Dream. Believe. Sparkle.

Out here in Wales, still working from home in the age of COVID-19, I don’t have access to a stationery cupboard. Thus left to my own devices, I’ve bought a succession of cheap but serviceable plain notepads for my scribbled work notes. Job done.

Nearing the end of another dull pad, I went a-scrolling a stationery site for a couple of ring binders to contain my Zoom/Teams-scrawls. I was ready to get a couple of boring plain ones just to do the job, but something called to me to keep scrolling. Right on the very last page I looked at, there it was. The glorious folder pictured above, covered with unicorns and rainbows and happy little clouds. I laughed out loud in pure ✨joy✨ and immediately added it to basket.

Is it professional? No. Do I care? Also no. Am I going to take this back to the office when we properly go back? I might have to think about that, although that’s less about what people might think and more that I wouldn’t want it to get damaged in my bag. For now it’s sitting on my desk, its exhortations to Dream! Believe! Sparkle! acting as reminders to look for ✨joy✨ and welcome it into my life, in whatever form it takes.

This and an accidental nudge from a Twitter conversation (thanks, Jono) got me thinking about this site. Just over a year ago now I decided to reboot it; the content was stale, my creative inspiration was at absolute zero, and I kind of wanted to show off my cool technical skills as I made my own website from scratch and gave insightful tips about Data and Analytics and Other Cool Things Like That.

The thing is, a plain white blog with dry tips about data does not spark ✨joy✨. So that lasted all of three posts. And I’ve been sat here ever since thinking “I should really deal with that”… really not dealing with it.

But now the unicorns are here and asking me what does spark ✨joy✨. And the answer — along with the odd piece of unicorn-themed merchandise — is making things, with my hands, and looking at the things I’ve made and thinking yes good.

So, that’s what I should be doing again here, I think. A self-indulgent finished object showcase. A sort of… personal ravelstagram. Here’s hoping that I get far enough that if I abandon it for another 12 months, it’ll look a bit better than it has for the last year. :)