For three of the last five years I have participated in The 100 Day Project, “a free, global art project that takes place online.”  People around the world commit to creating something every day for one hundred consecutive days.  Artists can choose any type of creativity for the project–painting, drawing, sewing, mixed media art, Zentangle–this possibilities are endless.  This is a way to get the creative juices moving in a concrete way every day.  Many people post their daily work on Instagram with the hashtag #the100dayproject2024.  There are some amazingly creative people out there!  It is worth a look even if you aren’t a part of the project.

The first year that I participated in this project was 2019.  I wrote a haiku each day.  Doing so was a great experience.  After the project ended, I went back and chose one of my photos to accompany each haiku and had them printed in a hardback book.  It was a labor of love, one of which I am proud…and I say that very rarely about anything that I have done.

In 2020, I decided that I was going to learn to use Procreate, the digital art and illustration app for the ipad.  I had fun and learned a lot about both the app itself and drawing.  But, the biggest takeaway for me from that year was that, though drawing on the ipad is more convenient and much less messy, I actually prefer playing with real art supplies.  There is just something that to me is more satisfying about working with paper and water and paint brushes and markers.  Don’t get me wrong, Procreate is amazing.  I do still play around with it, but it is not my preferred tool.

The third year that I participated, my intention was less defined.  I committed to doing “something” in my art journal each day.  I was successful, but I struggled much more through the hundred days because I was working literally with a blank canvas.  I did experiment with a lot of different journaling techniques and when it was over, I had definitely learned a lot…and had overcome much frustration.

I skipped the two years that I did (2021 and 2023) because the timing of the project was such that I knew I couldn’t commit to it whole-heartedly.  That said, I did miss it. Since lasy year was one of those skipped years, I am ready to jump back in in 2024.  Knowing that the project was to begin in February, I have been thinking since early in January about what I wanted to create for this year’s project.  The funny thing is that I already have two daily projects to which I am already commited.  I have taken a photo a day to document my life every day without fail since January 1, 2013.  I have done this for so long that it doesn’t even feel like “a project” anymore.  It is a part of who and what I am.  It is as much a part of my daily routine as is putting on deodorant and brushing my teeth.

This year I am also revisiting that daily art journal page project that I found so frustrating during the 2022 100 Day Project.  (Apparently I got more from those hundred days than I realized.)  This year’s journal is part art journal and part scrapbook.  In many ways it is an extension of my photo a day project, another way to document something that represents my day.  I don’t know that this discipline will continue beyond 2024, but so far it has been fun and not quite as challenging as my 2022 daily art journal attempt.

All that to say that I had to think long and hard about what to do this yuear that would be challenging but accomplishable and also something that would be fun as well as beneficial to my creative self.  The one thing that I enjoy doing is writing, but, for some reason that I have not figured out, it is the thing for which I don’t ever seem to take/make time.  I wish I understoodd that about myself but I don’t.  With all that in mind, I decided to circle back around to my very first 100 Day Project and write for 100 days this year.  My goal is to write a poem a day.  The form is not as specific as the 100 days of haiku.  Its just a poem…whatever that looks like.  I will admit up front that this is a huge undertaking, but I want to try.  I’m sure there will be some haiku that makes its way into the next one hundred days.  I hope to use this time to try to establish a writing routine to which I am as commited as I am to my photo project. I also hope to grow as a writer by trying new forms.  They say practice makes better.  We’ll see how it goes between today and May 27th!