I’ve been reading a book called Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell (highly recommended by the way). He’s studied trends in professional athletes, extraordinary musicians, and all-around successful people and the one thing that sticks out is (contrary to popular belief) they aren’t just lucky people. These people have taken advantage of prime circumstances and practiced – most of them over 10,000 by their mid-twenties. Mind blowing, intimidating, and inspiring all at the same time!

So, rather than completely abandon my extra-cirricular design a day project, I’ve decided to try and post at least one a week.

The following quote was submitted by my brother and sister-in-law. They found it in a magazine and thought it would make a cool design. After a bit of research, I found the quote is typically attributed to someone named L. Reid.

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Use it up. Wear it out. Make do, or do without. – L.Reid

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This one’s been finished for a while but for some reason life is taking over design and I’ve decided that’s got to stop! I am excited to announce that I’ve joined The Sketchbook Project, so my Design a Day project will probably be put on hold until the end of the year.

The Sketchbook Project is a very cool social endeavor – any artist can join, fill their sketchbook, and return it to Sketchbook headquarters by January 15, 2011. The sketchbooks will be exhibited in galleries and museums all across the country! After the tour, the sketchbooks will enter the permanent collections in the Brooklyn Museum of Art.

Until then – here’s design 109:

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Even though I’m not a photographer by trade, I really enjoy it. This weekend we trekked to Saint Louis to meet my mom, dad, and brother to finish taking his senior pictures. He’s really into his dirt bike, so that dominated the majority of the session.

I’m scared of failure.

That’s really what it all comes down to. My parents taught me the value of finishing what I’ve started and it’s served me well. It doesn’t matter if you’re tired or don’t feel like it. You finish.

I’ve accomplished quite a few things in nearly 27 years, things I’m really proud of, but I’ve also got ambitions. I’ve got ambitions of doing something bigger and better than what I’m doing now. I want to make a difference and there’s one thing I’ve realized – when you want to do something bigger, sometimes you just have to fail. It’s a tough pill to swallow and one that will probably take a while to get used to.

If you’d ask me now, I wouldn’t know exactly what to say I want to do. I’d probably say that I want to get my Master’s degree and maybe even a Ph.D., I want to live in Europe, I want to teach people new things, I want to work in an environment where the creativity isn’t stifled by clients, I want to experiment. Maybe I’d make all sorts of excuses about why I’m not going after any of those things right now.

Maybe I’d just be a better person to admit my ambitions and pursue them rather than worrying about whether or not I’ll fail.

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*Special thanks to The 99% for getting me to think seriously

Sadly, it’s true.

I’ve been hard at work this weekend helping get the StitchMix website ready to launch and prepping for Fashion Night Out in Chicago this coming Friday (if you don’t know what StitchMix is, shame on you!). Last night I had a burst of typographical inspiration and am happy to say that I’ve got quite a few hand-drawn type sketches ready to digitize. Here’s to long weekends! Happy Labor Day.

**By the way, if you love the background pattern, it’s mine and you can download it here.

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What else?

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