Creatively Blocked? Do Something Else

Last night I made 128 scrappy triangle squares.

 

I'm having a hard enough time getting my body clock to spring ahead to Daylight Savings time, so I went to bed and left them like this, ready to be pressed later today. They're made from 64 four-inch purple squares, cut from a handful of purple fabrics and 64 unique non-purple squares, pulled from my mini-scrap bins. Finding scraps that were large enough from which to cut a 4-inch square turned out to be the biggest challenge.

 All that pressing, cutting, sewing, squaring up and trimming didn't feel at all creative. In fact, more than once last night, I had that, "what was I thinking" feeling–it seemed like all too much work for the small project I had in mind and thought I would complete in a night or two.

But it was, in a way, meditative and by the end of the night, not only had I made all the units I needed for that small project, I also had a new idea about which way to go with my tea towel challenge.

(I also had this pretty little pile of thin fabric shards from trimming those squares that I think some of the returning birds outside might enjoy to use as nesting materials)

Often the best thing I can do when facing a creative block or a unresolved question is to DO SOMETHING ELSE.  Cook, garden, work on a project in another medium or just play with a small project that is completely different.  Flexing creative muscles in a different way seems to prime the pump and enable me to continue through the block or solve the problem that has left me stuck.

Your mileage may differ, but when deadlines (real or self-imposed) and helpful friends don't work, somehow doing something else works for me.

As it's already Wednesday in other parts of the world, I'm linking with Esther's WOW on Wednesday.