Week 36 Prompts for Illustrate Your Week 2023

Prompts for Week 36 of 2023 for #illustrateyourweek in your illustrated journal

I post the new set of prompts for Illustrate Your Week every Sunday. I post these here on the Illustrated Life substack with additional context. What’s that mean? You can still find the prompts, as always, at Instagram, but if you follow them here, you might get a bit of extra insight, some fun calendar connections, or even a bonus prompt now and then. Thank you for supporting #Illustrateyourweek! If you keep your own illustrated journal, I hope you find the prompts helpful and inspiring.

Illustrate Your Week Prompts for Week 36

It’s Week 36! Into September this week, which feels like it’s a week in the journal that will usher in the remainder of the year. The turn of month always creates opportunities for reflecting on the month that has just ended or making some notes about plans for the new month. Some of the calendar connections this week are fun for drawing. Fitting in your life notes around drawings is okay!

You can draw anything on your pages and fill in with your daily notes. There is no one-size-fits-all formula for how to keep an illustrated journal or for what counts.

Calendar Connections

The calendar connections each week give a bit of random context that might inspire you to think about or notice something specific. Maybe they spark memory. Maybe they nudge you to draw something you wouldn’t normally draw or give you an idea for something to draw when you want to draw but don’t want to figure out “what” to draw.

Here are some of the calendar notes that made my radar for Week 36:

• National Doodle Day (3)

• National Pet Rock Day (3)

• Labor Day (4)

• National Read a Book Day (6)

• Gramma Moses Day (7)

• National Ampersand Day (8)

• Star Trek Day (8)

• Care Bears Share Your Care Day (9)

• International Sudoku Day (9)

• Teddy Bear Day (9)

• National When Pigs Fly Day (9)

Extra/Bonus Prompts

• Teddy or Care Bear

• The final frontier

• A list

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There Are a Lot of Prompts

Should you do them all? Probably not! Prompts are always just ideas for things you might include in your journal. Your immediate life is really where your journal starts - and it may be that your memory life has an equal role. Observances can be a conduit to memory, an excuse to buy and draw (or Google) something simple (like a Twinkie), or simply fun to write down for context in terms of the passage of time.

Note: There are lots of dates on the calendar each week. I don’t want the weekly prompts to be simply a calendar toss-up, so I pick and choose, always aiming for a list I hope will inspire you to draw or reflect. Your journal has the space for any and all of the days that are important to you. What you value and want to record comes first. Prompts are always best thought of as filler, not as a prescription. You might have other days that are of particular note for you. We shouldn’t all be recording exactly the same things in our journals!

Your illustrated journal is a freeform space to hold your personal documentation, memories, hopes, wishes, and the tiny details that make up everyday life. — Amy Cowen

Daily Notes

As always, I hope you take time to make plenty of notes in your pages. As an illustrated journal, there is an implicit mix of drawings and words. For me, the project is always a journal, not simply a sketchbook. Even though I draw lots of random things (especially portraits), the book as a whole is a “journal” — an illustrated journal of my life. For me, this isn’t simply a sketchbook. My daily notes help keep the journal anchored in my life.

While I don’t believe in rules for personal projects, for myself, I do think the personal notes, stories, lists, and tidbits are a foundation.

You don’t need a more exciting life. This project celebrates the quotidian. — Amy Cowen

Use the Prompts that Speak to You

As always, the prompts are provided simply as optional nudges you may want to mix in with the recording you do of your day-to-day life. If you do Illustrate Your Week for a while, you will find that some prompts recur. (This is a good thing and true to the process of keeping a journal based on your life.) The weekly prompts give you options if you find yourself, pen in hand, and not sure what to draw, paint, write, or record in your journal.

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Illustrated Journal Basics, Background Information, & How to Get Started

I’ve moved all of this information into one place. This page has a kitchen sink’s worth of information. Jump around, get excited, get inspired, and then get started.

Your journal has the space for any and all of the days that are important to you. What you value and want to record comes first. Prompts are always best thought of as filler, not as a prescription. — Amy Cowen