Hi, friends!

I've got some fun things to share with you today that will give you a peek into what I've been up to lately. I've been busy behind the scenes working on several special projects, and today I'm going to pull back the curtain and let you get a sneak peek at some of them. Sound like fun? I hope it will be as fun for you to sneak-peek as it is for me to share. :-)

So, first -- drum roll please! -- I'm so excited to share with you a new website I finished creating today. That's right, today! It now serves as my online home base to communicate who I am and what I'm about to people who meet me for the first time.

As a bit of explanation behind the decision for the site, sometimes I suspect it's a bit confusing to grasp who I am and what I do because I manage a couple different online spaces and keep tackling different projects. This new website will, I hope, serve to communicate in one concise place who I am, what I do, and where I do it.

So, here it is . . . introducing the site I've affectionately nicknamed CS.com: my very own URL at www.christiannesquires.com.

(Woot!)

What a day of creative planning looks like for me.

Also, I've mentioned before that I'm developing my first online course, and this is really exciting to me, too. I never realized I would experience so much joy and passion from doing something like this, but joy and passion is exactly what I have experienced in great measure through this process. (This is the point at which Kirk usually tells me, "That's what we call a clue.")

In case you don't visit my spiritual formation site, Still Forming, I recently shared a video over there about how this first online course came to be. You can watch that video here. In the video, I also shared that I've named the course Look at Jesus: a Gospel immersion course, and I will be rolling out registration and more details about all of it in about a week. (Eeeep!)

So, for a sneak peek for you here, I thought I'd share with you a few glimpses into my creative development process for the course. Sound fun?

What happens when I do a little creative planning.

One of the first things I did in creating the course was to clarify my heart for it. What did I hope people would experience in taking the course? What were some of the desired outcomes I had for it? What did I hope people would receive?

I spent some time getting colorful and creative in my journal concerning those questions, as you can see above and below!

The next thing I did was ask the question, Who would take this class? I knew the course wasn't for everyone, but who was it for? Again, I let loose with the markers and allowed myself to brainstorm ideas and decorate the page with doodles concerning this question. (I really loved this creative process . . . can you tell?)

What I found so interesting about these creative brainstorms was that each of them seemed to have a single unifying thread -- a word that I felt summed up my answer to each question.

For the first brainstorm, the unifying thread was revelation. For the second, it was desire.

And then on another creative Saturday, I spent time writing down my assumptions about Jesus that I'm carrying into the course. You can see from the journal photo above that I have some pretty strong assumptions about one point in particular on that score. :-)

Throughout the process, I've also written down some of the things I believe about myself as its leader (instructor?), as well as my declarations about what the course is not. When it's time to roll out registration, I look forward to sharing more of those specific thoughts with those considering taking the course.

Sketching a site plan for a new project.

Lastly, I'm privileged to be working on a very meaningful project at my church these days. I was invited several months back to serve as the project manager for an online resource that ministers to people facing a variety of emotional and spiritual struggles. It's been fun and invigorating to work with a talented and creative team of people on the site design, the content it covers, and some of the multimedia aspects we're creating for it.

Along the way, I've learned how to be a video producer . . . something I never envisioned I would learn how to do but that I've discovered I absolutely love.

Can't wait to share the resource with you when it goes live!

And that about sums up my world these days. I've missed posting here on a regular basis and look forward to getting back into a routine of sharing with you the dailiness of life and the ways God is continuing to teach and grow me.

xoxo,

Christianne