As we tend to do at year’s end, I’m taking stock of how things went. That includes how I’m feeling about being able to embrace everyday creativity. I’m using David Parrish’s breakdown of a-Creativity for artistic interests and i-Creativity for ingenuity as I consider how creativity shapes my life. (Here’s my blog post about this.)

Life pulls us in so many directions. It’s unlikely that’s ever going to change.  I’ve been sharing every now and then about how I make time for creativity in my upside down, topsy turvy life. If you want to catch up, read How Would You Use More Time? and An Update on Time Savings  and When Does Time Pressure Help Creativity – or Not?

Meanwhile, here are my year-end reflections in case they help you do the same.

On the Artistic Front

I feel pretty good about how I embraced everyday creativity in my writing activities this year. Mainly because I committed to protecting time for deep work to craft stories. For me, a deep work period often is only 30-60 minutes at a time. This almost always happens super early in the morning and involves ignoring all distractions so I can go into the zone.

But I didn’t have as much time as hoped for my arts and crafts dabbling. I’m not that skilled on the techniques side of thing. No Estsy shop coming for my stuff! But I love learning about various crafts, experimenting with materials and just enjoying the act of creating something even if I don’t know what to do with it afterwards.

I’m going to blame the dent in my crafting time to the endless hours I spent painting and redoing parts of our home. It all started with major water damage in a bathroom that led to a remodel in 2024. We realized our aging house was done waiting for attention. That led to a kitchen remodel, a second bathroom + closet remodel (which led to a new roof that I did NOT do myself after we uncovered a major leak), then a bedroom do-over, and then a living room do-over. Yes, all in 2025.

Now that I write this, when did I think I’d fit in some knitting? And I did enjoy picking new colors and materials, thinking about layouts and functionality. Look at me, amateur interior designer! Okay, I’m counting this in my artistic bucket.

How about you? How did you embrace everyday creativity on the artistic side? Any surprises or detours from the year?

On the Ingenuity Front

For some people, this involves inventing things and I’m impressed with those folks and their skills. My focus is on busting through challenges getting in the way of my writing time, how I’m approaching a project or something going on with the family.

I do feel like I stayed mindful in thinking about creative solutions to everyday challenges. A few examples:

• I had an exciting mini-breakthrough this fall about how to help my younger daughter with one of her goals that’s been elusive to achieve. It underscored the value of keeping an eye out for innovative ideas, technology and products that can emerge and be game changers.
• I posted this article recently about how I use simple prototyping in a variety of ways. Relooking at my examples, this year definitely involved a lot of pencil and paper to mock up ideas and story layouts.
• And I kept working on doing better setup of bibliographies for my nonfiction books to save me time down the road. This is an example of a time multiplier. You invest a bit more time upfront to save time down the road.

How about you? Any thorny situations that you busted through either with a creative flash of clarity or intentional use of creative problem-solving methods? Or any life hack inventions making things easier?

Were you able to embrace everyday creativity this year in satisfying ways?

2026 Pledge

I don’t do New Year resolutions, but I do like to set a few goals. Thus, for 2026, I solemnly pledge to keep protecting deep work time for my writing and pick back up on my fun arts and crafts dabbling instead of tackling a million house projects (although, there will be a couple of DIY interior design opportunities). I also have a couple of life sticky wickets that I’m going to intentionally tackle with some creative problem-solving.

Yes, I will continue to embrace everyday creativity. 

Are you with me on the everyday creativity pledge?

Quick Reader Poll

I’ll also keep writing and advocating about the value of finding time for all forms of creativity in our lives. I’d like to tailor information and support to what you’d find helpful. Much appreciation if you can give me guidance through this one-question poll.

Thanks and happy creating!