Blessed Yom Kippur to all who commemorate this most Holy of God’s special days. I have been trying to learn more about the feasts for years and could never find what I was looking for. But this year my husband found Rabbi Curt Landry on Youtube and we have been so blessed to be able to participate in the Holy Days this September. Yom Kippur is from sundown on Sunday, September 24 until sundown on Monday, September 25, and is a day of repentance for sin with fasting from food, bathing and physical contact.

I haven’t felt like posting much at all since the beginning of summer, but I do appreciate the fellowship and community which keeps me coming back here. But I have also realized that there is joy in simply creating without any expectations; without sharing it with anyone, and doing it simply for the satisfaction of making something with your hands.

I have started cracking into my many handmade journals, giving them each their own themes. I started one with mark making in crayon as an exercise book for an abstract class I am working through. Last night I had the idea to make one into kawaii collages. I think the pull towards this style lately is that I am longing for something very light-hearted after a very long and heavy season of difficulty. God has been infusing joy into my days lately and I have such an anticipation of what is to come. I can see how much work He has done in my heart and life and I know that I will soon see the fruit of that.

I’m sharing the first few pages that I started in my journal. These are carefree, simple, and quick collages of my interpretation of kawaii. My husband and I went away this weekend for our anniversary and we stopped in at a Japanese gift shop, which was likely the main inspiration for this idea. The materials I gathered were: pastel highlighters, fluorescent gel pens, cute stickers and washi tape, cutesy fabric, bright floral napkins, and some hand-painted floral ephemera. I may draw some animals to add to the collages later, as they seem like a kawaii staple.