The new year brings hope for greater things.

It’s been a few years since I’ve made new years resolutions. Ambition is great, but being reasonably ambitious is even better. My approach for 2021 is to keep my resolutions simple and achievable. Here are my top 8.

1. Read more books

I’m in the middle of several books right now and hope to finish them soon. But, I’ve found it challenging to sit down and completely immerse myself in a good read. Before college, I could easily finish a book within a few days. In the summer, I would walk two hours round trip to the library and lug home a heavy bag of books in each hand. I read while I ate and even read with a flashlight under the covers when I should have been sleeping. I’d love to rekindle my passion for reading.

Goal: 1 book a month

2. Write more for pleasure

Recently, I came across writing I did in high school and was pleasantly surprised by my creative writing abilities during that time. I always faced my writing assignments with enthusiasm and also enjoyed writing poems and short stories for fun. After college, I fell out of practice — only writing emails and other short-form content. This new blog is my first step to set this resolution in motion.

Goal: Create three blog posts a month between all my blogs; journal at least once a week

3. Hydrate and eat well

2020 was the healthiest I’ve ever been. It resulted from not dining out because of the pandemic and making better food choices due to my pregnancy. For the first time in many years, my cholesterol was within a normal range. I also worked hard to keep hydrated during and after my pregnancy. My goal is simple — keep up with the great work.

Goal: Drink at least 9 cups of water a day; track daily food and water intake

4. Exercise regularly

I listened to a Ted Talk recently that resonated with me: The Brain-changing Benefits of Exercise. Working out has always been a challenge for me, but I believe that pairing a healthy diet with regular exercise is essential for physical and mental health. My primary source of exercise has been walking my dog, and I would like to be more consistent with that routine. The treadmill will be my new best friend when it’s too cold outside. I also want to incorporate more intense workouts throughout the week.

Goal: 30 mins of intense workout three times a week 

5. Craft more

I decided to teach myself how to sew about ten years ago after being inspired by all the handmade goods I saw at the farmers’ market and boutique shops in Fremont (Seattle). I became addicted to the hobby for a couple of years, accumulating shelves of fabric and bins of supplies as a result. I even started a crafting blog. Eventually, I shifted focus on other things and lost the momentum. I started sewing and crafting again last year, creating and designing toys for my baby. Every finished project was so rewarding.

Goal: Complete one DIY projects a month

6. Less screen time

I spend my workday in front of my laptop and multiple monitors. After work, I play catch-up on social media and communications on my phone. In my downtime, I enjoy watching TV — all while browsing on my phone. As a result, I don’t take too many breaks for a screen. I worry about my screen time because of frequent exposure to blue light and how it may affect my eyes and sleep. It also distracts me from my family. Limiting my phone usage is the easiest for me to control, so setting screen time limits will help me be more mindful.

Goal: Reduce screen usage by 20%

7. Sleep more

Hopefully, reducing screen time and blue light exposure will help with my sleep cycle. I also have a newborn, and his sleep schedule doesn’t agree with mine yet. I have always been a night owl and am used to operating with little sleep, but I know this is not healthy or sustainable (remember when I mentioned all the reading I used to do in the dark when I was younger?). The key will be to wind down for the evening at a more reasonable time.

Goal: Go to bed by midnight on the weekdays.

8. Focus more on family

I find it difficult to resist working late. I tend to hyper-focus on my work tasks, and I’m a workaholic. After work, I often jump right into a pet project and also spend a good part of my weekends doing the same. I need to be better at balancing work, hobbies and family. Work and hobbies are fulfilling, but family is the most important at the end of the day.

Goal: Spend quality, uninterrupted time with the family on the weekends and two evenings during the weekdays.

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Sometimes the simplicity of pen to paper is the best way for me to visualize and organize my thoughts and ideas.

At one of my corporate jobs, I had to meet regularly with one of the C-suite members. She came to every meeting with her laptop and a printed document. When I saw her in the hallway, she was always carrying around that document. When I asked her about it, she told me that it was part of her daily routine. She would print out her schedule for the day and note all the important things she didn’t want to forget throughout the day. This simple document helped her organize her day and thoughts. For some reason, this always stuck with me.

I thought about her recently when I was trying to find a way to improve my time management. I was getting tired of bouncing between different apps on my phone and laptop — all while juggling the daily grind of work, a newborn, four pets, housework and personal hobbies. If the old school paper and pen were effective in helping a C-level executive manage her day, then it should be good enough for me too. Plus, I’ve always preferred a physical to-do list. The act of crossing a completed task is so satisfying.

The Not-So-Basic To-Do List

A basic to-do list wasn’t quite what I envisioned though. I wanted a format that captured my schedule, to-dos and tracked my daily food and water consumption. I found different templates online, but they were never just quite what I had in mind. I eventually gave up and decided that I needed to hit the drawing board and design my own agenda layout.

After tweaking it a little every time I used it, I finally settle on a format that worked best for me. I still use my various apps, but this daily view helps me step back and assess my day at a glance. I like to print out my template the night before, so I wake up in the morning ready to go. I’m sharing my template in hopes that it might help someone else out too. Enjoy!

Daily Agenda

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These days creating branded graphics for your social, website, and marketing needs is easier than ever with free online graphic design solutions — where design skills are a plus but not required!

As a marketer who wears many hats, I am constantly managing various creative projects. I’ve often worked with lean teams where graphic designers were not available, so I would have to create my digital assets. Luckily, I took a graphic design class once upon a time, and it introduced me to the basics of Adobe Creative Suite (Creative Cloud). I developed my skills on-the-job throughout the years, but Creative Cloud can be quite intimidating for a beginner. However, there are alternative solutions that anyone can easily use. 

Many free online solutions make it simple to create visually-striking and on-trend designs for different marketing channels and in various formats. Someone without any experience can whip up a graphic using pre-made templates and easy drag-and-drop features (commonly known as WYSIWYG, “What You See Is What You Get”). One of the most popular tools of this kind is Canva.

Canva

Signing up for a free Canva account is easy. It gives you access to thousands of templates and millions of images in its searchable database. Most templates are free and as well many images and design elements. Other images are currently available only with the Pro subscription for $12.95/month – a significantly lower cost than many of the top stock image sites. Just be sure to check the licensing guidelines to ensure the proper usage of images. 

You can also choose to upload images from your device, making it easy to stay on-brand when using Canva for promoting your own business. Whether you upload your own or use Canva’s, you can apply filters and do light edits to all.

Let’s look at three ways you can get started in Canva from the homepage.

1. Start From Scratch

Just as you’d expect, starting from scratch means starting with a blank canvas. You can choose your dimensions at the start of the project (the free version doesn’t allow you to resize your work later). You would then incorporate a template, images, text, and other design elements into your design.

2. Start From a Blank Project

This option is similar to the first option, as it also starts with a blank canvas. The main difference is that you select project types with predefined dimensions for different marketing platforms or document types.

Here’s just a small sample of projects:

3. Search By Designs

Starting with a blank canvas can be great because it gives you complete freedom to customize it as you go along. But if you need a little inspiration, you can jump-start your project by searching for designs from the main page. You can use the design as-is or customize it to make it your own. Here’s a snapshot of the results returned when searching for “real estate”.

Since Canva is so customizable, it’s easy to start with one template and quickly make it uniquely yours. Here’s an example of a graphic that created from an existing design with minimal effort:

When you finish your design, you can download it in most formats and share it for free. Printing service is also available, making Canva a one-stop-shop.

What’s great about Canva and other products that share similar product models is that you can virtually work from anywhere — your work automatically saves to “the cloud.” Canva also has a mobile app, so you can continue to edit your work while on-to-go. The auto-save is also a nice feature because you don’t have to worry about losing your work.

Other Online Graphic Design Tools

Many other products share a similar user-interface. So once you’re familiar with Canva, it’s easy to transition to others as they often have similar editing options. Here are a few more to explore:

• DesignBold
• Adobe Sparks
• Crello

While Adobe Creative Cloud comes with a premium fee, Adobe offers some of their most popular design solutions for free on mobile. Just search for “Adobe” in the App Store or Google Play and try out a few!

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