I committed to a 100-day creativity challenge. For 100 days, I will craft one haiku, paint a small watercolor, and then write the haiku on the painting.

I’m a bit behind on the painting as I needed to wait for the paper to arrive before I could begin. However, I am on target with the haiku. So far, 20 haikus grace my notes. It’s amazing to think I’m one-fifth of the way through the challenge. I love that at the end, I will have 100 pieces of art. They are the perfect size for this type of a challenge – one quarter of a sheet of 9×12 water color paper.

I’ve finished 3 cards – painted, written, and waxed.

I love them. They are an easy way to have more creativity, writing, and art in my life.

And, they are a way to challenge, and hopefully quiet, my inner critic, who sometimes seeks perfection rather than process, beauty, goodness, and learning.

For instance, look at the 9.7.26. First I didn’t like the watercolor shapes, so I added the gold lines, and voila, I liked it. Then I added words, and didn’t space out the first two lines of the haiku poem. Ugh. So I looked, wondered, and thought about possibilities. Turns out I’m unsure there is a better placement. I would like the yellow block to the right to have the first line. But then the first and second line are in yellow blocks, while the final one is not. So perhaps what I did is ideal? I don’t know. One thing I do know is, in the future, I might want to lay it out a few times in my mind before writing.

I’m so happy it’s Friday! Fingers are crossed for many opportunities to watercolor over the weekend.

Meanwhile, I will continue to write. It’s been a blessing to write each day – both for the moment of thinking and creativity, and for the opportunity to reread my thoughts from days past. For various reasons, I was thinking I might have many cranky or negative poems. Sometimes life is tough and it can come out in my writing. Frankly, I was worried my relentless positivity was a thing of the past. Imagine my delight when I read the poems and discovered most were positive. Some had two stanzas — one of complaint or less than hopefulness, and then the second encouraging hope, or pointing out previously unseen truths. So, I write, read, and paint on, and I am grateful.

What might you choose to do for 100 days?