Fun Five is a monthly email I send out on the 5th. Each edition is a short list of five things I’ve been enjoying lately. Things like inspiration, design, music, food, small curiosities, and more.
September is here, and it has been an incredibly busy time with packing up, moving, and getting settled into my partner's apartment. Through all the chaos of moving boxes and organizing, I managed to find some amazing inspiration and entertainment to keep my energy up. Here is what caught my eye this month.
1. An unexpected music discovery
This episode of the Friends Keep Secrets podcast stumbled onto my YouTube algorithm, and it is such a fun watch. Benny Blanco and his co-hosts basically pull a mystery guest off the street in LA to interview. It turns out, Natty is an aspiring music producer, and they end up playing two tracks made with their best friend, an emerging artist named Bex Grimes. I was honestly blown away. You could instantly tell the track was going to be good from the very first few seconds. You can watch the exact moment here. If you like it too, here is the link to the first track.
2. Getting hooked on audiobooks
While sorting through my stuff and packing for the move, I decided to finally give audiobooks a try. I had never listened to one before, but I kept hearing great things about the Dungeon Crawler Carl series. The narrator, Jeff Hays, does an unbelievable job bringing it to life; it honestly feels less like someone reading a book and more like an immersive radio drama. Here's the quick premise: Earth gets turned into a televised alien dungeon crawler, and a guy named Carl has to survive it alongside his ex-girlfriend's talking show cat, Princess Donut. By the end of the first book I was completely hooked, and within a month I am already on book five. It made the packing grind fly by.
3. The case for mixing wood tones
I came across this reel about mixing woods in interior design, and it completely changed my perspective. She explains that defaulting to matching every single wood piece in a room actually makes a space feel washed out and flat. Instead, she shares practical guidelines like using a 60/40 ratio (a dominant wood and a supporting wood) and focusing on matching undertones (warm versus cool) rather than trying to match the exact species or colour. Now that I have seen this breakdown, I cannot unsee it in spaces where everything comes from the same catalogue set. There is just something so much more curated, cozy, and lived-in about pairing different tones together, like walnut and white oak, which is definitely something we are keeping in mind as we arrange our new space.
4. Daily creative play in a notebook
This video really inspired me to kick off a new creative habit: quick mixed-media explorations in a small notebook. Working at a pocket-sized scale immediately removes the pressure of trying to produce a finished masterpiece. By using both sides of the spread to test ideas with similar colour palettes, it feels like taking two low-stakes swings at the same concept without second-guessing yourself. It has quickly become a small pocket of creative play that I look forward to every day, just exploring textures, layering, and loose marks. A big thank you to Jasmin from @neon.and.lines for popping up on my feed and sparking that habit.
5. The core of Have Fun Or Else
Lastly, this video by Scotty Gange came across my feed, and it genuinely sums up what Have Fun Or Else is all about. He shares a great reminder that life is supposed to be fun, and that learning to implement joy consistently into your life is one of the greatest skills you can develop. It is all about mastering the art of excitement for the small daily things while working hard to build something meaningful over years. When you are putting in the work, you have to be able to enjoy the hike up the mountain, even if you are not even halfway there yet. It captures the exact mindset I try to bring to my life and art, and it felt like the perfect reminder to close out this month's list.
Thanks for reading the Fun Five. If there is a great audiobook you have been loving or a new creative habit you picked up lately, feel free to reach out and share it!
P.S. Here's a quick peek inside my notebook from this week.
