Welcome to Book of Days 2022! I am so happy you're here!!
Here is the Information Packet which will give you some insight into who is teaching when throughout the year! I've also included a list of my favourite supplies, but note that each artist will provide a list of suggested supplies of their own!
Our Facebook Group is where we'll commune and share our work. You will find all of the guest artists present for at least two weeks during the time they are featured in the class, but many of them DO Book Of Days as well, so you'll be seeing them pop up! Here's the link. The password is birdsofafeather
CLASS INDEX
January Introduction & PDF Workbook
Please report all errors, broken links, etc. to hello@effywild.com
NOTE: As I mentioned in the video above, Renee and I could not meet in time to get the Wild Musings interview done for ya (Vancouver is experiencing some pretty wild winter weather and her wifi is out) and the main lesson from me this month doesn't make a lot of sense without it but it was posted later in the month, so you'll find it in the lessons below.
Here's a peek at the Speed Painting to tide you over.
I trust that you'll have plenty to do in the meantime, though, and just in case you want MORE I've got a lovely mini-workshop from the ever-wonderful Sal Scheibe for you! Please enjoy "Personal Stargazer", which you'll find in the classroom for this month here.
Note please that I messed up the order in which all of these offerings appear, AND this doesn't include the bonus from Sal, but you get the jist, right? :)
Everything else is linked below! For Best Results, Take this month's content in the order in which it is offered.
BONUS - Art Journal Play Party + Journal Decorating Videos
BONUS - Personal Stargazer with Sal Scheibe
BONUS - Companions On The Journey with Effy Wild
BONUS - A Portal Painting For 2022 with Effy Wild
MAIN - Altered Book & MORE Spread with Sarah Trumpp
MAIN - Wild Musings - A Collaboration with Renee Magnusson and Effy Wild
This includes my musings for the month along with a link to a reading of the musings voiced over this month's speed painting. You'll also find journal prompts and suggested activities. Enjoy!
Everything else is linked below!
MAIN - Gentle Grace with Effy Wild
MAIN - Peace Within with Tara Lynn Pugh
MAIN - Memories & Reflections with Amanda Trought
BONUS - You Do Not Have To Be Good with Effy Wild
March Introduction & PDF Workbook
Hello, My Lovely Fine Feathered Friends!
This is where you'd usually find The Bed Head Diaries, but I wrote you something instead this month. I'm pasting it here, but you'll also find it in your lesson from me for this month!
I weighed the impact of coming on camera and trying to stammer out something that would be of use against the state of my GenX nervous system (we lived through the threat of *waves at all of this* in our youth) and my nervous system won. As it should. I believe in times like these that we should all weigh these things carefully and offer *what we can* instead of forcing ourselves to offer what we *think* we should offer.
Just when I thought we were coming out of the worst of it, there’s more, and I know I’m not alone in feeling saddened, infuriated, and frustrated by that. The sense of powerlessness is palpable and exhausting, so I’m going to do what I’ve learned to do over the last decade or so when things are as they currently are.
Dance in. Dance out. Do the cha with “knowing what’s happening” and “tuning out”.
If you follow me on the socials you know I’m currently doing #the100dayproject (find my updates over on TikTok and Instagram). It’s been a source of insight and self-soothing, but over the last few days, it has given me an opportunity to “pray with paint”.
Praying, for me, is not the exclusive property of particular religious systems. It is something I think many, many of are wired to do in troubled or triumphant times. “Please” & “Thank You” seem to be a natural thing for us humans to utter as we cast our eyes to the celestial or terrestrial realms or powers, right? Even those of us who don’t necessarily believe in such realms or powers can be found whispering little prayers out loud or under our breath.
I’m not sure where I stand on realms or powers. I know there’s something that seems to respond when I connect to the divine as I imagine it, and that’s enough for me, to be honest. I pray. I don’t worry about belief or faith or to whom I’m praying. I just light the candles and offer my voice in devotion or petition or gratitude to whatever benevolence might be listening.
That’s what this project has become for me. Praying with paint. Even when I don’t feel like it. Even when I’m overwhelmed. Even when I believe with all my art that nothing I “like” will come of it. It doesn’t matter. The energy I expend as I make marks is an offering. The marks I make are utterances. The attention I pay is a prayer for peace, for relief, for release, for answers.
It’s helping. I hope you find something that helps you, too.
This includes my musings for the month along with a link to a reading of the musings voiced over this month's speed painting. You'll also find journal prompts and suggested activities. Enjoy!
Everything else is linked below!
MAIN - At Ease With Effy Wild
MAIN - Your Time with Iris Fritschi-Cussens
MAIN - Oracular Vision with Shinjini Mehrotra
April Introduction & PDF Workbook
Hello, My Lovely Fine Feathered Friends!
I am on hiatus this month, so there's no lesson from me, but I've got FOUR awesome teachers to keep you company!
This includes my musings for the month along with a link to a reading of the musings voiced over this month's speed painting. You'll also find journal prompts and suggested activities. Enjoy!
Everything else is linked below and in the right-hand sidebar. YAY!
This includes my musings for the month along with a link to a reading of the musings voiced over this month's speed painting. You'll also find journal prompts and suggested activities. Enjoy!
Everything else is linked below and in the right-hand sidebar. YAY!
MAIN - Two For Joy with Effy Wild
MAIN - Two Birds with Eulalia Mejia
MAIN - Bits & Pieces with Maureen Nadeau
BONUS - Live Zoom With Effy Replay
June Introduction & PDF
Hello, My Lovely Fine Feathered Friends!
I'm so excited about this month's content, and I hope you are too! I'm coming to you post-COVID, recoverd-ish - I still lose my voice at the drop of a hat and I'm experiencing some fatigue and brain fog that I hear are pretty common. My cough is pretty much gone, though my allergies have ramped up. It's been a journey, that's for sure. I'm grateful to be on the other side of it, but I admit, it's been impacting my ability to slay the list and do the things!
This month's bird feeder is gorgeous, though! I somehow managed to pull it all together, and I'm so proud of that! I had to swap out a guest teacher due to circumstances beyond our control, which was a bit OMGDOOM, but we figured it out, and I'm super stoked to introduce you to Tamara Sagathevan this month, who will be joined by Tamara Laporte and I in offering you your main lessons!
I even managed to sneak in a bonus for you! WOO HOO! Let's get into it!!
BONUS - When You’re Confused About Power with Effy Wild
July Introduction & PDF
Hello, My Lovely Fine Feathered Friends!
The birdfeeder is PACKED FULL of stuff I've created and curated for you and I am so excited to present it to you! This month, we're going to enjoy another Multi-Day Spread tutorial - an interactive one this time, which makes me squee. We've got Tiare in the house with a super fun, bold lesson in collage, and Jane is up with her "soulmapping" process and a lesson in invoking protection.
So much goodness.
I'm typing to you from the nest, flanked on either side by the doggos. My knee is elevated up on a pillow. It's encased in a brace, and I'm icing it *again*.
I don't know what I did but I came home from fest two weeks ago with a million bug bites, a broken toe, and this bum knee! Apparently I am "I took a turn dancing around the fire and now I am in pieces" years old.
It's okay, though. My sense of humour is intact, my dogs are fanastic company, and I can still art even with a few broken bits!
When you read this month's workbook, though, you'll discover that I came home from the fest that broke me with a desire to be out in nature much more than I have been, so sense of humour and fab doggos or not, I am feeling a bit laid low. Walks by the river are calling my name, and here I sit. Darn it!
BUTANDALSO
The body is wise. It's demanding a bit of a slower start than I intended, and that's a bit of a drag, but I'm taking the lesson about general conditioning to heart. I've joked that I'm going to have to "train for next fest" but I'm only half-joking! Apparently, if you let yourself go completely sedentary which has been the case for me over the course of the pandemic camping or anything that requires movement is going to hurt! Okay! NOTED! I get it now! I will let the broken bits heal up and then I'll start moving again - slowly. Gently. Training for fest. Training for life.
Thankfully, before the knee gave out on me entirely, I got a few walks down the river in so I have the incentive to get back out there!
I hope your summer is off to a beautiful start. I know there's a lot to be upset over, angry over, scared over, and I'm right there with you. I hope that having this space to dip in and out of is helpful. I hope your creativity serves you as beautifully as mine serves me. I hope you find solace in meeting yourself on the page and giving yourself space to feel what you feel.
Know, always, that I'm with you and I'm sending love to all the parts that need it,
Everything else is linked below and in the right-hand sidebar. YAY!
MAIN - Who Am I Today with Effy Wild
MAIN - Collage Play with Tiare Smith
MAIN - Shield: Under The Aegis with Jane Cunningham
BONUS - Rewild Me Speed Painting with Effy Wild
August Introduction & PDF
Hello, My Lovely Fine Feathered Friends!
I'm officially on hiatus this month, so there's no full-length lesson from me but I wanted to get this up early for you because I'm teaching a live virtual workshop this weekend and I wanted to get this all sorted beforehand!
Have such a lovely month! Enjoy our guest artist's and I'll see you in all of our places!
MAIN - In A World Of My Own with Rachael Caringella
MAIN - Watercolor Botanical with Airmid Wylde
BONUS - Junk Journal with Sarah Trumpp
October Introduction & PDF
Hello, My Lovely Fine Feathered Friends!
It's my favourite time of the year - autumn + thanksgiving in Canada + spooky season. I'm doing my best to revel in it even while I'm in a bit of a rough patch in terms of my mental health and energy levels. I'm pretty sure I have long COVID - the brain fog is *real* y'all + therapy has been really putting the boots to me. I've even opted out of going to Harvestfest this year because I am just truly not up to it. BUT!
I am okay. I am healing! And my creative practice is keeping me sane. Putting together this content for you every month really does shape and structure my days in such a helpful and meaningful way, so thank you for that, and I have some things upcoming to look forward to. GG is coming for Thanksgiving and will spend the long weekend together hanging out in our pajamas and watching crap on TV! Sarah Trumpp is coming to see me at the end of this month and we're going to see Amigo The Devil in Toronto ON HALLOWEEN NIGHT, y'all! What a cherry on the top of the sundae that is spooky season! PDF Workbook For October Everything else is linked below and in the right-hand sidebar. YAY!
MAIN - A World Where There Are Octobers with Effy Wild
MAIN - Creative Souls Art with Christa Forrest
MAIN - A Witchy Lady with Cristin Chambers
BONUS – Two Speed Paintings with Effy Wild
November Introduction & PDF
Hello, My Lovely Fine Feathered Friends!
Maybe you haven't noticed, but I've been very quiet here and in my other spaces. Let me tell you why. While grappling with other more personal things that I won't go into here, I've been truly agonizing over what to do about Book Of Days going forward. It's been coming up in therapy, in private conversations with friends, in meetings with my "wisdom council". I've been asking myself a lot of hard questions about it because it brings some stuff up for me each and every month that has forced me to take a good hard look at it.
It's gorgeous. I love it. AND I'm burned out. I can't maintain the pace I've been trying to maintain since I opened it up as a collaborative e-course in 2018. I need space and time for other things, which I talk more about in the workbook for this month, so please read it. I've grown out of feeling like I need other guest artists to "validate" my existence as a teacher and artist <----that was a massive revelation. I am trying to do the work of a team each and every month, and I'm not a team. I'm one person, and putting this together is *too much* for one person. I don't even have someone I can yell to from the studio when I'm in the weeds and don't have time to cook dinner. It's just me and the dogs and the cat and *all of this work*. I don't know how to market well AND each and every year, Book Of Days opens in an absolute SEA of other year-long e-courses and it gets lost in the fray, which is bad for me, financially, and bad for my guest artists as well.
In short, it's become too big for me, and it's time I surrendered to that awareness and let it go.
Book Of Days is retiring. This will be the last year I offer it. I know. It's sad, but truthfully, I'm excited, too.
I might do a twelve-week session here and there in the future, but it will not return in this iteration. Again, I write more about this in the workbook for this month.
Access to BOD2022 (and any other years you signed up for) is not going anywhere, though! You will still have forever access!
About This Month and Next Month
Because BOD is retiring this year it didn't make sense to me to go on hiatus in December like I usually do, so I'm taking my break this month and offering a lesson I filmed for Moonshine instead. I'll be back in December with a GRAND FINALE lesson and you'll be invited to a Solstice Releasing Ceremony on December 22nd, 2022 at 1 p.m. EASTERN. We will talk over what we wish to let go of from 2022 (SO SO MUCH RIGHT?) and what we wish to carry over into 2023 and then we'll paint our desires for the year to come together over Zoom. I'll have that link for you in December's lesson.
I want to thank you, all of you, for your presence in Book Of Days throughout the years. It has been an absolute blessing and I have no regrets about creating it and pursuing it over the course of the last ten years! It's just time to let it go and what better moment to do that than on the day after Samhain?! I can't think of one.
Here we are, a decade after this program first began on our very final lesson in Book Of Days! It feels like the end of an era! I'm having some trouble saying "goodbye" so I've decided not to. I'm going to be around on Patreon, Youtube, and in Moonshine 2023. You'll see me in Life Book 2023, and popping up with weekend workshops on a variety of topics in my new teaching network, so "goodbye" doesn't really apply here.
Still, as hard as I tried, I couldn't film a farewell video without losing it, so I've opted not to. I will see you in all of our places throughout the rest of this year and 2023 and details on that are in your PDF workbook!
Meanwhile, I'm doing a live Solstice Releasing & Receiving Ceremony on December 22nd on Zoom. We'll begin at 1 p.m. Eastern. I'll be doing a bit of an info session on Moonshine 2023, and then we'll focus our attention on what we want to leave behind in 2022 and what we want to bring forward into 2023. We're going to PAINT OUR FACES OFF as usual, and a replay will be released shortly after, so if you can't attend live, I'll see you in the replay crew.
And that's it, loves. Here it is. The finale! Thank you so much for journeying with me for all these years. I love you.
