Currently 2025 Workbook
Hi! Thank you for being here and joining me on this creative adventure of the Currently Workbook. 2025 will be my 6th year (!!!!) working on this project. After 6 years, I have a lot to look back on.
Check out the video I made and you can see an overview of my workbooks!
To give you a quick background, in 2016 I started tracking my months on my blog (Shutterbean) with “Currently” prompt of what I was doing each month.
I wanted to improve my handwriting and journaling, so I created a creative routine around it. Sharing it online kept me accountable!
Here’s my first post- Currently 2016
It helped me pause and reflect. It also helped me slow down the pace of creating new recipes (which I was starting to burn out from). My Mom read the currently column religiously (like everything else on my blog), and it acted as a conversation piece/way to connect through our weekly phone chats.
I carried out this practice online from JUNE 2016-OCTOBER 2017 and then my Mom died on Thanksgiving. My creativity in the kitchen halted. My family system was obliterated. I spent two months completely numb, going through the motions in survival mode.
As someone who thrives on routine and loves streaks, it was devastating to not have finished out the year strong. I picked the practice up in January 2018 and started playing around in Procreate on my iPad where I made this template… which eventually turned into the Currently Workbook.
I also did drawings and mapped out my month. I was determined to make my handwriting better and learn how to use Procreate. I checked in with myself and my grief every month.
What I didn’t realize at the time was that I was creating an anchor and a community to help me rediscover meaning in life after losing my mom. This workbook became my lifeline and a healthy outlet for processing grief.
What a journey it’s been!
My mom never got to see any of these workbooks, which makes me sad. But I know I wouldn’t have come this far in my creativity and dedication to leaving a trail of magic behind without her influence.
Through my Currently Workbook I have:
a solid art practice
a good way to check in with myself
visual proof of my life and growth
an unintimidating place to play
a place to dream and plan for the future
a trail of magic to leave behind
a small community of mostly women who love practicing art too!
The Currently Workbook is up in my shop!
This year, I played around with new formats-
I made boxes to fill in so we can make lists.
I also made a section for us to create BINGO cards- so we can refer to all of the things we love to do during each season.
I am hoping to make my bingo card look like my October 2021 pages with illustrations!
The back is updated with a new image too :)
Are you ready to spell out your intentions for next year?
Get yourself a Currently Workbook! If it sells out from my Etsy shop, you can always find one on Blurb (they'll ship internationally if you're abroad!)
If you want to do parts of the project but not all, consider downloading my workbook template from my shop. You can build a binder system out of it.
I have a private facebook group where we share our pages, if you’re working on one too!
You can see all of my Currently posts from 2017-2023 on Shutterbean.
In 2023, I started filming timelapse videos of my workbook monthly spreads. Learning how to produce video content has been a new/fun stage in the process. Here’s a playlist of all of the calendar spreads.
(subscribe to my YouTube channel while you’re at it!)
And of course, I have shared my Currently Workbook pages on Substack for the past year (without ads!). Thank you to my paid subscribers for your support. It is my goal to have a monthly hangout where we can work on our workbooks together. I’ll tell you more about that soon.
