I Must Blog More, I Must Blog More

“I must blog more”. These are the words which run through my head every time I blog. But it’s not easy being a mum and a maker (I’m a #mamamaker apparently) and blogging has joined a long list of things to do. I’m a juggler of sorts, and every minute of the day seems to count.

Time with my son, Jesse, is precious to me and I usually work when he naps or he has gone to bed. I feel like I work 24/7 these days in one form or another - my plates spin in the air at high speed - making dinner, baking for Jesse, cleaning, washing, food shopping, stopping food from Jesse’s spoon hitting the ceiling during feeding, changing endless nappies, watching Peppa Pig (countless, countless times) then running to my studio as soon as his head hits the pillow. Ooo and breathe… I can faintly recall those days I’d start work at 9:30am and leave at 5:30pm before I had my son and decided, whilst on maternity leave, that I would turn what was a little side hustle into calling myself a jeweller by profession.

So how am I feeling now that I am in the throes of said profession? I’m tired, and stressed very often and feel that I don’t have a moment to rest; but there’s also immeasurable joy. I have reached the age of 41 and am finally where I want to be, professionally. Since I drew and wrote growing up, since I used to help my father as a bricklayer “knocking up the muck” when I was a little girl, since I loved my art and textiles classes at school yet took a different path, since I worked for other people (albeit some lovely people) in administrative and legal fields for some 25 years (a world away from being a jewellery maker) - I can now say I create for a living. There, I said it. I make items of wearable art which will long outlast me; I am free to explore and indulge my creativity; to hunt on the beach for seaglass and sea pottery and call it ‘work’; to sculpt, swirl and manipulate metal with a flourish that makes me want to say “ta-dah”; to have people ask me to use my hands, hands which have itched not to tap away at a keyboard (oh the irony) but instead to pick up tools I never thought I’d own, to make stuff, to make amazing stuff, stuff they want to wear every day, stuff they want to wear ‘for best’, stuff that forms part of special days for years to come.

I can balance nourishment of my soul this way, my love for my family and my love to be creative; me as me and me as mother/wife/partner. For all you mums out there balancing this kind of lifestyle (you’re probably way too busy to read this), I’m there with you anyway, sitting on your shoulder telling you to keep going. You got this.