Best New Finds of 2011

2011 was a great year for finding new inspiration 
and getting organized!  

When I first discovered Pinterest, I felt like I had struck gold!  Pinterest is an online pin board where you can collect images you find on the web and organize them by topic for easy reference.  Your boards are shared publicly with others, who can choose to "follow"  boards that interest them.  Best of all, clicking on an image that you see on a board links you back to the original post, where you will usually find directions or other helpful info.  

People are using Pinterest to collect ideas for all kinds of things, from recipes to home improvement, weddings, fashion and even fun quotes.  For the Art teacher, Pinterest is total inspiration!  But be warned.... this eye candy is addictive!  Be careful that you don't spend so much time looking at all the great ideas that you don't have time to actually do any of them!!  (Can you tell I speak from experience on that one?!)

My other favorite find this year was Evernote.  My son had actually told me about Evernote a while back, but I mistakenly thought I had to master it before I could start using it (wrong!), so I never even tried it until this year.  While I still have a long way to go to take full advantage of all it can do, I am finally using it and loving it!

Evernote is like having a personal digital assistant to record your thoughts, create notes, clip web pages, make checklists, capture interesting stuff you see, and lots more.  You can even take photos of your handwritten notes, put them into Evernote, and they will be searchable later.  How cool is that??!  With Evernote I can stay more organized and that translates into getting more done.  They even have a library of free tutorials, demos and tips to help you get the most out of this amazing service.  As an Art teacher, Evernote helps me keep track of lesson ideas, supplies I need to purchase, prep I need to do and posts I want to write.... and I know I'm only scratching the surface of what it can do.  

I'm looking forward to being more organized and more inspired in 2012!  

Happy New Year!!