I had written “maybe join Twitter” on my writing goals list for 2019. Well, over a year later, I have officially joined Twitter.
I spent more time than I would like to admit trying to think of what to say for my first tweet.
I guess we’ll see how this goes. You are welcome to follow me @BrigitteBrulz.
My 12-year-old daughter, who had illustrated Aah! Blown Away, Crash!: An Alphabet Misadventure, designed the banner for my Twitter profile. She chose to use the colors and font from my website along with the cover images of the books and journals I have published.
Please let me know in the comments below if you have any suggestions for using Twitter!
(This post contains affiliate links, which means I may make a small commission at no extra charge to you if you click on a link and make a purcahse. Thank you!)
I have really enjoyed creating and publishing journals over the past year. I made reading journals for my daughters to record the books they’ve read, a field trip journal to record field trips we attend, a sermon notes journal to take notes during our Sunday morning sermons, a high school journal for my daughters to record daily snippets of their high school journey, and a baby journal for moms to record the first few years of their baby’s life.
So, it really wasn’t much of a surprise when my 13-year-old daughter came to me and said she had an idea for another journal we should create.
She explained to me how she wanted a journal similar to Rip It! Write It! Draw It! but specifically for Christian kids. She had plans of what she would do on each page and some Bible verses she could include. I absolutely loved her idea and told her she should create it!
My daughter had all the ideas, but she didn’t know how she would create the pictures and format the journal. That part sounded perfect for my 12-year-old daughter (her sister) who had just finished illustrating the book Aah! Blown Away, Crash! An Alphabet Misadventure.
Learn more about Aah! Blown Away, Crash! An Alphabet Misadventurehere.
I figured having the two of them work together on this journal would be a great use of the extra time they had since most of their activities had been cancelled as a result of the COVID-19 quarantine.
They spent quite a bit of time planning exactly how they wanted each page to look and stored all of their ideas in a binder.
My 12-year-old daughter used Affinity Designer and Canva to turn all of their ideas on paper into reality. Let me just say, I am amazed by what my daughters were able to accomplish! I really hope they continue to use the gifts God has given them.
They found some images on Pixabay to use in the journal, but all of the images shown in these pictures were created by my 12-year-old daughter.
This is the first activity they created for the journal.
And here is another activity.
And another one.
Sorry, my website address won’t show up entirely on all of the pictures for some reason and my pictures aren’t the clearest. But other than that, aren’t they amazing?
My daughters created over 75 activities for the journal.
Each activity has at least one Bible reference that relates to that activity listed.
Just two more pictures of the inside activities. (I can’t show all of their pages!)
Then, they ordered some copies to keep, hand out, and sell. Their box of copies arrived last Friday.
Of course, I bought a few copies, too. I’m waiting for them to sign my copy.
Write, Draw, Believe is now available on Amazon here.
I’ll close with the words they included on their dedication page:
“To all truth seekers- May you find the one and only Truth!”
“This journal is dedicated to every Christian obedient enough to follow God with their entire heart. May God give you the strength to follow His calling.”
(This post contains affiliate links, which means I may make a small commission at no extra charge to you if you click on a link and make a purchase. Thank you!)
Earlier this year, my daughters and I were sorting through some things in our basement when one of my daughters found this little notecard bin.
It may not look like much from the outside – just a plain, clear bin to hold notecards. But the inside is full of memories from years ago.
I had purchased the bin and labeled 365 notecards (one for each day of the year) at the beginning of 2015. Each night, I wrote the year and a short sentence or two about something my family had done that day. Then, I placed that notecard in the back, so the next day’s notecard was in the front.
I continued this for over a year and enjoyed reading what we had done on the same date the year before. For some reason, I stopped writing our daily entries, and the bin ended up forgotten in a box in our basement until my daughter found it.
Now, the little bin sits on her dresser. My daughter has been recording a daily entry in it ever since she discovered it.
It’s interesting to hear what we had done together four or five years ago on the same date. A lot has changed since then!
That little bin gave me the idea of creating a multi-year journal. That’s how the baby journal I created earlier this year was born!
I had a couple of expecting moms I knew in mind as I put the baby journal together. But my daughters are past the baby stage, so I created another multi-year journal with my daughters in mind.
I received the proof of the high school journal last week. The cover is gorgeous!
Of course, the actual journal will not say “Not For Resale” across it. That’s just what the proof says.
Journal owners can spend just a few minutes each day (or night before bed) to write a couple of sentences documenting memories, places visited, activities, current events, or whatever else is on their mind. If they miss a day, they can simply continue on whatever date it is. Great for the busy high schooler!
Each page is divided into four journal entries, one for each year that occurs on that page’s indicated date (except for February 29th, which only has one journal entry for Leap Year).
Journal owners can see their thoughts and activities from the previous years on the same dates. This is a great way to see how much remains the same and how much changes throughout 9th grade (freshman year), 10th grade (sophomore year), 11th grade (junior year), and 12th grade (senior year).
The journal is softcover and measures 7″ x 10″. The first entry begins on July 15th, so journal owners can record their thoughts as they prepare to start high school.
Additional pages in the back of the journal provide space to record:
favorites
compare and contrast favorite food, song, movie, TV show, color, book, class, teacher, sport, hobby, restaurant, store, and two other options over the years in a simple chart
sports and clubs
classes
goals
fill-in-the blank space for the writing prompt “After high school, I want to…”
special memories
anything else
pictures
I ordered two journals for my daughters. Unfortunately, I’m a year late for one, but she still plans to fill out the pages for her remaining high school years. I can’t believe I will have two high schoolers this year!
You can click here to order a high school journal today if you would like one. (All of my journals can be viewed in one spot here.)
The snow has melted, the grass is green, and the flowers are growing!
My daughters and I had fun earlier this year creating our own spring pipe cleaner flower craft, which you can check out on Hands On As We Grow if you would like (here).
The idea for this craft came to me while I was organizing some of our art supply bins. The sunflower seeds were just a fun addition to use up some pickle-flavored sunflower seeds I had at home.
Ever since publishing Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles, finding pickle-flavored items has been kind of a joke in my family. So when I saw these pickle-flavored sunflower seeds at Dollar Tree, I decided to purchase them.
Interestingly, even though my book is titled Pickles, Pickles, I Like Pickles, I don’t think I have ever actually liked the flavor of any pickle-flavored food I have tried. I like bread and butter pickles, but not pickle-flavored sunflower seeds. And since the rest of my family didn’t plan to eat the rest of the seeds, we decided to use them for our flower craft.
I thought the flowers turned out really cute with their pickle-flavored sunflower seed addition.
What do you think?
Check out these posts for some books to go along with the flower theme:
Brigitte Brulz 