In 2016 I had a resolution of working harder to lift up others instead of being in my own emotions all of the time.  On a day to day basis, we are all just trying to survive adult-life/mom-life that we hardly have time to make grand gestures for our friends beyond big milestones like baby showers or birthdays. 

The Leslie-Knope-created "Galentine's Day" holiday is a perfect excuse or reminder to lift up your gal pals.  Let's be real... most women being really emotional puts a big hurdle for female friendships.  We keep tabs of things like "well they haven't initiated hanging out with me, and I've asked 2 times. Fine I guess they never want to hang out with me."

Well that's not how Leslie Knope thinks, my friends! She will bombard you with friendship and make a binder about all your favorite things. She doesn't take things personally and skulk back into a surface level friendship. It's definitely a lesson in being more intentional and thoughtful with your friends.

Bertha from Chic in Academia ran with this idea and hosted a fun "mom's night in" Galentine party at her house this month, and it turned out so sweet!  I was able to do some calligraphy origami place cards for the dinner table, and they turned out exactly like I pictured in my head! whew!

I'm so excited to have been a part of this styled shoot done by Becca Bell of 2b Photography that's now featured in the October 2016 Issue of Beauty, Cocktails, Girl Talk's on-line magazine. My lettering (invitations + place cards) makes an appearance -- and somehow Ann Marie Leveille conned me into playing the Bride again... not a tough sell. ;-)

Thanks to Sarah Elizabeth Cleveland of Repertoire, my calligraphy was included in the sweetest garden party shoot she designed for Social South Magazine.  My favorite part of the shoot is definitely the florals made by my bestie, Sarah Woodall.  Her centerpiece was amazing, and all of the girls had their own flower crown -- which, let's be real, makes me jealous. I wish I could wear a flower crown every day!  Everything was captured beautifully by Love Be Photography. 

Today is National Donut Day... which made me think of this incredibly fun baby shower (or "baby sprinkle") that we had the privilege of throwing this spring.  One of the main reasons I love events is because each one is tailored specifically to the honored guest, and celebrating what makes that person unique is a really fun experience to me. 

One thing that the honored mama, Kelly, loves is donuts!  Now this was also supposed to be a baby "sprinkle" since it was for baby girl numero dos, until all the ladies got a little carried away with all the baby things... But besides that, we were going for a "sprinkle" which made the color palette of a sprinkled donut an easy choice.  Also, Kelly chose a gorgeous floral print from Little Unicorn for the nursery so we wanted to incorporate that, too!

This week, two of my friends and I launched an instagram project --Gold Leaf Creative-- to document our "creative growth projects" (as I'm labeling it).  

 2017 Update: Now we have moved the account to be an official floral business, run by Sarah -- @goldleaffloral. I have a calligraphy account @swanlindseylettering, and you can find Brittny @brittnyrenephoto! 

​We have all been learning and doing event planning/floral design/calligraphy/photography here and there, but never really felt like we had arrived as master artists.  Well, duh! We aren't! But one night at a girls night we decided that shouldn't be holding us back, and we should work on more projects together. 

"Perfectionism is the enemy of learning, creativity, and innovation."