I
love being creative. I always have. When I was a kid, I loved going to paper stores to look at all the notepads, pretty pens, coloring books and stickers. While other kids played with toys, I wallpapered cardboard boxes for my dolls to live in. I drew floor plans and searched magazines for the perfect houses and color schemes (surprised?). In high school, my favorite classes were art and calligraphy (to be honest I barely survived biology and algebra).
My first business as a young teen was painting strawberries on clothes pins and glass jars and selling them. My second business was as a scrapbook business for Creative Memories. And of course, through the years I’ve been able to enjoy creativity primarily through decorating my homes.
I feel fortunate to be able spend a lot of my days now working on one creative pursuit or another through my work, which is really cool and really makes my heart happy. But I wondered a few years ago if I needed to find a new hobby, since my hobby (decorating) was now my job! Hmmm…something to think about.
Even when I try to just stop working for the evening I tend to start doing what I love doing, which is being creative and working on my house. HA! Sounds weird, but I STILL love what I get to do as my job just as much as I did when it was just a hobby.
So, even though I do not consider myself crafty at all, in recent years every time I saw cute idea for a craft, I’d buy the supplies with the intention to use them as a different way to be creative and relax. I got all the rubber stamps, all the paper, all the ribbons, all the embroidery kits, the beads, the markers, the colored pencils, the photo albums, the stickers, the glue, the washi tape, etc. So much stuff!
A couple of years ago Courtney and I tackled decluttering all of our art and craft supplies, organizing each and every thing we wanted to keep. Everything we hadn’t found time to use in ages went to the church for the Sunday School or women’s groups or Goodwill.
It felt so good to make room for and organize the supplies we wanted to keep in a way that inspired us to actually use them! Our IKEA drawers are my favorite for crafts. My mindset used to be KEEP ALL THE THINGS just in case we wanted to use them for something someday. But I no longer think like that! Or at least I try not to because the funny thing was, the more stuff we had the less likely we were “do the things” because it was just too overwhelming to find and manage all that stuff! Now I strive to keep less, but actually make time to use what I love!
I share some of my stories and thoughts about the significance of “doing the things” in my new book Make Room for What You Love. It isn’t just a book about decluttering and organizing! It’s about making room in your home and life for what you really love, including what recharges your energy for what you love and how to be more intentional with what you keep in your home and what you do with your time.
Speaking of doing what you love and making room for it in your life, months ago my girls and I started looking at all the coloring books in our favorite paper stores (yes, I still love going to paper stores!).
Coloring seemed to be the perfect way to unwind and relax because it was a creative task that wasn’t a part of a “to do list” (like painting a wall might be) nor did it require a lot of supplies to organize, other than a coloring book and a box of pretty colored pencils! We brought our favorites home and indeed we can confirm, coloring is just as amazing as it was when we were kids!
But you know what? In our house-shaped heart of hearts, we really wanted HOUSE coloring books.
Since we couldn’t find what we were looking for, we partnered with our awesome publishing company to create the coloring book of OUR dreams!
It’s for all of us house and home lovers.
On July 1, our first coloring book will be released and you guys, if we can say so ourselves, it’s adorable! We were blessed to be able to be very involved in the creative vision, which was super fun for us to dream up such a neat book!
The wonderful artist Nicole Dougherty (who worked with us on our other books) hand drew the most precious artwork and special quotes for this book, we can’t wait for you to see it!
Houses, rooms, patterns, and all the most adorable of house-y things are inside.
You can dream up ideas, try out new color schemes, pick your favorite color and pattern combinations, and even color pretty pages that you can frame as art or hang on your inspiration board (all the pages are perforated, one-sided and printed on high quality paper).
What you see in this post is just a very tiny sneak peek of what you’ll find in the book (we haven’t yet received the first actual copies, just sample pages!) we will share the book with you the moment we have a copy in hand! The cover is a gorgeous companion to The Inspired Room book with shimmery copper leaves and would make a fun gift or girls’ night activity book!
> You can preorder it on Amazon or Barnes and Noble and it will be delivered to you as soon as it is available! <<
** The colored pencils we use are these and these (the second ones are our favorites, great quality!) **
We can tell you for sure after spending the past few weeks coloring pages, coloring is just as fun (if not more so) than it was in kindergarten! We can’t stop! We hope you’ll love this coloring book as much as we do. It was a complete joy to be involved in this project.
It is so important to make room in your home and life for the things you love. Make the time to be creative and to do things you enjoy!
This week I’ll be sharing some updates around my house (progress on my fireplace!) as well as more about making room for what matters most to us in our home!
The colored pencils we use are these and these (the second ones are our favorites, great quality!)
Hi Melissa
Written as if from my own lips! As a kid my favorite “toys” were my crayons and coloring books. I would spend hours upon hours, feeling the need to color the entire page before ever thinking of going to the next one. Every Christmas Santa would leave new crayons and coloring book…well into my twenties!! Im so excited for your new book and will definitely be ordering one!! Thanks for creating.
Yay! Thank you, Lee!
Ooh, what fun! Are the Doodles in there, too?
Oh my word! Really?!? I’m going to pre-order today! This is just too awesome!
Thanks so much for being excited with us, Sharon! It’s a lot of fun!
Will you be selling the pencils as well? I don’t have art stores near me.
Thank you! Oh yes you can find the pencils we use here >https://theinspiredroom.net/gift-guide-office/ :) have fun!
Melissa, such a cute idea and such inspiration on a Monday morning heading to work, I’m on a commuter bus reading not driving…haha?
Ha! Sounds like the perfect activity for your commute :)!
Oh of course I pre ordered want to support you ❤️
Aw, thank you :)!
Awesome. Such a cool idea. I always wanted to draw my own house ‘things’ but I can’t draw. Now I will be able too. …Woot.
Yay! You’ll have fun with it!
How exciting! So proud of you for venturing out even more…you truly are inspiring!
How funny, a girlfriend and I were just talking about how we both still love to color and buy those Mandella coloring books! Could be because we both teach the lil ones in Sunday school. ? What a wonderful,idea to have a more grown up version and of ” homey” things! I just pre- ordered! Thanks Melissa!
Thank you so much, Jo Jo! We’ve been having so much fun with it! :-D
I haven’t joined in on the coloring book craze but I sure like yours! I’m obsessed with gardening now that weather is better so I’m either planting, seeding, or garden reading. Maybe spring is getting in the way of commenters?
Oh yes, spring always does that! And just all the social media in general means less blog comments. I’m glad people still read, though! But I do miss hearing from everyone :)!
Melissa – Brilliant! Awesome! Wonderful! Relaxing evenings! Inspiring. And a lot more. You’re amazing.
Big Hugs – Lylah
Big hugs back to you! Thank you for always cheering me on! XO
Melissa,
Your creativity never ceases to amaze me! I started coloring again about 5 years ago with my Mom after her cancer diagnosis as a way to cope with stress and pass the time during the lengthy chemo treatments. Until seeing your coloring pages, I have never found any of the choices out there to be fully satisfying, and now I know why! Thank you for continuing to inspire me to be purposefully creative everyday!
Warm regards,
Ruth L
Thank you, Ruth! You are so welcome. I hope this book will inspire those of us who love all things home! <3
What an amazing idea!!! It just made my heart beat a little faster :) can’t wait to own this coloring book!!!
:) thank you Sara! I can’t wait either! <3
Colouring books calm our minds.This is a fun Idea. Looking forward to this.
What fun! This is such a great idea!
Where did you get your pencils?
I am looking forward to coloring in your new book!! I have framed a few of my “works of art” for inexpensive decor….:)
I have seen the new coloring books in stores everywhere and they are sooo wonderful. I was hoping one day to find either blank greeting cards that one could color, or cards with a simple upbeat message inside…ones to color uniquely by…me, or you. Has anyone seen color-yourself-cards?
I can’t wait for this to come out so I can add it to my collection!
Hey what a great idea, this is indeed going to be so much fun. Congratulations!
How busy you have been these last years Melissa, really!
Can’t wait to get the book! Last week I was at Walgreens and saw a coloring book that I thought would make good wall art, so the timing is perfect.
Great idea, Melissa! I love Alexandra Stoddard’s books, and they have beautiful line drawings of her home in them. I photocopied some of her pages to color for myself a long time ago, so this is right up my alley.
Oh, that’s cool, I remember those book drawings! :)
What a fantastic idea! Just curious because I don’t see it listed anywhere, how many pages is in this coloring book?
Thanks! I believe it is 80 pages, with one sided art and perforated on quality paper so the colors won’t bleed through, and you can take them out to hang or frame, too!
YES!! You have made what I longed for but could not find! A coloring book that has real things. I kept looking at each new one that came out but the new age weirdness books did not look like fun. And you went above and beyond and gave us “home” stuff to play around with”. This is the best. It will also delight the granddaughters. Thank you, thank you
Hooray! Yes, I agree and I just really really wanted something like THIS! So thrilled with it, thank you for your excitement! I cannot wait for everyone to see it!
How fun! I just went to a Bible Journaling workshop yesterday at my church. You get to color and create designs around a meaningful verse in the margin of your journaling Bible (or a blank journal book). sounds like that would be right up your alley!
That sounds amazing! What a fun idea!
OMG Melissa! I cannot believe what you’ve come up with now! Just what I NEED — that is, the book coming out, your addressing the sad reality of owning so many craft supplies that it’s near impossible to have fun with them. I forwarded this email to my sisters, who basically roll their eyes when I mention my “inventory.” I’ve ordered and am so looking forward to the arrival of this piece of my Melissa Michaels collection! One sister just emailed her latest pencil coloring page to us yesterday, so you are quite relevant!
WONDERFUL! I’m so glad these books will meet a need! I hope you’ll find just as much joy in reading (and coloring!) the books as I did in creating them. Thank you for your excitement!
Yes! Yes! Yes!! I love this!!!! You are crazy talented and creative!!
Wow! How fun is this! You are such a smart lady! Can’t wait to get my copy of both books!
My daughter and I recently went through all our craft supplies and decluttered them. It’s much easier to find what we’re looking for now. How neat that you were able to turn your idea for a coloring book into a real book! It looks great from what you’ve shown us.
Glad to hear about your new coloring book!
I love coloring! What a fun idea!
Kari
http://www.sweetteasweetie.com
This is perfect, Melissa! I can’t wait to get my copy!
I love coloring books and recently purchased several myself. I need to make more time to color! Congratulations for finding a niche that had yet to be filled. I have a craft room which unfortunately rarely gets used because of all the clutter. I cleared out a lot of things, but I know I should do more purging. I used to love scrapbooking as well and keep thinking I’m going to get back to it. I have so many supplies and unfinished projects and need to set a timeline for myself to use them!
How fun!! I still haven’t tried out these new coloring books, but I hear their actually very relaxing to do. Yours looks so stinkin cute!
So happy for you!
The book looks beautiful and it’s such a great idea!
I can’t wait to see it!
I love this so much! And such a great outlook on being creative but not spending all your creative free time organizing an overabundance of supplies! I was the same way – hoarding all those craft supplies! But it is so freeing to buy supplies and make something as I’m inspired. Plus I’m more likely to actually finish it when I only have one project going at a time! So excited for this coloring book!
Now you have my attention! What pencils/crayons a you recommending? Some of us need a lot of help!
Don’t stop now. HA! HA! Good for you. This too will be a success!
Keep going, give us journal with some of these pics and things that women enjoy.
Suggest: bee skimp, short poetry, quotes. Thanks!
Thank you for the encouragement, I would love to add more products like that! :) If you look in the post there is a link to the pencil sets I have! Hope that helps. :)
Still don’t see pencil source.
From the others commenting you better include the link again
They are linked at the bottom of the post and right under the pre-order link :) These Prismacolor ones are our favorite >> http://bit.ly/1SqEEYA … and these are our other ones shown in the post >> http://bit.ly/1SIEIlC
This is such a cool idea!! Thanks for thinking it up. You are a creative WONDER.