My creative self

I have to say, I'm a bit proud of my creativity lately. I'm not sure why this is this case, but I've started and finished (and some not so finished) what seems to be like a zillion "creative" projects lately.

My most recent one is my refinishing a piece of furniture...this little beauty to be exact:

 

I had already taken off one of the top cabinet doors before I remembered to take a picture. (You can also notice my yoga mat, foam roller, shoes, and printer there in the background haha.) 

I've helped other people refurnish before. My older sister Christianne is great at it. But this is my first project for me, doing exactly what I want. 

Granted what I want is pretty simple. I'll be leaving off the top cabinet doors, painting the whole thing black (I'm real creative I know), possibly doing an accent pattern on the back of the top two shelves, and possibly replacing the hardware. (The current bottom handles don't bother me too much.) 

So far I've sanded everything down, painted corners and curves with a deep red in case I want to let it peak through at all, and painted a top coat of black paint on the whole thing with the exception of the bottom six inches. (I'm going to let the top dry so I can just turn it on the side to get the bottom parts.) 

The main reason I'm writing this post (especially while the project is only half complete), is because I kinda laughed at myself while I was painting tonight. One year ago I was ever so struggling to do my weekly post for our sister creative blog, "Keep the Juices Flowing." I could never find time to do a craft to blog about. So as the weeks went on I found myself blogging about uh, music, organization, networking, or fonts. And those were all last minute topics thrown together Tuesday night for my Wednesday deadline. 

But here I am now. I'm, dare I say, even more busy that I was a year ago. (With a new job with a few extra hours, plus teaching Zumba and learning and creating choreography on top of normal stuff...hmm although maybe I have fewer friends now. Maybe that's it :P) 

Now I'm constantly doing some creative project. I guess even coming up with new Zumba choreography is creating. I've been so excited to have people come over to my new home because I get to show them everything I've been working on. ...Although I've been a little hesitant because I'm not "done." But I'm just not sure if I will ever actually be completely "done." 

Anyways all of this reminds me of Pres. Uchtdorf's General Conference talk from last October where he talked about the act of "creating."

"The desire to create is one of the deepest yearnings of the human soul. No matter our talents, education, backgrounds, or abilities, we each have an inherent wish to create something that did not exist before....As you take the normal opportunities of your daily life and create something of beauty and helpfulness, you improve not only the world around you but also the world within you."

- President Dieter F. Uchtdorf,

Happiness, Your Heritage

Tonight, I'm heading straight to bed. But tomorrow, I'm planning to get up and "create."