Category: Crafty

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Watercolor Purge

This Summer required extra Weekend Therapy to unpack everything we went through the last two years. When it started, I was still feeling floored that we had shut down the year prior, let alone the ups and downs of the most recent school year.

My summer friend on 35 mm

So I took pictures, traveled a bit, walked around aimlessly, rode my bike, binged TV, obsessed over listened to true crime podcasts, hung out with the kids, talked to my counselor, and watercolored. I think it accomplished the goal of coming to terms with all of the transitions, and I felt ready to finally start to hope and plan for the year ahead…however unpredictable it might prove to be.

My own counselor is helping me realize that we often think of self-care like we can put rest in some reserve for later when our lives explode again. But alas, it’s not so easy! Self- care is an ongoing process, and in the down-time of summer I’m learning to use my energy to process the past, and develop sustainable self-care habits for the busy future.

Anywho, at the end of the day (or summer) I have a cautiously optimistic readiness for the school year and a big ol’ pile of photographic and art prints! I went the summer taking pictures of my watercolors and then gifting them to people who will find them meaningful. And after ordering some magical giclee prints, I’ve decided to motivate my self- care practice by starting to sell them!

It all started with this first illustration of a book store near my cousin’s house in Columbus. She started out our summer with her beautiful neighborhood!

More to come on this if I can ever for the life of me figure out the interwebs, but if the site looks a little different it will be a sign I’ve figured it out!

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Summer Photog

Five purchases later I have two 35mm Minoltas that actually work and I am OBSESSED! Despite weighing 10,000 lbs, I yanked those suckers all over the place with me this summer and I can’t be more happy with how my pictures are starting to turn out!

It take a second to develop (I don’t have a local lab so I’ve been using darkroom.com), but there is something really lovely to learn in taking pictures with a 35mm camera. You’re in this cool spot, with a cool shot, and looking through that viewfinder knowing that your picture may or may not turn out with these old broads. What does that mean? You are so much more involved in the picture because you also have to be present to remember the moment since there’s a good chance you might not get it back! Bless, you can take the hobby our of the, er, the counselor out of the–whatever, you know what I’m trying to say!

With practice, I can also tell that I’m improving on reading the exposure and aperture and focusing and whatnot. But guess what? No need for pressure because you have about three weeks to develop and check in on your progress. You either have to go with it or put the camera down.

This Summer was such a needed rest. I tried to really be conscious about allowing myself to process the crazy year behind and the uncertain school year ahead. The cameras were a perfect way to check my efforts and force me to slow down.

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NEW SUMMER OBSESSIONS

By the end of the school year this year I was itching for a new hobby to dig into for the summer to avoid my mid-July-I’m-not-serving-society-no-one-loves-me-I-miss-the-students-and-I-am-bored funk. As if by cosmic design, while traveling in WV to see family in Ohio, I found a super cheap 35 mm camera in an antique store and I was ready!

I have some knowledge of film cameras because 1. I’m old, and 2. I had taken some photography classes in high school when you still got to barrel your own film and develop them in the darkroom (see: #1). I cleaned up the camera, bought film, joined the photographer Facebook groups, and grabbed books for my new summer obsession. Because, it would be too rational of me to not deep dive into the shallow end of a loose plan as per usual. Low and behold, the camera didn’t work. Womp womp womp. Soo…because I had already made the financial and mind space commitment, I had to take on another new skill. EBay.

After an obnoxiously long path filled with hidden bots, broken cameras, untested vs. tested, messages, and semi-unhinged stalkerish bidding, I finally got a little Minolta rangefinder gem. Minolta has always been my fav camera and their designs (insides and outsides) have always been the sleekest to me.

She’s a beaut and I love her. Of course, I was also still hoping to have a SLR so I also got another one of those.

Now I just ride around and snap pictures of pretty things and pray to the shutter speed/aperture gods that something will turn out. and it’s lovely.

Because I can’t just do anything without thinking of the SEL side of the activity, I have also found that I’m learning more than just film settings. It’s like going back to the days of waiting through the week for a favorite TV episode or holding on making plans until someone can get home and to a phone. I can’t see what I take, I can’t tell what will come out, and I can’t get the images right away. Patience is a virtue, but far from my strong point so in that respect, my cameras are giving me a full scope of newness, resilience, and needed holding. I’m currently holding back the urge to find a grant to help me build a darkroom in my school to teach kids how to develop. Where is the end for all saints’ sake?!

FYI- these are all of the parts, tools, and two dead cameras that delivered me to this post.

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Rope Basket Weekend Therapy

So here’s the deal: when your 19-year-old kid asks you to do some plant-related business with her, you don’t ask questions. As is true for many parents, we are in a new phase of kin bliss following the tumultuous years in which I thought my teen might be a sociopath my child was claiming her independence. After years of careful grooming, my daughter is in her first new place and has embraced my love of all things houseplants.

Being that making is my therapy, it has actually be a really awesome outlet for me to have a reason to craft plant-related things for our little endeavor. While I am the middle-born-flower-child, she is the first-born-rule-follower-turned-rule-maker, making us the perfect pair for a little entrepreneurship!

You can check us out on Facebook or Instagram if you’d like, under Plant Plug 757! In the meantime, I’m crafting up new plant-related goods with rope planter covers for the last few days of my Spring Break!

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Collage Self-Care

Mini collages based on our Legitimate Rights…

Legitimate Rights, Marsha Linehan in DBT Therapy:

  1. You have a right to need things from others.
  2. You have a right to put yourself first sometimes.
  3. You have a right to feel and express your emotions or your pain.
  4. You have a right to be the final judge of your beliefs and accept them as legitimate.
  5. You have the right to your opinions and convictions.
  6. You have the right to your experience – even if it’s different from that of other people.
  7. You have a right to protest any treatment or criticism that feels bad to you.
  8. You have a right to negotiate for change.
  9. You have a right to ask for help, emotional support, or anything else you need (even though you may not always
    get it).
  10. You have a right to say no; saying no doesn’t make you bad or selfish.
  11. You have a right not to justify yourself to others.
  12. You have a right not to take responsibility for someone else’s problem.
  13. You have a right to choose not to respond to a situation.
  14. You have a right, sometimes, to inconvenience or disappoint others.
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Linocut Therapy

I’m participating in my second linocut print exchange! This one is inspired by a student from a couple of years ago. The title is 8th Grader, and I drew an image of her that haunts my mind often.


She would sleep on my office couch during times when her home was particularly unsettled. She had more life experience than me and taught me a lot about struggles that had previously felt so far away from my world- intense familial drug use at young ages, assault, generational prostitution, addiction, abuse, and the many things a family will go through to get by. I have unfortunately had many students who live in crisis, but her situation was a different universe of normalized trauma. She never disclosed these circumstances as complaints, they were peppered throughout our everyday communication. It was no different from other students who stop in daily to tell me about their relationship.


She disappeared to Florida, had said she would be fine once she could secure a financial set-up like her mom and the trucker. I think about her almost daily still. I miss being able to put eyes on my students to see that they’re still safe, or still there.

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Easter crafty

First of all, get a Cricut.

Second, if you are in the saintly way or Catholic, check out Tiny Saints because they’re adorable. I love a good collection and these little charms can be picked based on any lucky recipient’s personality so they’re super personal little gifts. I may or may not have found a couple for myself too.

Had the craft therapy itch this year even though my babies aren’t so little anymore. I put little faces on some plastic eggs with my new, amazing, magical Cricut. Then pulled out the hook for these mini hats. They were crazy easy and fast- I love how they turned out! The kids loved them too, well really, they mainly loved the money inside the eggs, but I’ll take it!

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Bossest Ever Crochet Hook

I am literally in love with this new (to me) hook. For real, we will have a Summer wedding with flowers and puppies. I was checking out some of the rubber-enforced hooks on Amazon and found the Addi Swing Hook by chance. My tension is usually pretty tight so I was intrigued by the shape and took a chance on a 1.5 for a summer bag I’m doing (it’s never too early to start prepping). It took a second for me to figure out, but I have gotten the hang of it! The only thing I miss about my tiny 1.5 is feeling like a giant while man-handling that little metal bar. But I do it miss the claw hands I had after using the standard, that’s for sure.

My inspiration comes from this lovely pin