Creative Inspiration

Experiencing writer’s block? Not sure what to paint? Bored?



Keri Smith has a series of books perfect for sparking your inner imagination and creativity. While some might argue these books are for kids, we would like to disagree. In How to be an Explorer of the World you will investigate the beauty around you that is often overlooked. The goal by the end is to have created a series of artwork that you could display in your own private art gallery—creating art from found objects on your route home, finding objects in nature that match the random paints chips you may have lying around, or documentation of patterns you find around you. In Guerilla Art Kit you will learn about temporary art—infusing artwork in public spaces (that disappear obviously—no vandalism charges desired!). Perhaps you’ll craft Keri’s seed bombs and throw them into the nearby landfill or educate others with sidewalk chalk on a busy sidewalk. It provides recipes for temporary mediums to relay the message on whatever you might be passionate about.



About Keri Smith:

Keri Smith is an author/illustrator turned guerilla artist. She is the author of several bestselling books about creativity including the bestselling Wreck this Journal (2007 Perigee), How to be an Explorer of the World –the Portable Life/Art Museum, ( 2008 Perigee), The Guerilla Art Kit (2007 Princeton Architectural Press), Living Out Loud –Activities to Fuel a Creative Life (published 2003 by Chronicle Books), and Tear up this Book! :The Sticker, Stencil, Stationery, Games, Crafts, Doodle, And Journal Book For Girls!, (2005 American Girl). Her newest book, This is Not a Book will be released fall 2009 by Penguin Books. She is the author of the popular weblog the Wish Jar which attracts over 10,000 readers daily, and writes on occasion for a variety of magazines (including How Magazine). Keri spends her days playing with her husband and son, and divides her time between upstate New York, and the countryside of Canada.

As a free lance illustrator she has worked for a wide variety of clientsworldwide. Most recently Random House, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Ford Motor Co., the Boston Globe, Galison/Mudpuppy Press, and Hallmark. In the last few years she has given lectures and workshops on a variety of topics for The Learning, Arts & the Brain Summit at Johns Hopkins University, the How Design Conference, the OntarioGraphic Artist’s Assocation, UC Davis, and schools across North America.She has been featured in How, Step by Step, Print, Bust, Wired and many more.

National Reading Month

March is National Reading Month! So now that the weather cooled down again grab a book and cozy up inside. Here are a few suggested reads...

You may have already read Three Cups of Tea by Greg Mortensen (and if not, do!)--an intriguing and inspiring story of how one person can influence change and rally a village behind a common cause. Now, check out Stones into Schools by Greg Mortensen. It's the follow up to Three Cups of Tea explaining his efforts in Afghanistan. If you saw his speech at the Morrison Center back in November 2008, you learned a little about the present events he's working on, but check out this book for further detail. Every day, the Taliban are preventing girls from being educated, burning schools and commiting horrible attrocities. In Afghanistan, a son must ask his mother's permission to join the Taliban's forces, and as Greg Mortensen explains from an African proverb, "Educate a boy, and you educate an individual. Educate a girl, and you educate a community." Taliban camps are set up in areas of deep poverty offering food and shelter to those who commit to their 'education'. Mortensen understands this to be the reason why to build schools near these dangerous areas to give other options to those in so dire need of help. And as a result, has seen those schools burned--yet, he continues to strive forward. Check it out!

Another inspiring book is Expanding Architecture: Design as Activism. It's a compilation of 30 essays by leading architects and designers on the need to shift our thoughts and perceptions of what the built environment should be like. It calls for social equity and designing for community and the public good. Filled with color images of existing projects it challenges us to consider what we can do in our own community.


We've all read these classics but who can resist the binding? Penguin Classics has been continuing to release some of these well known novels in their clothbound series. The collection started out with about 10 but new ones are being added. Wouldn't these look nice on a bookshelf?




If you're in the mood for some warm food, flip through the pages of Heidi Swanson's Super Natural Cooking: Five Ways to Incorporate Whole and Natural Ingredients Into Your Cooking. The Spring Minestrone shown on the cover is amazing and suits well for the current cold weather. The Mesquite Chocolate Chip cookies were delicious--even though it proved difficult to track down the mesquite flour (if we all keep asking at the CO-OP I'm sure they'll start stocking it regularly). This book is also responsible for an addiction to hibiscus tea. A recipe has yet to fail in this book. Maybe indulge in a bowl of Spring Minestrone while delving into one of the above mentioned books?



Happy Reading!