From the Compost Heap header. A pencil style illustration of a compost heap with flowers and plants growing around it. A bee buzzes by and a white rabbit hops by.

  • Time, Time, Time ⌛

    It feels like years since I’ve written.*

    Since then…

    the Wheel of Time Season 3 trailer dropped.

    Season 3 is airing in March – just in time for my birthday.

    If you love fantasy books like Lord of the Rings… I’d love for you to give this a watch next month and nerd out with me. Even if you haven’t read the books – the visual design and performances for this show are so stunning I’d really recommend watching first and then diving into the books.

    This season is based on my favorite book in the series!

    The Shadow Rising is when Wheel of Time steps away from Tolkien and starts being it’s own thing.

    Half the characters travel to the desert and meet a complex warrior culture. The others go hunting down some very dangerous women. The layers build from there! I can’t even mention my two favorite parts because they are too spoilerific, but check this image out:

    A misty location with two figures suspended within three silver rings

    Don’t you want to know what’s happening there?

    I’m dying to see this scene. It happens “off page” in the books. 👀

    [This Clip Contains Spoilers]

    If you’re a book reader (or just don’t care about spoilers) here is the first scene of Season 3. We are starting out with a bang!

    What else happened this month?

    Well… I completely redesigned my website. 😂

    It’s still “under construction” so pardon my dust (and broken links) as you’re poking around. I hope to “unveil” the new site properly next month.

    I wrote a few posts including this one about website design as worldmaking. My old website was a minimalist website (which lives on as a virtual art gallery.) But I’m letting the rest of my site be weirder and more me.

    I hope it will sprawl and grow into a proper labyrinth.

    I’ve been having a lot of fun with visuals and texture. But my favorite detail so far is this “page not found” design, which feels very me.

    Screencap of Sarahshotts.com 404 page. "You've fallen down a rabbit hole" and Tenniel illustration of White Knight from Alice in Wonderland stuck upside down with his legs poking out of the ground. "What you're looking for is no longer at this location."

    If you want to read the boring reasons about why I’m switching web & newsletter platforms I’ve written about my online ecosystem here.

    I’m leveling up my zines!

    This month I used a printing press to make the February zine.

    You can see the process (including a timelapse video) here. You can also see a mini Wheel of Time zine I made. I’m going to print them up and leave them around town as guerrilla fan marketing. (Let me know if you’d like to do the same and I’ll share the file.)

    READ ONLINE

    Now that I have a printing press I’ve added a $10 tier where you can subscribe for quarterly prints as well as zines.

    I’ve also realized that the time I’m spending on these zines has been growing each month. (Especially in contrast to the simple letters I started with.) So I’m phasing out pledges below $5. This means I have more freedom to play with color and multiple page zines if I’m so inspired.

    I’m also stepping away from Patreon and Substack to host subscriptions on my own website.†

    Everything in one spot. (Finally!)

    Works in Progress

    Here’s a peek at what else I’ve been working on this month.

    Soft sculpture of a brain made from baby clothes. One hemisphere is sewn from baby socks, onesies and washclothes. Scraps sit on a wooden table to the side.
    SOFT SCULPTURE BRAIN

    Nearly done with my soft sculpture brain sewn from baby clothes. I have two hemispheres complete and need to spend some time refining them and doing finishing work. (They’re a little unbalanced at the moment.)

    Nested rainbow hearts drawn with crayons. Rainbow sorted colored pencils and art supplies to the left.
    home education rhythm

    The transition from holiday chaos back to a normal routine is hard for neurodivergents. Here is how we’re finding our feet again and freedom within structure.

    Now that I’m integrating my various blogs into one location my archive is much larger than I realized.

    Here are a few highlights.

    This time in 2015

    Embracing my Inner Samwise

    This time in 2021

    Studio Tour

    This time in 2024

    From the kitchen table to NYC 🗽

    February seems to be a big month for me!

    It’s all that energy from surviving the holidays and getting back into a rhythm.

    (You can browse the February archive here.)

    I’m planning to move the archives month by month. Motivated in part by sharing this time hop with you. Which means (if all goes to plan) I’ll be done by next February. ‡

    The Compost Heap is handmade without the use of AI. 🐝

    Support doing things the old fashioned way by joining my Patrons ($5) and I’ll send paper copies of my zines with the coolest postage stamps I can find.

    Not About TETRIS zine on a wooden table. The title is letterpress printed and three printed blocks in purple pink and yellow are arranged as if to pile up.

    Not into snail mail?

    Here are other ways you can support.

    • Share with a friend. (It’s free!)
    • Art swap! Let me know if you’d like to swap your art for a zine.
    • Buy a book or zine from my (new!) shop.
    • Link to me in your newsletter.
    • Send me a recommendation for something (book, blog post, movie, recipe, you name it!)
    Drawing of a tin can telephone and the words Let's chat

    I’d love to hear from you.

    Hit reply to email me directly.

    Let’s talk web design, printmaking, or Wheel of Time. 🥰

    Thanks for being here.

    I appreciate you.

    Sarah signed with a swoopy S

    Compost Heap Illustrations by

    Gracie Klumpp of Leave the Fingerprints. 🐞

    Footnotes

    * To share the Neuro Nest Retreat. The workshops were all recorded so you can still join in here. I’d love to have a weaving from you. (Yes, you!)

    † Substack supporters will continue to be charged through Stripe. Patreon has been shut down so anyone supporting there will need to resubscribe. (You should already have emails from those platforms, but if you have any questions at all just ask.)

    ‡ Something I’ve learned by moving blogging platforms a couple of times is that something always goes funky. Formatting is strange. Photos are hotlinked. Multimedia elements (audio, video, embeds) are missing or broken. And hardly anything has alt text. I’m using this chance to dust all the cobwebs before making posts public.

    Read more: Time, Time, Time ⌛

  • Not About TETRIS

    Zine made imperfectly on my typewriter reads: Have you ever played TETRIS for so long that you see falling blocks in your daydreams? This experience is so common it has a name: THE TETRIS EFFECT It's a lot like having an ear worm. A song that pops into your head repeatedly. But more fun. Back in my early 20's (when lots of kids go out partying) I hung out with theatre nerds clustered around a desktop computer taking turns playing TETRIS. I think we were all seeing TETRIS blocks in our sleep. I was one of the best. My hand eye coordination is not that great, but I do have excellent pattern recognition (thanks autism) so I am a deft hand at TETRIS on PC. Or I was. Last year, I started playing TETRIS with my kid. Not real TETRIS. A mobile version where you place tetrominoes" into a square grid. No falling bricks No time limit. You play at your own pace. It's basically TETRIS style tangrams. You might have expected I'd be a bit rusty, but my brain immediately accessed endless hours of TETRIS experience & favorite strategies. BUT when you're taking turns with a 4 year old games become somewhat chaotic; you find yourself in situations you'd never have put yourself in. it wasn't long before I realized my strategies weren't working. *Yes, there is a real name for TETRIS pieces.
    Green, yellow, purple and blue TETRIS pieces fall beside the following text (as if to pile up to a game over.) But it wasn't because of my Player Two... I was applying old rules to a new game. Classic TETRIS requires that you play from the top down. If you make a mess it takes up valuable space and is hard work to correct. Mess up enough and it's GAME OVER. This new game allows you to place pieces anywhere. And rows clear both horizontally & vertically. I was playing in one plane and suddenly there were two. IT may sound simple, but it was working against every instinct I had. My kid, not having the baggage of traditional TETRIS, picked up on this nuance much more quick ly... putting blocks thatt were "wrong" and clearing rows. Sometimes multiple at once. I was determined to wrap my head around the new dimensions. So I started playing by myself in the evening, My score grew higher & higher as I broke through mental blocks to see new possibilities.
    This new TETRIS game isn't about perfection. It is about making the best moves you can with the blocks you have. Mess and all. This zine isn't about TETRIS. February, 2025 A KINDLE CURIOSITY ZINE

    —

    Zine Shop

    Past zine issues are available for purchase in my zine shop.

    Subscribe for Monthly Zines via Snail Mail! 🐌 📬

    Virtual Zines via Email

    Open airmail envelope with blue and green stripes
    Read more: Not About TETRIS

  • This month I’ve leveled up my zine making to including the Provisional Printing Press.

    I’m very excited to bring printmaking into the process!

    Prints of TETRIS shapes made with flat LEGO pieces cover the table
    Prints of TETRIS shapes made with flat LEGO pieces and letterpress cover the table

    I spent the whole afternoon making test prints to see what worked best and also played with some letterpress type to print the zine title.

    Cannot wait to send these out to everyone!

    Photo of my desk with TETRIS and Wheel of Time Zines, scraps, ink and blue Aes Sedai mug

    Read the Not About TETRIS zine.

    Buy a copy in the Zine Shop

    Subscribe for Monthly Zines via Snail Mail! 🐌 📬

    Read more: untitled post 156077775

  • I’ve been waiting 26 years for this.

    January’s Zine

    This month’s zine is a collaboration between 38 year old me and 13 year old me. I made it with stickers and journal entries from my millennial time capsule – created in 1999.

    To celebrate waiting 26 years to open this time capsule I’ve made a full color zine this month! To go with the Crayola vibes I used rubber stamps instead of my typewriter this month. Sometimes it’s nice to get your hands dirty.

    Patrons watch your mailboxes. The rest of you can click here to read online.

    I was SO sure there was a Tamogotchi inside! But the only “artifacts” were a dried out gel pen (I’m 90% sure it was dried out before I put it in) and a McDonalds Beanie Babies Happy Meal bag. I remember being really confused about what to include that I wouldn’t somehow miss in the next 26 years. 😂

    What would you have put in a time capsule to represent the year 1999?

    In the Studio ✂️

    Something I realized during NaNoWriMo is that I want to make my noveling process more interdisciplinary. My first step was printing out images from my novel’s mood board. Holding these in my hands and moving them around was incredibly regulating after an overstimulating holiday season.

    10/10 would recommend paper mood boards.

    I’m planning to pin these on a cork board so I can continue to move them around rather than gluing them down. I may even use string. (I have a long standing thing for conspiracy corkboards.)

    The added benefit will be keeping my story visible to my conscious and unconcious mind throughout the year. Here’s a time lapse since I’m not on Instagram anymore.

    Over the last month I’ve realized (reading Ray Bradbury & Dorothea Brande) that my creative ecosystem needs more time for dreaming and ideation. So my word of the year is Reverie and I made this phone wallpaper as a visual reminder. The painting by John William Waterhouse is titled Boreas.

    I’m also starting a “writing from life” practice – separate from my self reflective journaling – to keep up my prose writing throughout the year. I both need space to think about my novel and space to write. I’m using this gorgeous spreadsheet to track my progress. Something I love about it is that you track time as well as words. Time researching, writing, prepping all counts. There’s tons of flexibility in setting goals and the spreadsheet even encourages you to allow for missing days.

    My kid is 5 1/2 years old and this feels like the first time I’ve had the energy and capacity to stay up late writing most nights. (Brain fog in the morning means waking up early never worked for me.) I’m so grateful to home education for giving us the flexibility to set our own hours.

    Reading 📖

    I posted my 2024 reading wrap up to my blog.

    My favorite reads were…

    Seaborn by Michael Livingston

    Pirates, magic, queer characters, and grounded historical details bring this world to life. The sequel Iceborn comes out later this year!

    All of the Discworld books I read by Terry Pratchett.

    And these books on the writing process:

    Zen & the Art of Writing by Ray Bradbury

    A Slip of the Keyboard by Terry Pratchett

    Becoming a Writer by Dorothea Brande

    Reading these together really formed a constellation of creative process. Observing what overlapped and what differed. I learned years ago I can’t use another creative process wholecloth, but reading about other people’s experience can help demystify the process. Studying early drafts of Tolkien and Sanderson’s work is really doing that for me as well.

    Digital Foraging 🍁

    This time last year…

    Hello from a Human Jungle Gym is a reflection on time and energetic capacity. I had similar goals last year, but continued to sink too much time into Substack. I’m hoping that making the big jump to Beehiiv will help me realize some of these intentions.

    We’ll see what happens long term, but I had twice the open rate on my last email as I have on Substack recently. People are starting to treat Substack like a social media and posts get lost in the feed.

    The Compost Heap is handmade without the use of AI. 🐝

    Support doing things the old fashioned way by joining my Patrons ($5) and I’ll send paper copies of my zines with the coolest postage stamps I can find.

    Not into snail mail?

    Here are other ways you can support.

    • Share with a friend. (It’s free!)
    • Art swap! Let me know if you’d like to swap your art for a zine.
    • Buy a book or a zine from my online bookshop.
    • Share this post on social media.
    • Reply to this email and suggest a book, a link, or something else that you’ve been loving lately. 🥰
    Let's chat header with hand drawn tin can telephones

    I’d love to hear from you.

    Hit reply to email me directly. Or ask about doing an art / zine / book swap!

    Thanks for being here.

    I appreciate you.

    Sarah signed with swoopy S

    Compost Heap Illustrations by Gracie Klumpp of Leave the Fingerprints. 🐞

    Read more: I’ve been waiting 26 years for this.

  • It's me, Sarah Shotts. Zine inside!

    From the Compost Heap header. A pencil style illustration of a compost heap with flowers and plants growing around it. A bee buzzes by and a white rabbit hops by.

    I made you a zine!

    Because The Medium is the Message I’ve given up weekly blogging and I’m making monthly zines instead.

    Here’s how it works.

    First, I noodle around with an idea. I type up a few notes on my phone and mull it over.

    I might browse are.na to find some images or I might use a photograph.

    Next, I do 2-3 rounds of edits. This process is powered by my kid’s hyperfocus when playing Zelda Breath of the Wild.

    Then, I go out to my studio and load up my 1950’s Underwood typewriter.

    Unless there’s a big problem (like above: when I loaded my typewriter ribbon backwards) I do my best to type the zine in one go. The mistakes and typos are part of the zine aesthetic and show it was made by hand.

    I actually love when the letters print twice or a little crooked. It feels punk rock in a world with AI.

    Then I add any images with double stick tape. I’ve decided to go full analogue and not do any digital touch ups.

    I Xerox the final product on my laser printer and send physical copies to my patrons (pledges starting at $3 on Patreon.)

    But you don’t have to pay to read. I’ll be sending a virtual zine every month to YOU.

    If this works.

    I’m not sure how well the zine will read on phone screens so this is a bit of an experiment. You may have to pinch and zoom.

    Or read on a computer. You can click here to read on archive.org. It’s pretty cool over there because you can flip the pages and see the spreads as they were designed.

    Otherwise I’ve popped the images directly below.

    Keep reading here.

    Accessible Version (for screenreaders)

    Bibliography (all of my research linked on are.na)

    Algorithm Free Portals

    Websites cost money. If we don’t pay directly they are making their money by selling our attention (ads) or mining our data (for advertisers or to train AI.)

    Here are some algorithm free websites I have been enjoying. I am happy to chip in my support for the services they are providing.

    are.na 

    Like Pinterest for art nerds. I started with a free account and quickly fell in love. There’s also an educator discount.

    Here’s a peek at the mood board for my fantasy novel.

    micro.blog 

    A simple microblogging platform. This is the passion project of Manton Reece, author of Indie Microblogging. He created micro.blog as a simple solution to own your own microblogging content. I could write a whole post about how great this is (for $5 a month), but I’ll try to keep it short. You can use it to build a website, make a blog, or microblog (like a Twitter or Instagram alternative.)

    I am playing around with a photo blog which automatically publishes to Bluesky. You can also subscribe to it via RSS.

    micro.blog is the way the web should work. It can be integrated with so many different things. I’ve even set up Beehiiv to automatically archive itself at sarahshotts.blog 

    Yes, I did mention bsky.app.

    Bluesky is a public benefit corporation with the mission to “to develop and drive large-scale adoption of technologies for open and decentralized public conversation.” (Source)

    This is a radical experiment in prioritizing the open web over commercial success.

    You have so much control over your experience there and you can even follow Bluesky feeds through RSS or on other platforms (like the micro.blog app).

    I’m going to be honest I’m mostly there for Wheel of Time (Season 3 is coming SOON y’all!) But I also made an artist / writer account and we’ll see where it goes. If you sign up let me know I’d love to connect with you there. Another cool thing about it is that they use domain names (if you have one) so I am https://bsky.app/profile/sarahshotts-com.preview-domain.com.

    Come on over to blue skies. Claim your name at least!

    My biggest frustration the last time I tested Beehiiv was the friction in the comment system. But I overlooked the simplest solution.

    I’ve turned comments off.

    Just hit reply to message me directly (or text me if you know me.)

    So much cozier.

    P.S. I should probably port over my “ways to support” banner, but it’s nearly midnight and we are drowning in sales emails this month anyway. I’ll put it back in January.


    Powered by beehiiv
    Read more: It's me, Sarah Shotts. Zine inside!

  • The Medium is the Message

    A few years ago I started making artwork with a gallery setting in mind (rather than Instagram.) That completely changed the kinds of things I was making.

    An embroidery frame holds a cross stitch that reads "I'm Fine". A second image shows the reverse which is a tangled mess of navy blue thread.

    I started the series My Brain on Motherhood and have been in over 10 fine art exhibitions. That never would have happened if I kept making art “for” the Internet.

    The medium is the message.

    The platform that we create for work for informs the work.

    Earlier this year, I stopped writing paywalled posts for paying supporters and started sending letters in the mail.

    Changing the medium of the message has made that work feel more personal and also more like human connection and less like work. So I’ve been wondering how to bring that energy to what I’m making here.

    I’m contemplating the ways in which I might go analogue with my newsletter in the new year.

    To test it out I’ve typed up I am not a brand. I’m a human. as a zine.

    This will be going out to my paid supporters this month as an experiment. (You can sub for as little as $3 a month via Patreon.) I’ll might alternate letters and zines depending on what I have to say.

    What’s interesting to me is how much this is about intention.

    Once made the work with an art gallery in mind – I can then share it on Instagram. (My “I’m Fine” cross stitch actually went low key viral.)

    But the frame in which I formulate ideas changes what I make.


    So when I say I’m going “analogue” I’m thinking of creating physical zines on my typewriter. That’s the medium. I’ll send paper copies to paying supporters (a sliding scale starting at $3 a month.)

    Once I’ve made that I can then archive digital versions of that zine on my website or Internet Archive (like this). I’ll send fewer emails (monthly or quarterly) that point directly to my website and / or compost heap. So the email newsletter becomes a channel to share my work and not the medium of the work itself.

    (How does that sound Seth Werkheiser?)

    I’m less and less comfortable having the work that I make live on someone else’s platform and this is an experiment I am excited to try.

    I’ve been circling around this idea for months now and I finally discovered Mail Blog and it inspired me to give it a go.

    If you’re considering how creating for the Internet in general is informing your work I’d really recommend the book The Medium is the Message by Marshall McLuhan.

    In the Studio ✂️

    Meanwhile here are a few updates from my creative ecosystem.

    First up, Entwined has gone to the editor!

    I’m also taking a course on sensory regulation with my partner. David and I are painting these sensory regulation cards and I’m very excited about them. (I don’t have it handy, but let me know if you’d like an affiliate link.)

    A lot of creative energy is also going into creating spaces for learning.

    And I’m also using our new laser printer to design our own handwriting sheets. (We’re saving the paper for a recycled paper bookmark project I’ve been ideating for about 5 years.)

    I also made this Wheel of Time inspired snowflake for WoTtober

    In the Garden 🌱

    Our garden is completely feral.

    But these volunteer tomatoes are VERY happy.

    Reading 📖

    Inspired by Hayley Dunlop I thought I might share more of the picture books we’re reading. This one has been a big hit. (No loose teeth yet, but we’re preparing to understand when it does happen.)

    Bear’s Loose Tooth

    Digital Foraging 🍁

    You can see another example of The Medium is the Message by these flashbacks to the time I was a “YouTuber.” I’m exhausted just thinking about trying to mask as much as I did in 2016.

    Seven years past.

    How to Make Leaf Rubbings on YouTube

    Eight years past.

    October Favorites 2016 on YouTube

    via Double Double Toil and Trouble an October roundup post on Substack from 2022.

    • Restack or recommend on Substack.
    • Buy my book.
    • Forward this email to a friend.
    • Pledge $3+ on Patreon (or upgrade to paid) for monthly snail mail from me.

    • Leave a comment (it’s free!)

    Processed with VSCO with al3 preset

    The Internet is like a tin can telephone. It’s just a rusty can until someone talks back.

    What are you making? What are you growing? What are you finding inspiring?

    Hit reply and let me know.

    This newsletter is a curated collection of tidbits from my overgrown Compost Heap (or digital garden.) Rummage around, turn the heap, and see what you can find for yourself. 🪱🐛🌱

    Illustrations by Gracie Klumpp of Leave the Fingerprints. 🐞

    Read more: The Medium is the Message