Dave and I got back from our mini road trip on Monday night.

We picked up our new (to us) car in Phoenix, Arizona and drove all the way through California, Oregon, and Washington over 5 days.

Here is Bruce (the car)! We drove 1500 miles including some mountains, and he did really well.

We stopped at Joshua Tree National Park – well, we didn’t plan it very well and ended up just exploring the lower part, but the landscape was out of this world. I felt like I was on the moon or mars! (I don’t know my planets very well 😬🌕)

We stopped at Redwood National Park as well. This tree had been hollowed out by the lightening and fire but the outside of it still stands tall and strong. Amazing!

We took a 90-minute tour at the Oregon Caves National Monument. Natural formation of the minerals over marble was truly breathtaking. If you go there, I highly recommend this tour!

On our last day, we visited Mt. St. Helens National Monument in Washington. It’s kind of hard to see in this picture, but the whole north side of the mountain had been blown away when the volcano erupted in 1980. We read several stories of the people who were near when the eruption happened. Many lives were lost and so many more were changed forever. So powerful.

We didn’t have whole a lot of time on this trip as we were trying to get back home in a timely manner, but we still enjoyed our adventure very much.

I’m slowly getting back into the swing of things and am super excited to share more previews form the new collection with you today✨

(Psst, in case you missed the previous previews, you can see them here and here.)

You know I care about self-care.

I used to work with people in domestic violence situations for 14+ years and found self-care to be the most important thing in their (and service providers’ ) healing.

Winter holiday season brings cheer and joy to many of us. But it can also be stressful and bring sadness and painful memories.

If you have a friend who needs a little encouragement to take care of themselves during the holiday season, this holiday self-care card would be a perfect a reminder 💕

It feels silly sometimes that we need external permissions to do something like self-care.

But I often need a permission to do or not do something and ask Dave to tell me it’s OK, like saying no to a business opportunity or a project, and he’d just repeat back to me word by word what I said and I say “OK” 😀

It’s silly, but it helps…

Speaking of self-care, I’ve also created a sister design to my popular “Self-Care is not Selfish” design.

It’ll be available as 8″x10″ (20.32 cm x 25.40 cm) archival giclee art print and a blank notecard 👇

Again, if someone you care about is going through a hard time or just not feeling like they’re doing “enough,” let them know they’re doing the best they can ❤️

(BTW, I’ve fallen in love with this soft pink color recently, and you will see more of it in my future collections!)

Before we move on to my next preview, I need to confess.

I was planning on creating 2019 calendars with self-care themed art and sayings, including the design above.

But creating 12 new cohesive and amazing art is no easy feat, and after considering the costs and timeline, I decided not to create a monthly wall calendar for 2019 😢

My goal is to create a stunning monthly calendar for 2020 and give myself plenty of time to do so – my apologies if you’ve gotten my previous wall calendars and have been waiting for the new one! I promise it’ll be worth the wait.

I still wanted to create a calendar that will bring you joy all year long, so I created this fun Llama Dream 2019 calendar poster instead!

It’s printed on 11″x14″ (27.94 cm x 35.56 cm) cotton paper, and has a very yummy texture.

That llama face, tho 😍

Sure, the yearly calendar may seem more decorative than practical, but it’s good for keeping track of things that happen monthly (like your period, that’s what I use my annual calendar poster for), quarterly, and/or annually.

I’d like to think of it as a wall art that happens to tell you the dates.

(Plus it’s printed digitally, so the price is more affordable than my archival prints.)

I created the calendar in a simple and neutral color palette (navy and warm yellow, my fave color convo!) so it’d look great in a kid’s room or your office all year long.

You like??

My new collection will debut in the next couple of weeks, so keep an eye out for the announcement! 👀

(Are you on my email list? Sign up, because I like to spoil my subscribers when I launch new products 😉)

Have a joyful day!

xo

p.s. Oh, and if you’re in the US, have a happy Labor Day! I’ll be at Fremont Sunday Market today 9/2, 10-4 if you’re in Seattle.