2016 Baker's Dozen (and a half)

Hi all!  I thought I ought to get this retrospective post done before we get to February (though there was one of these Favourites posts which was a whole year late!).   It's been considerably quieter here at Words and Picures in 2016, so you would think it would be an easier task to select my Baker's Dozen this time around... no such luck.   In fact, I pretty much gave up on the dozen and just allowed the selection to take its course.

Despite being away from my craft stash for the majority of the year, I think it's still important to reflect on the journey - perhaps even more important to keep track of where I'm going if I want to make the most of the crafting time I have.  So here are some of my favourite things from 2016... some chosen for significant elements they contributed to the journey, some just for the love of them.

(If you click on the titles, you can go and see them in detail - close-up photos always seem to capture a piece better than the "all-in-one" - and with a couple that means hopping onward to catch them elsewhere, if they appeared as part of my DT duties.)

Setting out with Wanderlust

Wanderlust Travel Journal

Bottling It Up

Full of Possibilities

Imagine Simplicity

Flourishing Florals

Reflection of a Dragonfly

Trash to Industrial Treasure

Beautiful Moments

In the Pink

Travelling the World

Wallflower Dreams

Monochromatic Observations

Lost and Found

Live Gently

Come What May

Believe that you can...

The Wonder of Trees

Walking in a Ginger Wonderland

So, one thing I notice is how many of my choices are book-related, either handmade or altered books/journals or art journalling within books.  Well, it is Words and Pictures... I suppose with my love of words and, by extension, books, it was inevitable that books and book pages would come to be a central part of this visual creative journey (check out last week's Harlequin Infusion for a good example, if you missed it).

Art journalling has definitely played a bigger part in the journey this year (if only because an art journal is a relatively simple thing to take with you on an actual journey!). And there's evidence of my journey into my own mark-making - a significant development this year - from scribbles to doodles to sketching and painting to allowing my own handwriting to put in an appearance. 

But looking at this post I'm also very conscious of the back and forth between simplicity and complexity.  I wrote about this conflict in the post for the Imagine Simplicity tag which you saw above.  I'm not saying it has to be an "either/or" but I think it's definitely an ongoing negotiation in my crafting style.

Thank you for indulging me in this reflective mode... we're heading forwards into brand new stamps next, so that will give you something completely fresh to enjoy!

Learning without reflection is a waste. Reflection without learning is dangerous.

Confucius