improve next time? This is related to accomplishments and work. This is something I can ask myself and that I asked myself very often related to everything. What do I love about it? How can I feel or experience more? But again, this is for each of us to take the time to personalize. I'm not going to fill in the blanks. Most of these because I like to apply it to different aspects of my life at different points of my life. Another great one to check in often with myself to make sure that I'm not getting overwhelmed or putting too much pressure. Too much stress is what do I feel I can handle right now? That way I can check in with what I'm doing or maybe what I'm not doing for myself care. On the emotional front. It also helps me to listen to my body In manage any stressful situations appropriately. Related to that would be, how can I stay emotionally balanced today? Or in my and you can personalize it. Would it be would it be in your work or in your personal life, maybe your family life for responsibilities. I'm going to leave lots of little spaces and room for other questions that come to mind. When I go back and refer to this page later on, I'm not going to fill them out either because then it's something that I can use over and over again. And what I do is I like to take time to journal these answers in my little journal book that this one becomes my little go back to keeps unsafe for my self-care. If you'd like, you can take a look of how it will all fit together. Now that we've created our little speech bubble will probably go here. I'm imagining myself reflecting and asking myself these questions. So just putting it on paper like this really helps me to remind myself of this important that'll redraw this little habit that makes all the difference for me in handling my emotional self-care. For the next part of this class, we're going to do some final little decor touches. I have here some little sticker pages, some beautiful little designs. And it's so easy to find nowadays that will sketch pads or little sticker books. And it really helps to simplify your life then you don't have to print something out or draw it. Even though I love to draw and create, I find that it encourages me to put more beautiful things on my paper when it takes less time. Having these sort of things really adds to the fun of it, because I can just add a few little things that will make it look extra special, extra beautiful without taking too much time and effort. I know that some of you might have very busy lives. We all do. So anything that saves time, but still adding that special touch, something that you love, something that reminds you of your emotional well-being. I'm all for that. I'm going to grow, go through my pages and see if anything sparks against sparks. A little inspiration that could really nicely goes along with my page. Again, something related to emotions and if not just a little flower or piece of decor is totally fine too. I do want to add some little flower touches. There's this nice big flower here. Could tie in really pretty as well as this one. You won't have the same pictures of course, but take the time to reflect on what will add a little bit of joy, a little bit of meaning for you. On this page. I like this little would look because there's something else that I would like to do for this page. I'm going to cut it out. I think it's sort of goes nicely with the beach because there's a little ritual that I want to keep in this book as well, something that I do every morning in my little journal. I went to include it on this page. Maybe I'll put it right here. A sticker, but I'm going to cut a little part of it because I'm going to keep part of it sticking part of it not. For example here I'm going to cut this out because I want this to be a little pocket. This little part of it. I don't want it to stick. I just want this little part to stick. So I took off the sticker part here and left this part like this. This is our next little step. Take your glue. Going to blew down what we have already in place. In our little speech bubble. I'm going to prove the first one down. Bottom one down. I want to cover this little hole here because he's from a calendar, but I don't really want it to be seen. If the bottom paper is stuck well then the others will be totally fine because of our paper fastener. And I'm going to, this fits here. This goes really nicely. Here we have a little flap that opens. I can even use this little scrap of paper here because I have three little papers that I want to add in there. Part of my little daily ritual. These are three little questions, three little reflection questions. My need to put a little piece of tape here to keep this down together. Doesn't look so beautiful, but that way it's that are close stronger for my little flaps in here. I didn't extra papers. That way I can take them out and still be able to read the texts that I'm going to include here. Going with some of the final touches that I chose. I think I'm going to put this flower there. Could even put it on top. Way. We don't even see that little paper fastener. And another similar flower. Either down down here or up here. Pretty here. These final touches. Just add something to your page, make it look beautiful. Might add the silver last one here. I have something on this side of the page too, in my little gel pen. And I'm going to add here emotional self-care. Just as a little reminder of what this page is all about. Taking care of my emotional well-being. Because we may not always think that self-care is also that our emotions. Here on this part, I'm going to just journal a few little things that'll habits or rituals that I can do. Good lady to my emotional self-care. Just as a little reminder, not only reflecting and asking myself these questions. There's so much reflecting, so many different aspects that I can focus on in this emotional self-care. Learn when to say no. Reflect on my feelings. Just sort of what we talked about here. Practicing compassion for myself. That's a big one related to my emotional well-being. Taking time to journal to me that is crucial one to help me express my emotions and feelings. Be aware of my emotional boundaries. This, I do it by checking in, again. Ask myself these questions. Another one from my emotional well-being is create art. We probably all have our little hobbies are little places that we'd like to go to to make us feel good emotionally. Art is one of them for me. I also like to watch a fun movie to get me into a happy mood. Listen to music is a huge one, not just a distraction. It's not that I'm going for this subtractions here, but I'm going to, I'm also taking the time to really dig deep and that out. My emotional frustrations or angers, because that's important. That's really what I've learned. This whole self-care journey. I can't just distract myself with these things, but I need to focus on my emotions first. Which is another biggie, is see a therapist. That's what I did to help me get started on this journey. I needed to get rid of some emotional baggage before I could do all this work in a work myself. Anyway, you can decide, you can check in and see what are some things that work for you. Because we're all different, we all need to personalize it for ourselves. These are some of the things that'll ideas and examples that helped me to feel emotionally at my best. I was going to share with you my three top questions every day of things that I journal. And this really helps me get onto this emotional well-being for the whole day. I thought little questions, but it's more like things that I reflect in journal loan. I let go of. I take time to journal about those things, maybe frustrations or angers or stress or fears or anxieties. There's always something everyday I had something to let go of. Then I'm more free. I'm open to focus on what do I want to focus on? I take time to list that some beautiful things come out of that. Beautiful reminders for myself. I also jot down some moments. Pitches, fiddle lessons, gratitudes. Throughout the day, extra little pieces of wisdom. Those three things really get me to a good start. A little bit. Wet, the pennies to dry. So I'm going to leave them here for now, but they will go into our little flap right here. I encourage you to try out this little ritual, those three little questions every day. If you don't want to have to write them down, maybe you don't have the time to write them down. You can just hang them up in your bathroom and take the time when you have a little break. These questions are related to more specific situations or experiences. For maybe when you have some more emotional ups and downs. Emotional self-care. What is that for me? If I just journal a little list of what emotional self-care means for me. Activities that helped me connect process, reflect a range of emotions. Could be related to managing stress or overwhelmed, which is very common for me. Navigating other emotions. Increasing gratitude. That's a big one for our emotional well-being. Gratitude or the dot, dot, dot because you can continue it. See if I have a bigger, thicker marker maybe for if you don't want to write this small, could also even just type it up and maybe it will be help you to fit in more things. You even have some little room here for other doodles or other journaling prompts. I'm going to write here, gratitude. Because that's a big one for me, feeling good emotionally. I'm going to write just a few words that come to mind. Keywords. Reflect. I'm going to add little dots for some fun. Touch of decor. Cause This is the way I want to feel. I want to feel joy. Here. You could write a little. This is a permanent marker, so it works quite well. Even on the tape. I will write 33 journal prompts maybe. Now, I'm safe. They're dry. They're not totally dry. This is the paper that I used was a little bit shiny paper, so I'm going to have to redo those, but that's okay for now. I can just put them in here. Just so we see our final page. You can take some time to reflect on it, to see what it means for you and how you like it, what you want to add to it, how you can use it when you want to use it. I hope that this little emotional self-care page was a help to you, was lots of fun for you to connect. If your emotions, as well as help your buddy or your friend or your daughter that you spend time with. In creating this page. That it will help them as well to learn to handle some difficult challenges or emotions that we may have. We all have them. We can't stay away from them. They're a part of us, but it's how we handle them, how he learned to handle them. That makes all the difference in how we feel. This has been extremely powerful tool for me. That's why I wanted to share it with you today. Hopes that you may be able to benefit from it as well. Please feel free to share your beautiful projects, your beautiful emotional self-care page with others in this community, because I'd love to see it. Bye for now. 3. Mental Self-care Craft: We will start off this course by getting our paints ready. I have my watch and my little paint colors, as well as my watercolor page, my paintbrush. Before I get started, I wanted to take my craft book just to sort of checkout the size. Before I start my painting. I'm going to take my pencil, just sort of draw the size of the page. I have to work with. So I have this square here so I could keep my mental shape or thought bubble into this box. Then I sort of picture how big or how much space I want to take for this thought bubble. I will gently draw it with pencil. I have other things I want to add to my page as well. So I think I'll take about this much space for it. Doesn't have to be perfect how you draw it, because we're not going to keep the pencil. We just wanted to add a little bit of color. I'm going to use some pinks and maybe some white here, which I'll mix with it. Like the very light pink, maybe even a little bit of purple. I'm going to start with the edges. I would like a little bit more color on around the edges. This is not a great paintbrush, as you can see. But just to show you don't need anything too fancy. Little bit of purple color as well. For little variety, I don't mind mixing them up. It I don't really actually need the white paint because this is light enough if you add enough water to it. Like the different textures that this paintbrush kids, it's not perfect as you can see, but it's not, it's not super smooth, but I don't mind that adding a little bit of texture. We're making here and little, I guess a little thought bubble. Because we're focusing today on our mental self care, mental well-being. That's what came to mind when that's what comes to mind when I picture mental self-care. But again, with this project, it's for you to personalize yourself. Maybe something else comes to mind when you're thinking of mental. Maybe a brain, maybe. For me, I like the thought bubble. And I think this is good. So I'm just going to put it aside to drive it. Remember, you can add as much or as little color and paint as you wish. You can make smooth lines, you can make rough lines, you can make dots. That's what I love about painting. And I like to include these little craft projects into my self-care moments because it just helps me to paint a picture in my mind so much more vividly and clearly. And it's something that I can remember in hold onto about self-care. It's not just something I've read, but when you actually do it physically, use your senses. I'm using my hands, my eyes, my creativity, as many senses as you can and the more you're going to retain it and be able to focus on it. And also be proud of the work that you finish. I love how it's coming out. You can just wait and see how it comes out once it's dry because the texture might be a little bit different. And that's okay. That's what I love about this activity. And I think painting is so relaxing and so meditative and even gives you time to reflect and it gives me time to let loose, to feel free because I have no, I have no real set golden mind. It's whatever comes on the paper, whatever my paintbrush chooses to do with the water, with the colors, how they mix together, blend together. That's the wonderful thing about art, about painting, and about self-care, which is why I love to incorporate some type of self-care habit or little ritual into my art and vice versa. I'm going to put it to the side to dry. For this next part of our course. You're going to need your craft book and you can open it. The page that you want. Minds a little bit bulgy because it's filling up really quickly with all these crafts fit. I love that part of it as well. So as you noticed from the supplies and materials that you needed, you can choose a picture of a girl's face. So here's one that I had from an old newspaper. Few find something in a magazine or a newspaper. And if not, you can even print one out yourself or even draw it yourself. Because all you'll need is the face. So I like her face. It's just her head is cut off, but that will be okay for this project. I thought of another creative idea to kind of hide that it's cut off. While our painting is drying. I'm going to prepare this part of the page. I'm going to cut her out. Maybe thin out the lines a little bit. I'm going to just curve this part for now. I'm showing you my thought process, my practical process of how I create these pages. But I know that you're not going to do exactly the same because you might not have the same pictures to work with. Your self-care will look very different than mine. I encourage you once again to personalize this to you on the supplies that you have, your style, your personality, your character, and your self-care needs. Because that's how you'll get the most benefit from these pages. I already liked the old fashioned look of this squirrel because it is a magazine and newspaper from the sixties. And it kind of matches and fits with my style to go along with this and to go with along with mental. I thought that I could maybe make a nice little collage of flowers on her head. Kind of makes me think of a positive mindset, positive thinking, which goes right along with our mental page. I have some cutout flowers. I have another sheet of paper with flowers that I can cut out. If you have some of these pages with flowers already that you can cut out, you can use that. Maybe you have some stickers. Maybe you have magazines, decoration magazines, home magazines, even shopping magazines. I find that they sometimes have beautiful pictures that I can use and cut-out. Here I'm going to cut out the flower, and I liked the little bit of greenery as well. Go ahead and use what you have on hand or what you prefer using to create this little mental self-care page? It's okay if I leave a little white. I loved the process. I loved each process of creating this page. I loved the finding materials. Finding a picture that inspires me. Maybe that helps me remember about my mental self-care. Sometimes I first find a picture and I think of the page that I wanted to create with it. Other times, I'm inspired by something I read. For this one, I knew that I wanted to focus on the different aspects of my self-care. Mental self-care is just one of them. As you go through this course, you'll notice that there's some other ones as well that you can focus on. This is just one of them. They are the more physical aspects of self-care. And then the more spiritual, emotional, mental, which for me kind of tie in together. I have a few flowers there. I'm not sure. I'll see once I have our little painting done, how far I would like the girl to go for right now, she's taking up a lot of the page. We'll I'll see if I cut it. I'm out here. I'm not sure yet. So right now, don't worry too much. We're just playing around with the look. But nothing is set in stone because we have include anything yet. I also have some sticker pages. I'm going to see if anything sparks a little inspiration or that I would like to add to my page. And kind of like these flowers kind of matches the color with my pink and purple. Maybe appear. I'm going to maybe add a little bit of greenery. To my flowers as well. I really like these pages of crafts and pictures because it helps save so much time. Even though I could probably draw these are paint them, color them myself. I tried to find something that is the easiest for me because I don't always have a lot of time. Even stopping. Take this time to create this page can be difficult sometimes. But I do it for my self-care. I do it for my creativity. If I do it from my little fun play date, because I know how much I needed. I know it's so good for me. It helps me to be my very best. Not only a gentle reminder of something I went to hold onto and focus on even down the line. But just taking the time for me is a reminder that I'm important. I'm a value. This time is so worth it. Even though I probably have so many other to-dos on my to-do list. Taking time to stop reflect on some of my aspects of self-care. I know will help me become a better version of myself in which I can later share with others. Be more energetic, I'll be more happy, I'll be more positive with my family, with my kids. So all the null will all benefit from this time that I'm taking for my mental self care. It's starting to take shape. I have loads of flowers now. I'm going to put on the stickers at the way end because I don't want to stick them in the wrong place. And that was it for preparing the face of our girl. Now you can check out your painting. Mine is nicely dried. I even chose paint that was a little metallic. I'm not sure if you can tell, but it's a little bit shiny, which is very special. So now I'm going to cut it out on the pencil shape that I drew previously. Again, to personalize it for you. Course, please be sure to use the colors that fit your mood, that really, that you really want to use. Maybe your favorite colors for those colors that make you feel happy, peaceful, funny, but colors are so important. I'm noticing for me, they be pink, very light pastel pink and purples. Make me feel calm. Then I have other colors that make me feel happy. Maybe yellows. I love certain sky igloos. Anyway, so you choose what you enjoy, what you love. There I have my little cloud or my little thought bubble. Going to straighten it out a little bit. I'm going to place it on my papers so I can kind of already decide where I want it. Just to have a general idea I'm thinking of over here. Anyway, we'll finalize that after. But for now, we're going to continue with our little bubble. And you can again grab your magazines, newspapers, and find some letters. I went through my letters collection and I cut out a few because I'm going to spell out the words, mental self-care. I have a few to choose from and went to see which ones I like best. I have this m or this one. I think it helps me once I put it altogether to choose the ones that I want. In t's, like mixing a variety of types of lettering, even lowercase, uppercase. I think that's loads of fun. I could go with those or I could change the M. This one. I think I liked this little one because it's different. Then I'm just going to trim the edges off to the right size that I need. Like that. This is a cursive n. I love adding. A little bit of different lettering as well. I'm cutting it to size as well, just so it takes a little bit less space. I really like putting titles together like this with old letters, new letters to if you don't have old magazines, I think it's so much fun. That's where the childlike creativity comes out. It's kind of like clay for me. Choosing letters, sizes, fonts. This sucks kind of fun. Even making them a little bit zigzag all over the place. Not perfect, perfectly straight. Mental. And for self-care, I just took a little scrap of my newspaper and I'm going to make the little, a little shape. A flag or a little ribbon. I like the colors a little bit brown. Stands out nicely with my little cloud as well. Next, I'm going to take my pencil and just do a rough sketch of the words self-care before I do it with pen. Once I haven't put in place. I can trace it over with my pen. You prefer you could also cut out the letters for self-care. I'm going to add it a little bit of black on one side for a little bit more texture and depth. For it to stand out a little bit more. It's very simple. Go ahead and get as fancy as you want for your title. I'm going to glue it in place right away just so it doesn't get messed up. I'm actually going to use this m not as wide. It takes a little bit less space. Then I glue my little ribbon right into center. If you wanted to, you can always use a marker or a pen. Give it a little bit more color or add something. I'm not sure if I went to add there's some white or maybe I'm going to even try a pink color, maybe have some pinks that I could try. Whether what you want to give a little bit more contrast to your cloud shape, maybe to your ribbon here. It's up to you. I'm going to try this with a little bit of pink on the edges. This is not really necessary, but I'm having so much fun. And I want my page to be beautiful and attractive, colorful, yet all so peaceful, not too cluttered. You decide for yourself what you would like. I might add a little bit of pink to the ribbon here to help that stand out. Can use a marker or you can use a pen. We have our little mental self-care title all finished and ready. Now moving on to our little envelope. So we're going to create a little envelope to put in some papers and some reflection notes. I have here a piece of wallpaper. So this is just a little scrap that I have from a wallpaper book. If you have any textured paper or even lined paper from a notebook. Or maybe more newspaper. You can go ahead and use that. I'm going to place my little cloud here, as well as my face. Just so I have an idea of where and how big I want to make my envelope. I don't want the envelope to go on her face. I could always put her on top here. I want to see as well how far to place her. Doesn't have to be a big envelope. It can just be a little corner envelope as well, if that's what you have the space for. I think I like it. So I'm going to draw out the general shape and size so that I can cut it out. I love the texture of this wallpaper, but now that I cut it out, I lose a bit of the text, but that's okay. Maybe I can find another way to bring some of the text in. Maybe even with little piece here underneath. We'll see, but for right now we're just going to create little envelope. If you have only regular paper, I would suggest to make a little envelope like this, which is very simple. Something like that as a shape that way it will be a little stronger, sturdier. This one can glue on itself like this. Then I would glue it on my book like this. If you would have regular paper, I would suggest you do it that way. If you have something like cardboard or thick or papers. So wallpaper is very strong. I can't even rip it so easily, so I'm just going to go with one layer of it. I don't need to have a fold because I can easily play something in the pocket without ripping. So it's up to you in which you have, as far as material goes. I'm going to create a little pocket here. I also have a little notepad paper. I might want to include here for some more reflection and more of my notes, trying to see how I can place it and how I can fit in the most possible. Could also put my envelope like this and slip my notes in and out like this. And I could place a little note paper up here. I sort of have different ideas. I think I have too many ideas, just probably the most difficult thing for me. I also have this old newspaper that I love adding a little bit of the old little bit more. I have the girl already in the letters, but just this brown color kind of puts it all together. Not sure if I can even fit that, so I might have to save that for another time. Well, we have the general idea, the general layout, and this time we're going to sort of put it all together. I'm going to take what I have. I have my little note page. I have my envelope. I have my girl. So it's the time to see how everything fits together. You see if you have to maybe cut some things to the right size. As long as I have my text, then the girl can be a little bit over it. I don't mind that. I'm going to maybe draw a line to the end of my page so I know where to cut her. Before I glue this little clown, I want to cut out a slit because I wanted to be able to put something inside. I take something very strong so that it doesn't cut through with my culture and my ruler. I'm thinking of doing a little cut over here. I always like more spaces that I can put things in little pockets or little flaps to open envelopes to meet at so much fun. Let's make sure it's cut. Here we go. For gluing this down because it's a little bit thick. I'm going to use not just stick glue but white glue. So you can have either white glue or maybe wood glue. And I'm going to put some glue on all the sides. Also pay attention to this top part. Appear. Be careful you don't want to do any on the bottom, except I will part here because this will be where my pocket ends. I don't want it to blew past that so that it doesn't fall in too deep. I'm going to place it as high in to the left as possible. Gently pushing down on each side, each of the edges, each of the curves. Remembering where I placed glue. I just haven't it blew down this side yet because I went a little space for my page. I'm going to draw the general size and shape that I want. Something like this. And now I can go ahead and glue this part down as well. While I'm at it, I'm going to glue down my envelope. Again because I have thicker paper, I'm going to use the white glue. If you have regular paper, then stick glue would be just fine. On the three edges, the sides and the bottom. Tried to keep it still for few seconds in place. You can always try out the pockets, makes sure that it's only having glue where you want it. Find that this helps you take a thicker paper or cardboard and just keep keep the part open where you want to use as a pocket. I'm going to cut out on the lines where I made for the girl to see if she needs to be a little bit lower maybe for the flowers appear. Again, I'm going to draw straight line here. You can do it with a ruler, but I find that it's not necessary to have it all perfectly straight. Kind of like goes with our look. Cut out collage, handmade, which is what I love. And I'm going to glue her down. Then I have the flowers that I cut out. They're quite big. Now I can also check out with the stickers that I wanted to add. C If I prefer those instead, maybe I don't need the really big flowers and just use the little ones. For example, this one might be enough. This one, or I would put those somewhere else. This is really up to you. This is like the fun final little decor touches. I don't mind even sticking out with my flower in a little bit, sticking out of my scrapbook. Maybe I could add these two and then this one. Mix this up somewhere else. Put it. Anyway, I'm going to do one at a time. Here. You just follow your heart, you just follow your tuition and your creativity. See what you would like best. I have a hard time making up my mind sometimes because I want to add everything to my page. I know I have to make some choices. Here's a sticker which is nice and easy. But I'm still going to cut out a little bit of the white around it to match my other flowers. This is not necessary, of course. Maybe I'm too much of a perfectionist. But I don't mind taking a little time if it makes me happy if it's going to help me enjoy this page even more. Find that a lot of physical things about what I create or how I do something also affects my mental well-being. I pay attention to that. It's part of self-care to be advise and notice the things that we love and why we love them. Or maybe the things we prefer when we have the choice, when we have the option. When I have the option and the time, I always try to choose what is what makes me feel good and satisfied. I went to look back on this page and be reminded of the time that it took. I don't think it will feel like time wasted. Not any bit of it. Not even this cutting out these tiny little details. I think I'll appreciate it even more because it took more time, more effort to make it beautiful, just how I want it to be. I know nothing will ever be perfect. I know that good is good enough. Doing my best is good enough. I conclude here, so I don't want to hide the L or the E2 much. That helped also actually to cut out a bit of the white because it gave more room to see these other letters. We can even draw a little bit more of the L on top here. So I can see that it's an L. The white spots. So don't be afraid to just do those little details that make it extra beautiful and extra clear. I did have this piece of greenery here. I could also add, maybe cutting it a little bit. I still want to leave a little bit of room for this text box here, like adding a little bit of flour here. Fifth, this one is a little bit too big. So checking out my stickers again, I could even maybe take a little flower like this to add. Oops. Again, cutting a little bit of the sides. So there's a little less white around it. I have another one. I like bringing in pinks and purples. Few different places on my page. Maybe this green greenery here from this flower. I could use it over here. As you can see, I'm just getting inspired as I go. It's hard to sort of clan these pages out all in one go or at the beginning. I find that it's part of the process to just let yourself pay attention to your feelings, to your desires, and what you want. At the time. I'm even thinking of adding this flowers behind here. If I had known that sooner, I would have included under the girl. But again, this little ideas, those little details come at the last minute. And that's okay. You just let yourself be inspired at the right moment. It's slowly coming together. Now this part of the course, we're going to start doing a little bit of reflection for our mental self care. I find that it's so important for me to know the why and the what it means for me so that I can be more motivated to practice with it. So first of all, asking myself, what is mental self-care for me? What does it mean? How does it feel, how does it show? So I'd like to put this on my page. What is mental self-care? Which I might even add? It can mean a lot of different things. I'm going to write a little description for myself here of what I feel is mental self-care. For me. I think it's any activities or routines, little rituals, habits that stimulates my mind, intellect. Anything that helps me practice mindfulness, which can mean a lot of things that's very broad. Creativity. Positivity. I don't know if I can fit it all in. I don't like it looking squished either. I'll just write et cetera. Because I can delve more into that in some of these pockets as well. After I write it with pencil, I know the general size. Then I'll just write it with my pen small as possible. I'm going to add here another little notepaper. That way I can include even more things. I can even fold it that way it fits even more. Here I could write something like benefits to paying attention to my mental self care. This is something that I can also take the time to journal. They terrane. If I don't have the time now, I love finding little quiet times or my morning routine to journal some of these more personal prompts in my craft book. It's something that you would personalize for yourself as well. I'm going to erase the pencil just for a clean look here. Now, we can go ahead and fill up our pockets. So you might be curious, what are we going to add to this pocket? This is really a fun part as well. For this part, I gathered together some little cutouts from magazines or sticker pages or old books, newspapers of things that made me think of my mental self-care and also things that I do or would like to do. We'd like to focus more on pay attention to that can benefit me in my self-care. So I'm going to cut those out and this is what we're going to place in our pocket. For example, here's a picture of a girl reading a book. To me reading, reading something uplifting or reading something fun is an important part of my mental self-care. Because I'm learning something new. I'm feeding myself something uplifting. I feel great after reading a good book for fun book. So I'm definitely going to include this in my pocket. A lot of times I add little lists of what it means for me or activities or practices. It'll habits that I like to grow into or keep doing. One aspect of self-care. But this time I thought it would be fun to add an, even a little bit more creativity. This picture is a little girl playing with her toys or doing something creative. I thought, well this looks like me. And it's good for my mental, it's part of my mental self care. There's so many things that make the inner child come out, whether it's art or clay, going to the library, just walking in nature. I just feel so alive, energetic and like a little girl again. So that's why I'm including this little girl picture. I think that that's good for my mental self-care. I have this little clocks. I love the old clocks. And also, I think this is a reminder that I can take the time for myself. I can take the time to treat myself to something that will be beneficial to my mental self-care. It's hard to find the time, but reminder, I can make the time. I want to make the time for this important time. Here I found a picture of this girl laughing and I thought that was so cute. Like laughing is so good for my mental well-being. Whether laughing at the jokes, got a good movie, funny movie, comedy, laughing at myself and my mistakes. Kind of like allowing myself, Hey, I can have a good laugh. When I do, it feels so good. That's another little reminder. I found this picture of a cat and we have a cat, and she often fails because she wants a little pet and some attention. And I think it's really good for me too. And my mental health. It helps me distress. It helps me make the time and stop and get com. Here's a picture of a radio and it's making me think of it might be listening to a good podcast. Sometimes when I'm doing coloring, I treat myself to listening to something on YouTube. I even if I don't watch it, I just listened to it and I really love that it's uplifting, it's inspiring. Depending on what I choose. O, I have two pictures of the girls, girl laughing. Maybe I'll choose this one. I just cut my little pictures to size. I want them to fit in my little pocket. I want them to speak for themselves. And if they don't, you can always include a little word or little phrase. So far these speak for themselves. I could always add a little something to this one if I wanted to be specific on what time do I want to spend, whether it's a specific time of the day or specific day of the week that I want to take to focus on my mental self-care. Here's another one, a picture of her with her pets, but since I already have the other picture, I'll I don't need that one. Here. I have a picture of a little journal. I love that. And I think that is really a part of my self-care as well. Mental self-care, though this one will not fit into my pocket. I'm going to look if I have an alternative. I have this little notebook here. Maybe I could use that for for keeping a journal. I'll put this one to this side since it's too big. Since this page is a sticker, I'm going to just take a white sheet of paper and glue it on top. Then I can cut it out. Cut it out any shape or size that I want. I can even include a little texts because there's space. I'm going to be a little bit more specific by writing journal, my thoughts, feelings, wishes. Dot, dot, dot. And I'm also going to write check in. That's my little time to check in with myself. I think another one I would like to add is create. Maybe I'm going to add this paintbrush here. This paint tube. That's what it is. We'll pretend that it is creating something is so mentally revitalizing for me, I would say there's nothing like it for me. So I definitely want to include that one in. I'm going to write in big letters. Create something beautiful, meaningful. Also just for fun. Creating something beautiful meaningful. It doesn't mean it has to be a value or for a specific reason. It can be just for fun. It can be just for me. Doesn't have to have a specific goal in mind. I'm going to include that. No goal. Thinking maybe to blue this one. Like I said before, if I wanted to be a little bit more specific, time alone, time for me. Time for wet. I love dot, dot, dot. You can look through your papers, your scraps, your cutouts, if there's anything else that spark something special for you. I'm going to take this little camera too because I also want to include maybe experience new things. Keep souvenirs. I loved doing that too. Whether it's taking a photo or writing about it, journaling about it. Something new. Be visiting a place, trying out a new recipe, new style of art. Anyway, I think there's so much more that I could include. Yeah, I might even take this little jar here. I love to cook, I thought so a mental thing for me. Just write new joys. Could be something I cook, something, I taste, something, I create. Something new. Breaking out of the norm. The daily routine I think is so good for my mental health as well. Anyway, what I love about this activities that I have these pictures here now, but with my little pockets. I'm not limited to what I include today. Right now. I can switch things around, I can add to it, I can move from IT to take away from it. It will always have that special meaning for me. Because of that, we'll always be just what I need. When I go back and refer to this page, I take these out, I'm reminded of these things that are mentally building for my self-care. But then I might be attentive to even more ideas and can add to it. If you wanted to, you could just do a little title here. And since I cannot write on this paper to make it with white paint, just going to make, and it'll flag again to match this part of my page as well. And just so it's not so straight or formal, you could personalize it what you would like to include on your title. I might just put I focus on these are the things I focus on at this time. For my mental self care. I could put it here or I could put a tier there. We have little page of mental self-care. I encourage you to go ahead and also finish filling this out for yourself. Personalize it for yourself. What do you feel benefits you get from your mental self-care? Paying attention to your mental self care. I'm leaving you with congratulations and well done. I hope this page was enjoyable, fun, relaxing, that it will continue to inspire you and motivate you to pay attention to your self-care. That is so important for you. And to remind you that you are important, you are loved, you are worthy of this time. 4. Spiritual Self-care Craft: Hello and welcome to another course of self-care. Today we're going to be specifically delving into spiritual self-care. You will need your craft book as well as a beautiful picture, something that depicts spirituality for you. I have this one here. I found it from an old book, and I've chosen this one because I loved the color pink. It makes me feel happy and joyful. The picture itself also makes me feel like I'm so small and tiny in comparison to what spirituality is. It's so vast, so encompassing, so intriguing. It's so exciting and beautiful. I think spirituality can be different for all of us. But I like this little girl peeking out. It feels like me. I'm just getting a little peek, a little taste, a little experience of what Spirit, God, the universe, higher power is for me anyways, so we're going to take this picture. We're going to cut it out to the size of our craft page. And I invite you to find a picture that means or that expresses spirituality for you. So that's for you to personalize. You won't find the exact picture as I have. But maybe you could find something from nature, a sky, maybe spiritual, being like an angel, maybe a picture of a beautiful book for some spiritual feeding and positive for your spirit. Anyway, I encourage you to find what is right for you. Maybe it could be something totally abstract as well. There's no right or wrong picture. It's whatever you would like to depict it for you. Because spirituality is so different for each one of us. So I'm going to be expressing and sharing a little bit of my thought process as I create this craft page using this picture here, but you can follow along using whatever picture you have. The next thing I'm going to do is I'm going to make some random shapes. Maybe you can already see some of my rough lines which I kind of played around with beforehand. So I'm going to start from the middle and just draw some straight lines, making them a little bit darker than what I had previously so that you can see them. Feel free to use a ruler if you want. But I'm not so picky about my straight lines because I'm going to cut them out. You can either have them as straight lines or you could also have them as circle shapes if you prefer, or ovals. Each time I'm going around the full picture from the center. And I liked that they're kind of random. I'm showing you the basic techniques that I use. Of course they're not really techniques that you have to follow to a T because each page is so very different and unique. I'm just giving you different examples of how I go about it, maybe my thought process so that you can then take these example and create something of your very own on a topic that would be fitting and speak to you the most. I'm going to put my book aside so that we can cut our lines. And the reason for that, if you've seen some of my other courses on these craft pages, you know how much I love to create those spaces. Either little flaps are pockets, are envelopes or pages that turn to have a place to journal or thoughts or wishes, what we love, how we feel. And I feel this is so important, especially for this spiritual aspect of self-care. There's so much in our hearts and our souls that we want to get out, that we may not have a place to get out. So this is a great opportunity for that. I'm taking this piece of cardboard that I can 3D cut on. I'm gonna use my culture and my ruler again to start from here and cuts out the first line just beforehand. To keep in mind, I'm going to keep one of each side uncut so that we can open it up like a little window. Before we continue on. I do want to cover the back side. You can either just use a white regular printing paper or maybe you might have another kind of paper. So I have here some flowered paper, or here there is a pattern paper. I might go with that just for something a little bit different. I'm just going to take the measurements by placing my picture on top, drawing straight line with my pencil. That way I can cut it to the right size. This will also help to strengthen our picture because of all the cuts and openings it will have. I'm going to put glue all over the back. Now for this, you want to make sure that you put glue everywhere, not just on the edges because of all the cuts that will be happening. You can see what the, That's looks like two, it's all nice and smooth. Case. You can trim it as you need. I see little part sticking out there. We have a nice sturdy picture. Now I'm going to take my culture and mental ruler. Just make the street cut on my pencil lines from one corner to the other. Then I check each one to make sure it's cut well, this takes a little bit of concentration. You want to get it right so that your paper doesn't rip. This is a whole process. We kind of start out by doing the creative side of things. Maybe they're crafty, artsy. At the same time, it's her time to relax, to enjoy, to have fun. Notice in our preferences, to pay attention to what we'd love. But then because we're giving each page a different topic of self-care. For me, at least it really helps me to dive deeply into these topics. Not just the artsy side of things, but also the depth of this of it, the feelings, the thoughts, the emotions. Then for the last one, instead of cutting it, we're going to give it a nice fold. So I'll take my ruler there just so I can give it a nice straight fold and then use my fingers. We have our first opening. First fold. I don't know about you, but I'm not so into these pencil lines all around. I'm just going to erase them as I go because now I see them clearly. Now we will move on to our next layer of cut. I'm first going to choose which line I would like to fold. Then I start here with the cut. So the next one is, I'm going to leave this one then uncut so that I can fold it. Cuts are getting smaller and smaller. Going deeper and deeper. Kind of like what we do when we pay attention to our self-care. We start out by little tip toes into the water. Especially if it's something new for us. Then we might get our feet wet. And realize that that feels good to Until little by little, we're fully wet into beautiful refreshing water. Alright, it's also going faster now that our lines are smaller. We have our last one. I think as I was starting to say, is first we get all crafts C. And I love mixing art into some of these things I want to grow into or remember, they serve as not only clearly at all my pictures for me, but also as gentle reminders that I can go back to and refer to later. The fun part of art. It's really the cherry on the cake for me. Then there's something so much deeper as well with so much meaning. So it doesn't just give me time for art, something that I love to do. But then it gives me something to help me in my goals are a little habits or rituals, routines in myself care. That's what I love about these. For me, it's a wonderful experience going back to these down the line. I could just write them down or list them down or put them in my little journal. But by putting them into a work of art somehow it just magnifies the experience all the more and the lesson for me as well, It's like a little treasure chest of jewels, of crafty experiences. So we have our little page all cut out. You can even see how it looks onto our craft book. So back here underneath I will also cover it with something just so I have another page, whether I want to include something written or some more, pictures and decorations, think I'm going to put whites because that way I can put in anything I would like. I'm going to measure it to the right size doesn't have to be exact because some of the picture is covering it. Then the cut doesn't even as long as it's nicely covering my page. And then our glue that for this one, I'm just going to put glue on the edges that's enough. Gently patted down so there's no wrinkles anywhere. Try it out and see how you could already glue this one into the book. But I'm going to, I'm going to take out my little notepad, old notebook, and cut out a page so that I can start adding. The backs are my extra journaling prompts. I'm going to place it here like this under where I went to glue it. I'm going to draw on the inside of it. Here is the right size that I needed. And I'm going to leave some space around each one for the glue. So you match it to your shape here so that you know that you're gluing it on the right side, are open it that way. I'm going to put a little bit of glue on the edges. I'm trying to say out if it's easier to put blue on this part, are on the line paper. Make sure it's the right place. I have this part that I can journal on. And if I wanted to in the back as well. Now moving on to the next one. You can take another sheet of paper from the same lined paper or you can even choose a different one. So I'm going to see if I have a different lined paper. I came up with a few other lined papers course you don't have to do this, but I think it's just fun to have a variety of different lines, either different sizes or some squares, different color. For the next one, I'm going to choose this one maybe. Again, I'm going to cut it, adding a little edged, not too much because I also even like the like this part of the paper as well. I need to make sure that I'm matching it to the right side. Now this time I'm going to try putting glue on this part. Let's see what works better. So just on the edges where I've drawn the pencil. I think if you line up one of them with your pencil lines than the others should also line up perfectly. This way worked quite nicely, was helpful to have the lines of the pencil to see where I wanted to place it. So there we have this one, we have this one. Problem with this is that it has a different packing. We're going to have to work on that. I have some leftover one of this so I could put it again. Unless you had another little pretty picture to add to a tier list of my other line papers are lines on both sides, but that one was part of something which I didn't check first. I guess that's okay. I could even add this one on top. Well, we have 11 left. I'm going to use the square one. Again. I take my paper. I'm going to gently draw, very lightly draw my lines. Then I can cut. Leaving a little space again for the glue. I'm sure to clue, just wear outer edges after the pencil line to find the right spot. I think it's here. And gently glue it down. Let's fix up this one. While we're still here. I'm going to draw this side here. Instead of cutting it bigger, I'm going to cut it smaller. Let's see how that works. Works well, I can always add some little pictures and decorations. This note page that it's harder to come up with a picture that fits exactly that shape and size. So I went with lined paper instead. Now we have our pretty picture already with a little notepads for all our fun. Journal prompts and digging deeper, checking in with ourselves. The next part of this section we're going to take again our craft book, Opening up to our white page. We're going to glue this into place. So for that, I'm just going to put some glue on the edges of our picture. All the sides, as well as to where the first cut, this, just so that it's extra strong and sturdy. You can put it everywhere if you prefer. And then we glue it in place. Then you want to open your first flap to make sure that it's not gluing down the edges just in case the glue kind of spread a little bit. You can also, again, gently pad these sites down. Especially here, this needs to be extra strong because it's going to be opening him saying, Hey, our pages starting to take shape. I think it's going to be beautiful. I love all these little flaps opening, checking in, checking in with our spiritual well-being, spiritual self-care, how we're doing, how do we want to grow in this area? I'm excited to fill this up to. Now. We're going to make our little title for our spiritual self-care. I have some letters here. From cutout magazines. And I'm going to spell out the word spiritual. I have different colors, different sizes, even different fonts. Because I wanted to have a wide variety and see which ones would go best with my page. I'm going to start out by cutting out the right letters to spell my word. I think I have a few doubles because that way I can choose. I'm going to place my letters here so that you can see them a little bit better. This is a big words, so we'll see how to fit it in. I like using a variety of different letters sizes. So if I have doubles, I'm going to just place them there. I went to see what looks good here. And then also what looks good on my page. Because that's the most important part, how it matches and fits my page or maybe my picture. I like how this one looks. Now the final tests would be to see how it looks like in my book. I could either place my letters, I'll look around. I could also do it on the bottom, some on the bottom, some on the top. Something like that. Another option would be to glue them in here. Maybe this would be a nice surprise as we open up our page, since we have so much space, I could even switch out some of the letters. So it's more variety. Then you can start gluing it down. Going to go down right away just so that it stays in place. Then we have loads of space to write, self-care. Any other doodling, any other journaling that we want. And it kind of leaves are front-page free. Kind of opens up the surprise to what it is all about this picture, this page. I liked it, intrigued, this intriguing this, I don't know if that's a word of it. I have a little ripped paper here. Maybe I'll have fun writing my self-care titled in here. I'm going to write here self-care. Do it with pencil to make sure I have enough space for it. Then I can take my pen and write over it. I could already glue that there if I wanted to. I think I will kind of like half paper, half cloth. You can also play around with any textures that you want, yours. I think that's the fun of it. That kind of opens up my creativity even more. For this part, we're going to add a few little extra touches of papers or de corps. You know that I love this part. This is the artsy, fun part. I don't really have any specific plan yet, but I want to bring in a little bit more color to each page. Maybe something unique and different, whether it's a picture or decoration. Paper. Even just a little rip thing. Just rip out a little piece of this paper. Nothing that I'm attached to as far as the texts goes. I love the little old fashion paper. Kind of brings out that touch of treasure. Excitement to it for me. Since this is kind of like my little treasure, treasure map. Of my self-care. I ripped out the first part and I'm going to sort of guess where my cut is actually because I don't really know, we can sort of feel it. This looks somewhat like it. I'm going to cut it, trusting me and try it out even if it's not perfect, it's okay. All right. I'm going to place that their love adding any little touch of color. And I've sort of just let it flow, let it happen that it be, As I get inspired. I find that with these pages I can't plan too much in advance. Most of my planning was finding this picture. And then I just let it happen. I think that's the wonderful thing about it and also the excitement of it. It's a whole little journey. As we discover about ourselves. I discovered what I like, what makes me feel good. It makes me content and satisfied. That's why we also make mistakes as we go along. As you've noticed, I've made mistakes plenty of times, but that's kind of the letting go part, something that I've had to really practice with in my self-care. Just let go of perfection that go of everything planned out to a T and go with the flow a little bit more. I think that's also a big part of spiritual self-care. Really paying attention to what's inside, deep inside our hearts, our feelings, our souls. What is our soul asking for? I'm practicing that as I go through my page, as I go through creating my page, It's a whole learning process because I think it's so ingrained in us to just plan everything out or do it like somebody else, then we lose that special touch with us. What makes us feel good? What makes us feel come alive. So please take the time to personalize this for you. Find the pictures you enjoy, colors that lifts your spirit. I'd like to think of this as a little touch of magic. Having a little touch of magic to my day. The form of art, beautiful things, and treasures of wisdom. By checking in and asking myself, how I feel, how I want to feel, what do I need at the moment? My heart longing for. That's at the heart of spirituality for me. Not doing something because somebody else doing it are expecting me to do it. Not following a specific ritual or even religion. Because I feel that that's so boxed in and it makes me feel boxed in. I sort of need and want that freedom. I've been boxed in so much of my life because of, because I'm a people pleaser, I went to make others happy. I want to make sure others are feeling good and I go by what they feel, what they say. But paying attention to my self-care has made it clear to me that I want freedom. And it's so liberating to realize that I can find my own freedom. I can find my own spiritual journey by following my heart, not by following what is right for somebody else. Everybody has their right to choose to follow their own path, their own journey. Especially when it comes to spirituality. I encourage you to reflect the time to find out what is it for you. What does your spirit need? What is it longing for? What is it crying out for? What is it searching for? We all have that hunger, that thirst for something spiritual. We find it in different ways. Some of us find it in nature. Some of us find it in art. Some of us find it in writing. Just let that be, that it'd be okay because it's what you need. And don't let others dissuade you. Don't let others judge you or criticize you for any of that. Already, paying attention to our self-care is a big deal. I know it is for me and I can get myself over feeling selfish and too self-conscious to me minded. But it's actually not that at all. Because by taking time for me, by checking in with I love what I feel is right for me. I'm so liberated to live my life and I finally feel free. I finally feel alive. I finally feel that I can really live my life fully. I can be the best, become the best version of myself. So I'm just playing around here. I'm not even really thinking about what I'm doing. I just love some adding some flowers, something beautiful and pretty. Even have some little angel pictures. I don't know if I want to add that, but that's why I said if you have any little pictures that would spark something for you, go ahead and use that. Maybe I'll cut this little angel, not a religious person. I know that my heart longs for some type of spirituality. When I think of a little angel, I think of just spirit being that is bigger than me. I don't have all these mindsets about it are all these theological thoughts about it or facts and figures. That's not for me. If I feel like adding it in my book, It's because I want to, not because of what somebody else thinks about an angel. Maybe I'll just cut this one out to go through little magazines are little books, old books, and find some little pictures there. It spell spiritual for you. I have some other little pictures and stickers that I'm looking what might spark something for me? I might even add this little cup of teeth. As a reminder that I choose. What is my cup of tea in spirituality? Not the same as for everybody else. Maybe I'll use this picture with, it looks like taking time to read to reflect on what I read, as well as to keep a journal, check-in with myself very often to me that's my way of practicing spirituality. If there's some way I can add it to my page, right, sort of helps to kind of place things where you wanted but not to glue them in yet because you might want to switch things around, move things around. So I have a few sticker pages to work with. I have little cutouts. And it helps to have these little, these little things because it saves time. Otherwise, you could also paint them or draw them yourself, which has loads of fun too. But this helps to save some time. So whenever I can cut them out or just have stickers all the better for me, then I still have some space for middle journals or little words that come to mind. I'm going to glue what I have so far. I started out with the big leaves, the big objects, then work my way. The little ones, little touch of nature really makes me think of spiritual things as well. Had to be a creator bigger than us to put it all here. Now that we've done a few of the little additions of pretty pictures, we added some flowers and little touch of decor to this page. Ich I might see what else I would like to do on these other pages here. I have here some sticker pages. If you only just have magazines or again, some other cutouts, then feel free to use that. I just want to see if any of these would spark something related to my spiritual self-care. I also have here a little cutout from a magazine is some pretty flowers and I thought that maybe spirits could be appropriate even if it's not the same spirit that we're talking about, but it could be something fun. So I might add this to it. Another form of spirit. And of course I'm going to add in the little flowers to give it a touch of UD and a touch of nature. I want to sort of add a little something to each page in case I want to add any of these as well. I like this picture of them. Dear brings nature for me. And I do get a sort of high as sort of. A spiritual feeling when I'm out in nature, like this pretty little nature chain. Maybe I'll place it here. Leaving room for a little title. I'll just include the little, little wine bottle for fun. I could add my flowers here. I think it's pretty to add a little bit of color to each page with something simple and stylish. I even have the leftover paper that I cut out. And I like these roses. I'm using anything and everything that I have. I don't like wasting. I like making the most of what I have been using this as a background paper page that also has some color with flowers. Adding something simple like that. You can also choose to put something on your picture here, but you don't have to. I'm also okay with leaving it just totally as it is very simple. This kind of has a simplistic, minimalistic look for me. But it sort of frees up my mind as well to reflect and to think about it as I want to at the time. And then digging deeper as I open up the pages, let yourself be inspired. You can put as many pictures, colors, additions as you want and as few as you want as well. I also have this one that I wanted to add to it because books and books are sort of spiritual, the feeding. I feel I could include these books somewhere if I wanted to. Now we're moving on to a little bit of reflection. Journal prompts. This is probably the most meaningful part, maybe the deeper aspect of this project in this course, we did lots of the creative side of things. The pretty pictures, the cutting out, the crafting, the design. Now comes the Digging Deeper, time for some feelings and thinking maybe how this can apply to us personalizing to our situation, and also personalizing to our own self-care rituals. And I love this part because it, it brings me the most joy, the most meaning as well. So I'm going to take my pen. You can use your pencil or a ballpoint pen. I'm going to start out by lifting each flap and writing something that I want to journal or reflected upon. I'm going to leave this little space for my reflection. Personal time. I'm going to add here my little title or my little question. Here I'm writing, what is spiritual self-care for me? I might even underlined spiritual. So it's nice and bold. I'm going to use my other pen. Just to personalize it for me. I encourage you here to think about, to reflect before you start writing so that you can write to what is truly in your heart. Doing whatever nurtures my spirit and allows me to think bigger than myself. Beliefs and values that are important to me and guide my life. I can always continue to add to it. Whenever I feel LED or something else comes to mind. I feel that it just helps to have a little sentence so that I can either refer back to it or it just so it's clear in my mind, what is spiritual self-care for me? This one, I want to write something about this picture. What does this picture mean for me or What does it have to do with self-care for me? And I like being reminded of that. Why did I choose it? I might write, how does this picture tie in to my spiritual self-care? I'm not going to be reading all this out to you right now because you're not going to have the same exact picture. But I just wanted to encourage you in case you wanted to also take the time to write something about the picture that you found or that you're using for your cover. There's so much power in reflection in writing it down, in affirming and reminding yourself of these little details that bring you so much meaning and value. For this one, I'm going to write a little question, something like what or how. Incorporate spiritual self-care into my day. I feel that when I list the things of what I'm doing, I feel encouraged that I'm actually working towards some of my goals or wishes in the topic of spiritual self-care. And number two, I feel that it helps me outlined clearly what I would like to grow into and even do better in and make progress in. I'm going to list just a few things that come to mind of what I do or how I incorporate spiritual self-care into my day. I'm starting out with maybe my morning routine. I take time for reflection and also write in a journal. This helps me to get the deeper things that are on my heart. I'm just free to write whatever comes to mind. Whatever I feel, whatever I long for what my heart tells me. There's no judgment or criticism. And the other one is I take meditation time, whether it's thinking on something specific or on an experience, something that happened, something that I love, or maybe praying or wishing. Hoping loves spending time in nature. And I feel that is so spiritually renewing as well. There's no distractions, it's just peace and calm. A little touch of nature, little beauty of nature. There's nothing like it to boost my spirit. I love reading, uplifting books or maybe listening to podcasts that are also spiritually feeding and also taking time to think about my values, maybe higher purpose. Or what am I here for? Thinking about my y's, why am I doing this? Here are just a few of the ones that come to mind right now. And I'll have space to write some more. And here I'm going to maybe right? How would I like to grow base? I went to grow in my spiritual self-care. So I'm going to take some time later on in the day or maybe tomorrow with my morning routine in my little reflection time to think about this one, as well as why, why do I want to pay attention to it? Why do I want to grow in my spiritual self-care? And then some, maybe even listing some benefits for myself. The more questions I can ask myself, the more I love it because it helps me to be very clear on the Y, on the reasons for it. And then it helps motivate me even more. Here on this page, you can also add in any little other words or feelings I love to add little feeling words. How does it make me feel? Then you can draw to around, scribble around some words. So I feel calm. It also helps me to feel more positive, prompts me feel joy. Also makes me feel more centered. I feel at peace, trusting, trusting of whatever happens. It's all okay. It's for my own good. Somehow I feel strengthened even when challenges come my way, difficulties. I know that I have strength and I am strong because I have something bigger than me who's supporting me? I feel supported. Again, you can use as much space as you want to continue to write down some of those feeling words. I'm going to use my marker just to trace over this little question. Whoops, smudging a little bit, but just to help it stand out. A little bit more smudged. Well, how does it make me feel? Maybe you can put it in a nice box. All right, Good. Put it in a little flag box. You can add any other little things that you would like. A little circle shapes. I don't know, these are little, little sparkles. Could add little stars. Again, whatever inspires you. I hope that you enjoyed this time of checking in, digging deep into this aspect of self-care. This time of pausing, taking time away from the busy-ness of your day is not time wasted in this time that you spend to energize your creativity in art with beautiful pictures and designs. One is to ask yourself these deep questions can be so beneficial. Studies even show how cultivating a spiritual life can have numerous health benefits. Because keeping a healthy spiritual life can help us better manage our physical health in so many ways. Another type of practice or ritual that you choose. And that feels most comfortable for you in spiritual self-care that you can do consistently. Once in awhile when you have the time, I'm sure will help you begin to notice these benefits and results such as quietness and calming of the mind. As you're opening yourself to feel an honor what your heart yearns for. This is so nurturing to fuel both your body and soul. We all have a purpose and a reason for being here and being sensitive to our spirituality will also help to make that clear to us in finding are own truth and values and the lessons that life wants to teach us. I especially love to incorporate a little gratitude into my spiritual life through some simple routine of maybe journaling three highs of my day. Or with every sip of coffee I think about something I love or I am grateful for tiny little routine like this can change your life. Don't feel like you have to begin Qj. A tiny little step to growth is something and most of all, except where you're at right now. Because that's a huge part of self-care, self-love. If you're interested to learn and delve into some other aspects of self-care. Maybe some of the more physical aspects. I invite you to check out some of my other courses here as well. Take care and live your day to the full. 5. Bonus: Additional Emotional Self-care craft pages - Leaf through: Hello beautiful Souls. I'm sharing here in this little extra video a few examples of other craft pages that I've recently made for my emotional and mental self-care. To give you a few more ideas of what you can do as you let your creativity run wild and get inspired. And these pages are chock-full of little routines and practices that I've been doing, as well as journal prompts for myself after checking in and noticing some areas in ways that I went to continue to make progress in regarding my self-care and well-being. There are loads of little treasures and hidden secrets packed into little flaps or envelopes or secret openings on these pages. Even sound that I forgot about as I was filming. That. Maybe I'll end up making more courses on these at a later date. Let me know if you'd like that. In any case, I wanted to show you what you are capable of doing. After you view my few courses on the subject of combining your love for art and creativity together with self-care. I wanted to also share with you here a few of the benefits that I and others have received after making these art and creativity makes me happy. It's my joy and passion. I get a sort of high from it. I'm paying attention to my physical needs and my emotional needs. At the same time. I use my creativity to facilitate soul searching and bring to light unconscious thoughts. Any sort of art form allows me to express what I have a difficult time putting into words. It works as a memory builder. Whatever I take time to do and create with my hands, it has a greater effect and meaning for me. It becomes like a concrete manifestation of my imagination and thoughts, subconsciously working for my good. I have a beautiful work of art that I feel proud of and can refer back to as often as I need. It helps grow my confidence as I see all that I'm doing to better myself care. It encourages me to take time for me with no other distractions. I can't very well multitask at the, in time. It's concentrated. Meantime, it helps me realize that I'm important. I'm a value and I deserve this time. I'm able to reflect and ask myself without so many questions that I never took the time for it before. I feel I'm learning more about myself as I do these craft pages. I realized that creativity is not so much about the end result, but about the listening during the process. It feels like play. But at the same time, I'm equipping myself with an amazing gift. Not just for now, but to use and be reminded of for as long as I need it. When I feel a low of inspiration, when I need a little pause to reflect. When I feel I could use a boost of joy, peace, or calm. I go back to my craft book. I open a random page and I reflect and focus on it. The more detailed, the more sensory play, the more I love it and the more it helps me connect within. It brings up memories of how I made it past a stressful situation or a difficult moment. And it just suddenly builds me up in confidence, encouraged for what I'm going through today. I feel proud and satisfied with beautiful creative artsy work. I allow it to bring me so much depth and wisdom as I related to my situation. Now, I can continue to add little notes to personalize it to what I'm going through right now today. There's room for evolving with how I'm changing and growing, what I need at the moment. I just need to add a little note or an extra little flap into the envelope. What I love most about these craft pages is that I have a way to connect with my team daughter. This is an outlet that we both can enjoy and have fun with together as we grow and progress in our self-care. It's a wonderful, meaningful experience. I can share with even a friend. I'm equipping myself with a self-care toolkits that I can continue to use down the line. This has become an outlet for the pains, fears, humiliations, challenges or disappointments. It helps me to check within For the Strength, wisdom, grace and joy to journey on. This has become art healing for my soul, for my mental health, and for my whole well-being. These are just a few of the many benefits that I'm sure you can also receive from paying attention to your self-care and to the things that you love. It might be music or dance. Of course, sewing. We're cooking, art in any form. I encourage you to take the time for those things that light you up, that make you happy. That gives you new energy to journey on. Remember to take care of yourself. It's because, yes, you are that important. Self-care is one of those things that is essential. We often don't take enough time for it or we feel that we don't have the time for it. But taking care of yourself, your body, your health, and mental well-being is so important. Not just feel better and be happier, calmer, more joyful, but you're also able to be a greater help to others. Take care and I'll see you next time. 6. Bonus: Gratitude Crafts Page: Welcome to a brand new day, a brand new empty page ready to be filled by you. I'm inviting you to come and join me as we craft together. So I'm using different supplies. For example, some old newspapers, some colored papers, be some cut out pictures from magazines or old books or even stickers. You can grab along whatever you have on hand. I'm here cutting up, ripping up a piece of old newspaper because I like to add that kind of part of my base of my page. I have here another pretty colorful picture of flowers, which I would like to include on my page because it's some of the colors that I love that I enjoyed the moment. I'm cutting it to the right size. Actually this one, I'm going to be ripping it as well. Just for the old Look. I have here some cut-out letters from again, old magazines or newspapers. If chosen the letters that spell gratitude. Since that's the one that we're focusing on today. I'm going to cut them to the right size. I prepared some of this material beforehand just to save a little bit of time. But then the rest of my page, I just go with the flow. I stay sensitive to the things that I love. Shapes and layout design. I have. Here's some other cutouts from magazines and newspapers that I've just been collecting since a little while. I want to choose a picture that kind of resembles gratitude for me. So I have here some smiling faces like this one. I think I'm gonna go with this one. I loved the old fashioned book. I'm thinking of where to put it and I'll cut it to the right size. I think maybe square shape will do. Because I have a few things in mind already that I want to include on my paper in my page. Just to encourage you to find something that sparks inspiration, sparks joy for you. And that is also meaningful, related to the topic of the page you're working on. I'm going to use this black piece of cardboard just to help it stand out a little bit more to create some contrast. Between my page. The picture. I'm just screwing it on top and then cutting it to size. Still, choosing where I want everything. I have here, the words written out self-care. Since this is parts in conjunction with our series of self-care and well-being. So I'm definitely going to include that on my page. Like cutting it and different shape. Just for variety. I'm going to switch out this T because it's green and I don't have the color green on my page. Oh, before I forget, I'm going to use this little notebook paper. Place it somewhere around here. Because I love to include any little places. Notepaper, writing paper for some journal prompts. That's really the meaningful part of these pages for me. I'm going to include another one behind here, so I'm just measuring it. Makes sure I get to the right size. I'm going to be placing it behind it. I'm going to use the picture as a little pocket. That's what I love about these pages because I can always change out the papers if I wanted to journal some different questions or if I have different answers. Now I'm going to start gluing it in place. Since I have the general idea of where I want most things. I'm being very careful with this newspaper because it's quite old. It's very easy to rip. And yes, it's got some stains and from US or storage. But that's okay. That's kind of like the look of the journal. I'm going to glue this one as well, these flowers. So I'm not going to glue the ripped part. I'm just going to put glue on the three sides, the two sides and the bottom. Because I'm also using this as a pocket, this picture as well. So again, I'm just going to put glue on three of the sides. I think I'll place it here. I'm not going to formal. Yes, I'm make sure that my paper fits in there. I use the ruler to kind of loosen it up a little bit and make sure my paper fits in well without any glue spread out on the wrong part. For my letters, for the letter T that I took out, I'm going to use this pink paper. It matches my flowers. I'm just going to write out the letter T, a big bold letter. I'll cut that out. I love it that it matches the pink of the flowers. It's bringing the pink and different parts of my pages. I'm just delicately cutting it. This takes lots of patients making sure we get all these little details. I couldn't find another letter T's, so I had to make my own. So feel free to create whatever you have to when you don't find what you need, you can make it yourself. Now I'm going to glue this little letter writing piece of paper. I liked the little ribs look as well. Next I'm going to add my title, self-care. Maybe I'll glue the letters down first actually to make sure that I know where I want to put the self-care title. Let me take all these off and I'm again putting glue very carefully down, preferably onto my book rather than on the letters themselves. Because they're very delicate. Now, igloo my little flag title. Again, not totally straight. I like the look of and formal. I have this paper with beautiful flowers, kind of like a background paper and there's Catherine's on both sides. So I'm going to take advantage of that. Even use some of the text. Because some of the text I feel can even fit in with my page quite nicely. I'm looking which ones spark some gratitude for me. Time of your life. That's quite nice and goes along with feeling grateful. Some other words here might want to use, but I like the wow, celebrate, wonderful party. Some of those made me feel grateful, are funded or reminders. Being happy and joyful, bringing some of that positivity into my life. See if there's any others that I could choose. I find here a thank you. That one is for this page. Don't worry if you don't have these exact papers to cut out, really use what you have on hand and you don't have to even go and buy anything. Because you could tie to exert. You can print them out, you can find them online. You could write them yourself as well. For these flowers. I had this paper, so I wanted to use it. I figured it would save me a little bit of time from drawing them myself. I think you could even check out some magazines from the sharps or maybe from. The four stores or other magazines. It's not complicated these days to find beautiful things like this. And even in dollars stores or there's so many arts and crafts supplies and very reasonable price as well. So treat yourself to something fun like this. That's also part of self-care. I'm choosing a few flowers here just to bring it a little bit more color and fine. And again, to include the pink that I love to different parts of my paper, of my page. I'm including a little bit of leaves for some greenery. Maybe here. I have this black piece of cardboard which I'm going to use as well to add to my pockets, flower pocket. And I'll again continue the ripped look. It fits really nicely and snug in here one more place that I can add some journaling prompts, reflection to glue my flowers in place. Last but not least, I'm going to do a little reflection time, so I'm just going to write in the titles for now. And then later on I'm going to take my little private quiet time to really think about and answer these questions for myself. What am I grateful for? That one also changes continually, so I'm going to fill up the page. Then when there's no more room, I can always switch it out or I can add to it because the pocket can fit in. Lots of rural lots of papers. Yes, I don't want to forget to glue these in so that they don't get lost. My fingers get a little bit sticky after all this gluing. Really, this is the fun part. We're working real textile here, cutting and gluing and ribbing and writing. Just missing the drawing part. But that can come in anytime you like. You can add little doodles to your pages. Here I'm going to include a few little words around my page, but feel free to add whatever your heart longs for whatever would make you really happy. Filled with gratitude. We want our cups to overflow with gratitude so that we can share it with others and overflow on others in our work through our art, in our interactions with others throughout the day. So my next prompt is how does it make me feel? And I have loads of room to fill that up. My last one here is benefits. Benefits for my self-care. I think I'm going to write. That kind of helps remind me why I'm doing it. I can jump down on my answers here. I love to add a few little keywords around my page. Again, that's the fun journaling, look. Happy, joy. I kind of asked myself what words come to mind when I think of gratitude. What ties in with gratitude? Maybe how do I feel? Great to include Thank you here, because that's really what it comes down to. Being grateful is saying thank you. Gladness. Going to use my white pen as well. I'd like to switch out black and white. Just for fun and variety. Smile. Kia. Put in as much as you want into this page. You can fill it up. You can make it as simple and minimal it as you like. Whatever suits your style. There we have it. Our simple but beautiful gratitude for my self-care craft page. And I'm really looking forward to seeing you in some more craft pages for our self-care.