Rekindling creativity and reconnecting with my younger self

Hello stranger! Long time, no see, right? 

I always feel most like myself when I'm being creative, which is why I'm setting myself the challenge to try twenty new and preloved creative hobbies this Summer, starting right here with this blog post. 

In my teens, blogging was a way for me to share myself with an accepting and open world, without the confines of a school uniform or preconceptions made about me by my peers and neighbours from my (very) small hometown. As I've grown into myself, I've grown out of the need to create and build that online space for myself, but I often think about how much joy it brought me when I was younger. I feel the same about a lot of other creative outlets I had back then, which is why I've devised a list of all the things I'd like to take up or revisit to help me reconnect with my inner child and my younger self. 

Here's what we've got: 

1.  Blogging (hello, I'm here! Easy win.)
2.  Lino printing
3.  Sketching with oil pastels 
4.  Rap 
5.  Crochet (I already tried and failed, but I'm ready to be hurt again) 
6.  Collage making 
7.  Writing poetry 
8.  Painting (I do this sometimes, but not often enough)
9.  Jewellery making 
10.  Air dry clay sculpting (the other way is too expensive) 
11.  Music production or mixing (overly ambitious, I am aware) 
12.  Photography
13.  Cooking (proper recipes, not just 20-minute meals I find on TikTok)
14.  Writing a comedy set (this one is for the resolution of a complicated inside joke)
15.  Upcycling/DIYing something nice for my apartment 
16.  Embroidery 
17.  Urban sketching 
18.  Scrapbooking (I fear I will regret this one)
19.  Video-making (at a very amateur iPhone user's level)
20.  Baking something extraordinary

And with this promise of creativity, I will love you and leave you by (partially) ticking one off the list. At Christmas, my boyfriend gifted me a camera, and a few months later I gifted myself the confidence to learn how to use it and go out into the world to capture moments that I deemed worthy of an amateur photograph. I've included some of my favourite snaps from our recent trip to Sicily right here to mark my commitment to rekindling my creativity. 

Chat soon,