Keeping Myself Sane

Hey friends and dedicated readers of GLR! Most of you might remember that back on November first I featured the Chuckie Goodnight Foundation. Those folks are really cool and have a whole bunch of fun stuff on their website that is aimed specifically at kids in order to teach them about the benefits of environmental protection.

Another thing all of you fine peeps might remember is that I have officially signed on as a NaNoWriMo participant this year. Why? Well simply because I know there are a few novels inside this old head of mine that are going to cause it to explode if I don’t let them out! So far the challenge is going great and I am staying on track to my personal goal of 2,000 written words per day.

So what do these two things have in common?

Well in the greater sense of the world at large, not much, but in my world they have met with a sweet hug. While perusing the Chuckie website I came across a coloring page. I saved it because I had meant to include it with the last post on these folks but in the end forgot to do so. Here is what it looks like in its original state:

I love that they have included a whole slew of different animals and ecosystems into this one fantastical rendering. A long time ago I read somewhere that coloring is a very calming activity so I decided in order to shut off my brain from characters and dialogue for a while, why not pull this baby up in Photoshop and give it some punch! I have always been a literal coloring gal, even as a kid I was not the one who created a purple sky or orange whale so in keeping with my standards here is the finished product:

I had to make a few minor line placement adjustments to make sure they were connected in certain places so when I used the fill bucket it didn’t fill in half the page but voila! I love how it turned out and for the thirty or so minutes I was filling this baby in my mind was completely free of clutter.

I think I might just have to locate my colored pencils (always my favorite over crayons) and print out a few copies of this just in case I get stuck on a scene. Freeing my mind helped me to write almost 6,000 words in one day so thanks Chuckie Goodnight Foundation! I feel ready to tackle the second half of this writing challenge.