Rachel's Viewfinder

Find Time to Be Creative, Plus a Recipe, AFI, pt 7.

Wed, 22 Feb 2012 10:21:51 -0500

If, as my co-worker Andy says, “creativity is not instant grits,” then how do you make time to let the creative kettle boil? “Lack of time,” frequently ends up as my excuse for not getting things done. Honest, it can be a legitimate excuse. If you’re like me, and you work a 9-5, five days out of the week, plus need time to cook, clean, chill-out, and check Facebook, there’s not much time left for creativity. Or is there?

A few months ago, I completed an interesting exercise: I listed out all the things I had to do, and all the things I wanted to do, and then assigned the amount of time it took to do each. These lists included everything from making supper, to commuting to work, to watching TV. After all was written out, I compared the lists and the time left over. I found that I was left with about two hours or so a day to do whatever I wanted. In reality, most of that extra time was probably frittered away with lolly-gagging on other things. But after studying the lists a little while longer, I started to see what took up most of my time during the day. The obvious ones were “work,” and “sleep.” So was “commuting.” But surprising, another big chunk of time was taken up with “cooking.”

Including everything from prep time, to eating, and clean up, daily meals took about four hours out of every day. And it took almost half of that time to cook supper. Good grief! No wonder why I felt like my evenings were full! My husband and ate late, and spent most of the evening working in the kitchen instead of relaxing.

When I was a kid, my Mom, for a while, did the whole “once a month cooking” thing. It involved an entire weekend, a hot kitchen, towers of Tupperware containers, and a huge bulk freezer. We packed away cooked meals, ready to be thawed later in the month and eaten. As a married woman, I live in a small efficiency apartment. My freezer is about the size of a small cupboard, and though I’m not feeding a family of five, there’s only so much you can fit in that thing. But instead of a month…I toyed with the idea of cooking all the meals ahead for a week.

I talked the idea over with Robo, and he agreed to help me do all the cooking. We took a Sunday afternoon, and cooked and cooked. In four hours, we cooked enough food to last us the week. Now here’s the scary thing: cooking on week-nights would take us two, to two and a half hours to make supper. Now, with meals all cooked, supper took only twenty minutes to make. Talk about gaining time! We were eating earlier, feeling healthier, and having more time in the evenings to do other things.

For the past two months, we’ve made Sunday afternoons our cooking day. We plan our meals out for the week, and then fire up the kitchen. Typically, big containers of food last us a few days, so we only have to cook three or four different things. Big favorites are stir-fry, chicken and dumpling casserole, and pots of soup. Then all we have to do is take out an evening’s portion, heat it up, and serve! And if we end up having people over, we just heat up a little more.

As you pursue time to be creative, I encourage you to examine your day, and see where the biggest chunks of your time are taken. You may not need to re-arrange your cooking schedule, perhaps. But you may find an unexpected pocket of time lurking in between paying bills and feeding the dog. Take advantage of it! If we are to practice our creativity constantly, then we must make the time to be creative!

If you want to try your hand at the “cooking ahead of time” thing, but don’t want to try it for a whole week, just try it for one day. Here’s a Caribbean recipe my husband and I cooked up over this past weekend. It simmers on the stove for over an hour, leaving you some time to be creative before supper.

Caribbean Chicken in Coconut Milk

3 lbs. of portioned sized chicken (thighs and legs work great; I used boneless to save time)

¼ cup of canola or safflower oil (use coconut oil for more flavor)

1 onion, chopped

1 garlic clove, minced

¼ lb. chopped mushrooms (I skipped these; not a mushroom fan)

2 cups of coconut milk (I used So Delicious unsweetened coconut milk beverage and it’s also gluten-free!)

salt and pepper

oregano

cayenne pepper

thyme

Towel dry the chicken. In a large skillet, heat the oil on medium heat and fry the chicken until brown on the outside. No need to cook all the way through. Remove chicken from oil, set aside. In same pan, saute the onions, garlic, and the mushrooms (if using) for about three minutes or until translucent. Return the chicken to the pan, and add the coconut milk. Season with salt and pepper, oregano, cayenne pepper and thyme (I guess-imated my seasonings…use what you think is best). Stir the pan to mix all the ingredients, and then lower the heat to a simmer. Simmer the chicken until tender, about 1 ¼-1/2 hours. The cooked coconut milk will be like gravy. Serve over rice or mashed potatoes (though rice would be more authentic to the islands).

Serves 6

Adapted from “Island Cooking, Recipes from the Caribbean” by Dunstan A. Harris, The Crossing Press, 1988.

Happy cooking, and happy creating!

My friends Johnny and Hally got married last summer, and asked...

Fri, 17 Feb 2012 09:54:00 -0500

My friends Johnny and Hally got married last summer, and asked my husband and I to produce their wedding video. This project is special. It’s an honor to be asked to use my creative gifts to bless friends!

I have my husband to thank for his coaching on how to approach this sort of project, as this is my first wedding video. It’s very different than my typical, interview-based work. We shot with a Canon 60D and a Sony Z7U. The challenge came with combining shots from two types of cameras and making the color differences seamless.

Johnny and Hally’s wedding took place at Camp Thunderbird, on Lake Wylie in South Carolina. The music is “Leaves” by airtone, from ccmixter: http://ccmixter.org/people/airtone/uploads

Arts, Faith and Inspiration, pt. 6 “How and Why to Use Deadlines”

Wed, 15 Feb 2012 11:06:07 -0500

Metamorphic rocks are rocks that have been transformed from one type of rock into another. Shale into slate, for example. What it takes, is heat and pressure. The metamorphic process transforms other rocks and minerals into something else. Something stronger. Something beautiful. For the artist, it is no different. Heat and pressure can make for better art.

The past month and a half, most of my time has been spent editing a wedding video for some friends of mine. Already having a 9-5 job producing videos, it can be difficult to pick up another video project after coming home for the night. But my friends’ video was eight months late. After saying, “Oh it will be done by [insert date]” too many times, I finally had to put my foot down. It was time to make and stick to a deadline.

Deadlines, despite all outward appearances, are a form of discipline. Just as practice times at regularly planned intervals increases creativity, a deadline for a project forces creativity. There’s something about a deadline that demands the mind to do something to make it happen. The increased pressure “ups the ante” on the project. You have to focus, or you’ll never make your deadline.

Focusing on a project to the exclusion of other things is not always fun. For the past month and a half, I haven’t touched much else and it’s been frustrating. I want to do the “other stuff” that’s rambling around in my head. Instead, my deadline forces the project to get finished. Now, for the first time in eight months, I can tell my friends, “Hey! It’s done!” How many unfinished projects are lying around your art space/craft room/house? If you’re like me, far too many. Deadlines can keep you from saying to yourself, “But I never seem to get anything finished.”

Having a deadline does not mean that if you don’t make it, you’ve failed and that’s all there is to it. That you’re no longer an artist. Meeting deadlines provide discipline, but should never be a measurement of success. Only a finished project should define who you are as an artist. I finished one part of the wedding video by my deadline. The second half is nearly done. Instead of stressing over a few extra days, extend the deadline. But don’t make extending deadlines a habit. That leads to procrastination, and the pile of unfinished projects.

Heat and pressure are not always fun to work under. But they can produce stunning results. For the artist, it transforms a pile of unfinished projects into completed works of art. For rocks, it transforms coal into diamonds.

bandh: Want to win a classic? We’re giving away a sterling...

Tue, 07 Feb 2012 11:24:01 -0500

bandh:

Want to win a classic? We’re giving away a sterling Canon A1 with 50mm f1.4 lens from our Used Dept.

To enter, just reblog this post and recommend another Tumblr user that you really love following (make sure it’s family friendly! And include an URL.)

All people 18 and over living in the United States can do this once only from 11:00 A.M. E.S.T. on February 7, 2012, until 6:00 P.M. E.S.T. on February 13, 2012. We’ll announce the winner here on our Tumblr, Facebook and Twitter.

Good luck!

See our rules and regulations for more.

This is exciting! And for my recommended Tumblr, please follow driftingfocus! http://driftingfocus.tumblr.com/ Her excellent photography, fact-filled adventures, and musings on life are worth your time.

Rachelfinder.com, the Re-Design

Sat, 14 Jan 2012 18:35:31 -0500

Rachelfinder.com has been given a facelift! While I definitely enjoyed the hand-drawn elements of my previous design, the structure left much to be desired. In addition, the focus of my website has slowly been changing over the past year. The new design is powered by Business Bullpen’s “Single A” theme.

Design Changes:

First off, the clutter is gone! As great as the old design elements were cool and hand-drawn, now there’s only one thing competing for your attention: the content. The blog itself is up and center.

Second, the extra content is organized in a new set of navigation links on the upper right. All the content in the links has been re-written and adapted as well, hopefully providing easier access to the information.

Third, my series on Arts, Faith and Inspiration is featured right on the home page. No more sifting through back pages of posts to find each post.

Content Changes:

The focus of rachelfinder.com in previous years has strictly been my mission work. Growing in the understand of my calling over the past three years, I’ve come to see that as a Christian artist, my missionary calling is an extension of my passion for art and ministry. As a result, there’s much more to be added to the conversation. The new content on rachelfinder.com reflects these additions.

In recent months, the Lord has given me a number of ideas to encourage other Christian artists about integrating the Great Commission into their artistic lifestyle. I plan to share those ideas, as well as my own experiences living out the Great Commission as a Christian artist. Also, I’m looking forward to sharing project ideas, inspiration and creativity tips, and other life-hacking skills in the coming months. Be on the look-out for the new content!

I’ll close this post with a quote from the great Mark Twain: “The two most important days in your life are the day you were born, and the day you find out why.”

Thoughts on New Year Resolutions

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 10:00:06 -0500

One of my favorite books is “The Yankee Way to Simplify Your Life,” by Jay Heinrichs. The better part of the book deals with finding your “calling,” and weeding out the parts of your life that hinder living that calling. My favorite theme from the book goes something like this, “What would you do with a million dollars? Now, can you do that without a million dollars?” Heinrichs’ point is that if you’re living your calling, you’ll be doing it without a million dollars, or if you had the money, you’d do it anyway.

It’s January of a new year, when everybody looks at their life and realizes it’s time to make some improvements because the previous year lacked serious “progress.” Over the past few days, I’ve read the resolutions of friends on Facebook and Twitter and I wondered, “What are my resolutions?” Call me content, but I really didn’t see anything that particularly needed improvement. Sure, there’s a few pounds to lose, and organizational prowess to achieve, but all at is per the usual.

So, I thought about calling and how I’ve been living it the past year. Looking back over my journal provided me with some valuable information. Namely, I haven’t written much in the last seven months. And my blog is lucky if it gets an update once a month. With that came Resolution 1): Write more.

Examining last year’s reading list proved equally disappointing, especially from the POV of a person who used to take 20 books out from the library and read them all in a week. The other day, I read over a blog post talking about self-improvement and was challenged to read more of the classics. At this point, the quest is simply this: Resolution 2): Read more. The classics will come with time.

My final resolution came out of the creative explosion of the past few months. After hand-making Christmas presents and ornaments, I simply want this: Resolution 3): Create more.

Resolutions are the expression of a desired habit. And habits, as Heinrichs writes, are “…something you do regularly that you don’t think about; something that would make you feel uneasy if you didn’t do it. Good habits simplify. They boost you towards you goals, make your daily life decisions for you, set parts of your life on autopilot. Bad habits complicate.”

Rather than resolve this year to change the innate and seemingly un-changeable parts of me (re: achieving organization prowess), I instead want to acquire some new habits to inch me further along in my calling. As you contemplate your New Years Resolutions, I encourage you to do the same. Try to make your Resolutions simple and a part of who you really want to be. Because honestly, as Heinrichs notes, “Anything other than your calling is a distraction.”

(Note: If you’re interested in reading “The Yankee Way to Simplify Your Life,” you can find it on Amazon, here: http://www.amazon.com/dp/0688163483/ref=cm_sw_r_tw_dp_s1zdpb0YD85WW )

Art, Faith and Inspiration, Pt. 5 "The Practice of Creativity"

Tue, 06 Dec 2011 10:22:21 -0500

Over the past few months, I spent time pondering what God would have me do with this passion for Art, Faith and Inspiration. As I thought, researched and talked with other creative people, I also tried to take the time to creatively “practice.” These little forays into creative expression aren’t meant to be spectacular. They’re meant to give the brain some fodder to chew on in between bigger projects.

Back in May, these words caught me on www.writerlylife.com: “Optimism has a funny way of encouraging more optimism; creativity often works that way. The more you make space for a creative mood in your daily life, the more you’ll find that creative mood popping up in the course of a day.” (http://www.writerlylife.com/2011/05/how-to-grab-a-creative-mood-when-it-passes-by/)

The concept struck a chord in me. I was stressed from getting married, moving, work, etc. My health took a dive (see April 11 post). All my energy was gone. My schedule had no room in it for a creative mood. But my job is a creative one. Everyday, I use creative storytelling through visual mediums, primarily through video producing. For example, a 45-minute interview becomes a 3-minute video with music, pictures, graphics…whatever. Every aspect of the production requires creativity. Over the past year, my projects piled up, and work became drudgery. How can you be creative on a schedule if you’re out of juice? As I thought about being creative, I realized I couldn’t afford to skip recharging my creative batteries. If creativity begets creativity, then I needed to do some extra-curricular creation. I started thinking of other ways to be creative that were not work-related.

So began a binge of gluten-free baking. First on the list were eclairs. Next came cheesecake. Because that was so rewarding, I started work again on a piece of science fiction. And then came my friend’s wedding and her bachelorette party…after squeezing the creative lemon for my previous projects, it was a delight to make her some hand-painted underware.

Now what does any of that have to with being creatively better at video-production? Well…not much…on the surface. Gluten-free eclairs, writing and underware don’t seem to have much in common. But as a means of letting my creative brain “do something else,” it was invaluable. I found that creativity on a schedule is demanding and draining. Giving my brain the time to “goof-off” and just “practice” being creative meant that creating on the schedule was not so taxing. And that meant regaining a level of enthusiasm that was missing at my day job.

Some things I’ve learned from my “practice” sessions:

1). Do something where the hands make something: cupcakes, curtains, a new doodle for the fridge…the goal is to have the hands moving with the creative brain.

2). Think, but not too much. Start with a general idea and let your mistakes guide the finished product. Remember, this is practice, not masterpiece.

3). Work in short bursts. It’s practice. Who cares if it’s finished (if ever?).

4). Avoid passive “inspiration”; no TV watching, Internet surfing, magazine browsing. The goal is to practice doing your own thing, not copy another’s work.

5). If there’s no creative tools, or you can’t think of what else to try, give reading fiction a whirl. It engages the imagination, the creative “muscle” to stretch and develop.

One of my co-workers, Andy Caldwell, had this to say in one of our department meetings: “Creativity is not instant grits.” He couldn’t be more right. It takes time…and practice. How do you practice being creative?

(Pt. 5 in a sometimes occasional series on Art, Faith and Inspiration)

In honor of #worldAIDSday and...

Thu, 01 Dec 2011 10:01:05 -0500

In honor of #worldAIDSday and #endofAIDS

doctorswithoutborders:

In 2000, MSF teams in Thailand first provided triple antiretroviral (ARV) therapy to people living with HIV/AIDS. A year later, teams in six other countries followed suit. At the time, a consensus held that treating patients with HIV was too expensive—ARV treatment cost around $10,000 per patient per year—too complicated, too time-consuming.

MSF doctors could not countenance simply offering palliative care and watching patients die, however. They resolved to find a way to provide people living with HIV/AIDS access to the same lifesaving medicines available in wealthier countries. Concurrently, MSF and its Access to Essential Medicines Campaign teamed with AIDS activists to advocate for price reductions in HIV/AIDS medications and against trade barriers threatening production of affordable generics.

The impact has been dramatic. By 2010, MSF was treating 160,000 people with HIV/AIDS in 20 countries—at a cost of around $200 per year per patient—and the international community was backing HIV/AIDS treatment programs once thought untenable. By the end of 2010, 6 million people in developing countries were on antiretroviral treatment, the bulk of it funded by the Global Fund to Fight TB, AIDS, and Malaria and the US government’s President’s Emergency Plan For AIDS Relief (PEPFAR).

Some 10 million more people still urgently need treatment, but last year, amid the global financial downturn, numerous governments reneged on funding promises to the Global Fund and PEPFAR flat-lined. European trade barriers threatened production of generics in India, the source of 90 percent of the HIV/AIDS medicines used in MSF programs and 80 percent of all ARVs purchased for developing countries.

The progress of the past decade must be protected. “The World Health Organization now recommends early treatment with newer and more robust drugs,” says Sharonann Lynch, the HIV/AIDS policy advisor at MSF’s Access Campaign. “Treatment can both save lives and dramatically reduce the risk of transmission of HIV. MSF is providing this treatment
even in places where doctors are few and far between, using trained nurses and peer counselors. A successful model exists, and the science is on our side—now the international community needs to step up to the plate.”

Photo: © Susan Sandars/MSF

It’s Christmas in the Media Dept! Sheila brought in her...

Tue, 29 Nov 2011 16:17:52 -0500

It’s Christmas in the Media Dept! Sheila brought in her Charlie Brown tree this morning. Perfecto! Now in the words of Brian Wilson: “The Christmas spirit grows with each new day…” (Taken with instagram)

I flew a plane across the globe today! Lately, I’ve been...

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 16:53:00 -0500

I flew a plane across the globe today! Lately, I’ve been studying Motion Design. While my forays into the art form have been simple (re, flying text for missionary videos), I’m excited by the possibilities that Motion Design offers the video-producer.

This little video is nothing more than another of my attempts at Motion Design. We will be praying for Zimbabwe tomorrow morning, but I wanted to talk about our recent trip to Thailand. A cute little image of an airplane flying across the screen seemed an appropriate transition.

I’m pleased with the outcome of this piece. I cobbled together some vector images I found online, but in the future, I’d like to create animations like this from the ground up, creating everything from scratch. Tools used were Photoshop and Motion.

Prayer Letter Project! It’s here! And it’s overdue....

Tue, 22 Nov 2011 10:24:21 -0500

Prayer Letter Project! It’s here! And it’s overdue. The Bogans Fall newsletter is finally shipping out. :p One of these days, it will go out on time. More details on that in a later post. (Taken with instagram)

For kicks and giggles this morning…me! The Hipster!

Fri, 11 Nov 2011 11:19:38 -0500

For kicks and giggles this morning…me! The Hipster!

HEY! OMIGOD HOW WAS THAILAND?! YOUR POSTCARD JUST GOT HERE AND IT'S BEAUTIFUL! I hope you had lots and lots of fun. Love you tons, give Robo a kiss for me :)

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 12:18:18 -0500

I’m so glad you got your postcard! :D We sent about 20 of them from Thailand. It was fun to go hunting for postcards and stamps. And then to look for a mailbox! Mailboxes in Thailand don’t look like they do in the US. They’re RED! And about as tall as me, and square (literally like a box). Come to find out, we had a mailbox right outside our hotel, but I didn’t recognize it as one. :)

Anyway, all that to say, I’m glad it came!!! :D

fotojournalismus: Local residents wade through flood waters...

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 11:12:25 -0500

fotojournalismus:

Local residents wade through flood waters with his cat in a plastic tub in Bangkok on November 7, 2011. Thailand’s Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra said she would miss an Asia-Pacific summit in Hawaii this weekend, postponing her debut on the world stage to deal with the kingdom’s worst floods in half a century that have claimed 527 lives so far.

[Credit : Saeed Khan/AFP/Getty]

Please continue to keep Thailand in your prayers!

Glimpses of Fall around SIM USA As a cold-blooded northerner, I...

Tue, 01 Nov 2011 13:12:08 -0400

Glimpses of Fall around SIM USA

As a cold-blooded northerner, I have a hard time believing it when color finally comes to the South. But it does, and it’s glorious!!

October 11-13 Our epic journey left us stranded in JFK, three...

Fri, 28 Oct 2011 10:06:00 -0400

October 11-13

Our epic journey left us stranded in JFK, three hours behind schedule. Thankfully, the same plane from NY took us all the way to Singapore. But in Singapore, our flight to Chiang Mai already left. Between gluten-free food needs, showers and missing the most of Tuesday, we navigate the hiccups to the plan.

October 10 We begin our epic journey to Thailand. For Rachel,...

Tue, 18 Oct 2011 10:00:05 -0400

October 10

We begin our epic journey to Thailand. For Rachel, this is her third time out of the US, but for Robo, it’s his first. And his first time on an airplane. And like most epic journeys, this journey had a few hiccups…

Happy Sunday! You can not walk around Chiang Mai without seeing...

Sun, 16 Oct 2011 05:13:33 -0400

Happy Sunday! You can not walk around Chiang Mai without seeing a Buddhist temple, wat or other religious site. Many have offerings of flowers, food, incense, and candles on their altars. As you go about your day today, spending time in church and worshipping Christ Jesus, pray for the people of Thailand. Pray they would come to know the love of Jesus and His peace in their hearts. (Taken with instagram)

First flight for Thailand—and Robo! We’re off on our...

Mon, 10 Oct 2011 12:54:39 -0400

First flight for Thailand—and Robo! We’re off on our trip! (Taken with instagram)

T minus Two Days (T for Thailand!)

Sat, 08 Oct 2011 22:22:41 -0400

Tomorrow is our last day in Charlotte before we leave for Thailand! I can’t believe it’s here already! Robo and I will be prayed for in church tomorrow at Steele Creek Church of Charlotte. If you’re in town, we’d love for you to join us! Service times are at 9:15 and 11:15.

On our new website, www.rachelandrobo.com, we asked our readers to post us an interesting fact about Thailand. We got all kinds of responses. I think my favorite is the fact that Thailand is known as “The Land of Smiles”. Visitors to the country are considered guests, and the happy faces of Thai people are known worldwide. I’m so excited to get to see these people for the first time next week! As we’ve learned more about Thailand, we’ve learned some other interesting things. For example, a Buddhist monk cannot touch a woman without becoming unclean. So if I see an empty seat next to a monk, I should not sit next to him! But apparently Robo could. Interesting!

When I was a child, we watched “The King and I.” After learning the country’s name was “Siam,” I tried finding it on my globe. No such luck. It wasn’t until a little later that I found out that Siam is now named Thailand. As I’ve been packing and preparing this week, snatches of songs from “The King and I,” keep coming back to me. Most often, it’s been “Getting To Know You.” I’m so excited for this opportunity to “get to know” the people of Thailand for a little bit. To share their culture, their food, their city. And I hope that as Robo and I are out and about filming and taking pictures, I find that the people of Thailand are, “putting it nicely, [maybe] precisely, my cup of tea!”

And for kicks, here’s the song I’m talking about. My apologies for it being a bit Western-centric. :p