Side Projects and Hobbies are Important

In Austin Kleon's book Steal Like An Artist, Austin talks about productive procrastination. He is basically saying when you are procrastinating from the main job that you're supposed to be doing, those procrastinations might turn into the thing you should be really doing. He says that the stuff that is just the play stuff is actually the good stuff. If you have a lot of projects going at once you can bounce back  a forth between them to keep the creative juices fresh. Practice productive procrastination is what he explains. He also talks about how he gets some of his best ideas when he is doing nothing and actually bored. Austin say if you're out of ideas, wash the dishes. Rake a really long walk. Stare at a spot on the wall for as long as you can. It's basically a good way to focus your mind.

When I tend to do nothing is when my minds starts to race. At first I thought it was great, but now I have realized I can't get all of my thoughts down or into something that I can recall later. This is kind of frustrating so I now try and keep busy in my down time. Keeping my hands busy is a good way for me to come up with creative thoughts. Whether if its playing with a puzzle or clicking the remote buttons, this always seems to help.

One of my most recent hobbies is sports magnets for the fridge. Below are an assortment of some of the NFL magnets I have done. I have also created baseball and hockey busts. I started out doing them thinking I could sell them and make some money off things I really enjoy. It makes me really happy because I throughly enjoy watching sports in my down time, especially football.

Project 3 is a menu design project for a local restaurant. The following images are one that I selected for my research. My peers and I really enjoyed the illustrative aspects of a few of the menus that I found. The one design that stayed with me the most is the second from the top. This is menu has a really sophisticated look to it. You know when you go to this restaurant you are going to be spending some money. At first the leaf insert caught my attention, but them I was really impressed with the clean overall look of this menu design. This is the one that I will try to draw inspiration from.