Skip to main content

Make: Telling Your Story

July is always an awesome month for me. July means Fourth of July and fireworks. July means a vacation; a vacation that typically doesn't leave my PTO (paid-time off) balance negative.
 

It also means I'm starting or partway through an eCourse or participating in a workshop. This summer the workshop is Find Your Voice, led by Kristin of Ruskin Papercrafts. And it's one you can participate in as well--for free!
 

Maxim_TellYourStoryFYV

 

How are you spending your summer?
 

Find Your Voice is an eight week online workshop that kicked off last Monday. The first week was about gathering our supplies, getting familiar with the format of the class, meeting fellow participants, and beginning a framework for our stories.
 

FindYourVoiceBinderSupplies

 

If you've been thinking about starting a blog or beginning a journaling practice, Find Your Voice is a great introduction! When the eight weeks are up you'll be more than two-thirds of the way to developing a healthy writing habit (you need 66 days before a practice becomes a habit).
 

Kickstart Your Storytelling Habit with a Weekly Creative Call to Action

Each week we have a creative call-to-action with three prompts. One of the prompts is crafting based, one is writing based, and one is picture based. For the first week, I initially shied away from the picture-based prompt as it would be less challenging. I instead chose the crafting based prompt: "create a project that represents you at the beginning of your storytelling journey."
 

FindYourVoiceBinder

 

I decided to decorate my D-ring binder with quotes or objects that represented significant events in my journey to find my voice. If you've followed the blog for awhile you might recognize some of the objects I chose for the cover of my Find Your Voice workshop binder. Don't worry, if you're new I'm about to explain. I also ended up filling the binder with worksheets and projects from other storytelling eCourses.

  • Footprints from a sign a friend made for us to hang in the delivery room.
  • A card from my first Mother's Day.
  • A piece of packaging from the bouquet cubes got me for my first Mother's Day.
  • Polka dots from a gift bag that held clothing for Gates.
  • Cover from the travel journal I created for last summer's Do What You Love for Life eCourse.
  • A piece of packaging from my Blogging Your Way Workshop mood board.
  • We Are What We Make button from the Kollabora gift that Alt Summit SLC participants received.
  • My name tag from the Hello! Social for newbies at Alt Summit SLC.
  • The banding from the Atly gift box that Alt Summit New York and Alt Summit San Francisco participants received.
With the items I chose it was important to capture significant events that have shaped my journey so far as well as represent hopes and aspirations. As a new mother, finding my voice is primarily about learning to balance sometimes diverging roles. With my binder, I wanted to represent this internal struggle.
 

FindYourVoiceBinder_Details FindYourVoiceBinder_Details_Tabs

 

Join us This Summer for a Free Storytelling Workshop

If you've been searching for your voice, I highly recommend joining us for the 2015 Find Your Voice Workshop, starting Wednesday July 1st 2015. To get a taste of what to expect, check out some of the projects I completed for the inaugural workshop in 2013:


 

genuinely eden

Credits: All layouts designed by and images taken by Eden Hensley Silverstein for The Road to the Good Life.

Labels:

Popular posts from this blog

How to Store Fresh Winter Squash, Potatoes, Onions, and Garlic

I love a well organized kitchen and pantry. Sadly, since moving to San Francisco, all of the places I've lived have lacked a pantry. No pantry means one has to get creative with storage. Some solutions, while pretty, aren't always best at keeping food. I'm now on a mission to organize my kitchen with prevention of food spoilage in mind.     Right now winter vegetables are available from our CSA, some of which I'm not very familiar with -- hard or winter squash varieties for example. And, with cubes until recently on a soft foods diet we didn't go through what I was buying as quickly as before. So, I was seeing potatoes turn green or shrivel. Squash rot. Garlic turn to dust. Seeing this waste a light bulb went on: I must be storing the vegetables wrong. To my cookbooks and the Internet I went in search of the right way(s) to keep them. And I discovered, or rather confirmed, I was doing it wrong.   General Guidelines for Storing Vegetables Most of us don't hav...
Read more

8 Best Places to Get Texas BBQ Shipped to Your Door

( updated September 27, 2023 ) Depending where you're from, BBQ is sure to get a crowd fired up. Just try to convince a Texan that Kansas City, Memphis, or Carolina Style BBQ is the best--I guarantee you're sure to see fireworks. Sadly in the San Francisco Bay Area, Texas BBQ is in short supply--rotisserie is more our style. So when I've got a craving, I head to my Texas favorites and have the BBQ shipped.     After years of getting Texas BBQ shipped, here are my top 8 places to get Texas BBQ shipped to your door. Along with my favorites, I'm sharing tips for ensuring your Texas BBQ arrives in time for your special occasion.   How do you like your BBQ? Dry rub or Sauce? Texas, Kansas City, Memphis, or Carolina Style?     Read on for my favorite meats along with the places in Texas to get them shipped from!  
Read more

new? start here.

( updated 02/24/2022 ) Welcome! Nice to meet you!   I’m Eden, a fourth-generation Californian. Together my husband, 9.75 year old daughter, and Maine Coon/Ragamuffin rescue cat are in the process of unpacking and nesting in our new 100+ year old Craftsman in Berkeley, CA (until this past December we called a 100-year old, a 847 sq ft Edwardian flat in San Francisco home). We define The Good Life with haves not wants and experiences not things.     What's your story?  
Read more