I’ve been on twitter for a while. I haven’t been using it, but I have, technically  been on it. It was really just a bit of a hangover from a university module and following graduation it sat, un-utalised and gathering dust for a good, long time.

But the past few months, I’ve been breathing a bit of life into the sad blighter and have, as a result have actually managed to amass some followers. Not a showstopping amount, but you have to start somewhere right? Give me a bit of credit, I am, almost entirely, social-media illiterate.

Anyway, I’ve become a bit addicted to the little beasty in recent months. I follow illustrators, writers, design blogs and news sources and publishers. I follow publishers and children’s magazines. I follow picture book blogs and reviewers. I’ve basically created a news outlet tailored to me and immersed myself in the world I’ve always wanted to live in (thus almost entirely bypassing the real one.) I spend a long time scrolling through the feed, gathering all the brand new announcements from the world of picturebooks and feel genuinely more involved and up to date with the scene than ever.

While generally tweeting work and commenting on that of others has been a big part of this online networking business, I think a total turning point for me with it has only come about in the past month.

I’d been watching the #colour_collective movement from afar for a while, but decided to take the plunge and commit. It’s a weekly, twitter based challenge started by the talented mum-of-illustration, Penny Neville Lee. Each week, a colour is established and 19.30 GMT on the Friday, anyone that wants to get involved released their image utalising that weeks colour with the hashtag. It can be old, new, any theme, any subjects, just as long as it contains some link to the colour.

No pressure, no expectation, just people with passion sharing things they make.

I love it, it gives me the boost to make a new piece of non-work work every week. Four weeks in, and here are my offerings:

It’s great fun, everyone is so nice about the work and there’s always one hell of a range to look at. It’s a digital gallery space and makes me warm and fuzzy on the inside 🙂

Friday night has become my favourite night of the week and yes, this does mean that I that I stay in and scroll about on my ipad instead of doing real life things, I am not ashamed. This is my life.

Plus I get to learn the names of all the specific colours. It’s like gaining a degree from Dulux.

Anyway, do check it out, it’s great fun and there’s no commitment required. Follow my colour collective adventures, and generally keep up to date with my doddly-goings on  @bagleybooks, or just stop by to see what it’s all about.

I can’t say I’ve really got this social media thing down, but I certainly feel I’m finding my feet. And just in time for the stocks to crash out of the bottom of it! Horray for timing!