Between keeping up with client work, exploring Scandinavia + working on this new site, I haven't had much time to just PLAY.

I don't say this to complain about my current state of existence. As a creative, right-brained human, I've simply learned that my happiness + sanity are in direct correlation to the amount of time I allow myself to explore whichever artistic medium I feel like on a given day. Sometimes that's lettering, other times that's illustrating new letterpress projects or pattern-making. Often, it's literally scribbling in my sketchbook.

In the past, I used time as an excuse for not doing this one simple thing that instantly brings alignment + joy into my daily being. I whined (and still whine), "But there's no timmmmeee!" at least once a week to my mom on the phone.

Over the last year however, I've discovered all I really need is 20 minutes. Just a mere 1200 seconds to get things and shapes and ideas and life mantras and built-up gunk and Salt-n-Pepa lyrics out of my brain, and alive onto paper.

My favorite 20-minute play activity is stamping. This all started years ago with potato stamping. Now, it's morphed into a full-fledged artistic witch hunt to find any thing or object in my vicinity, slather it with paint, and stamp it to see the results.

In London, I discovered shallot stamping (above). In Stockholm, it was mark-making (below). And when I arrive to Portugal tomorrow morning, I fully plan to continue this ever-evolving experiment while basking my face in the Lisbon sun.

From top left (L to R): stamped tea bags, paintbrush marks, corrugated cardboard cut into shapes, fusilli pasta, pepper grinder, bell pepper, shallot, paper coffee cup