in 2014, we moved in with my husband’s grandmother (she’s
95!) and the majority of my attention was going to my family. my girls are a
full-time job on their own. luciana is 5, started kindergarten in the fall, is
very much the caring, nurturing older sister and continues to be on her own
path with her language and motor skills.
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| luciana, november 2014 |
anabella is 2 (whew, boy is she good
at it!), is still very energetic and independent, and likes to challenge me. in
every. single. way.
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| anabella, november 2014 |
gramma is an old-school italian who likes to keep herself busy doing
yardwork or cooking or sewing. she calls herself lazy because she forgets she
swept all the leaves off her steps only hours before, (i did a-nothing today!) and
claims she is “like a baby” because we’re here looking after her and have to
help her put on her shoes now. i affectionately tell her she’s our teenager because
she’s stubborn, thinks she knows everything, talks back and i have to drive her
everywhere.
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| gramma & luciana, july 2014 |
my husband, adam, is type-a, loud, generous, loyal, funny and loves
to keep me on my toes.
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| adam & me, christmas 2014 |
luciana is my mini-me. anabella is our adam, jr. and gramma's her partner-in-crime. we all
seem to balance each other out.
then there is me.
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| drawing of me by anabella, january 2015 |
i had a few small invitation/card orders throughout
the year, did some things like halloween costumes, the girls’ birthday party
and other small random projects, but other than that i wasn’t really doing
much. ok, besides grocery shopping, cooking, cleaning, changing diapers, laundry,
picking up toys, settling disputes over who had it first and other typical
stay-at-home-mom-type activities. i mean, for myself. for some reason, i was
convinced that i had to streamline my interests and had to have focus in order
to be productive. i didn’t like how my business name (echo art and design) didn’t explain what i did
so i was spending all this time trying to come up with something that more
descriptive. but what was i? graphic designer? calligrapher? no title i came up
with seemed quite right. i kept trying to figure out how i could rebrand myself,
find my niche. creatively, i was stuck.
suddenly 2014 was over and with the new year comes a new
you, right? all i heard were people listing things they were going to start,
things they were going to change. i don’t like to make new year’s resolutions.
if you want to do something or change something, why wait? of course my husband
asked me what my resolution was and without thinking about it, i said “be more creative”.
then it dawned on me, why am i trying to limit myself? why am i trying to
change? why am i trying so hard to put these labels on myself? all it’s really
doing is stopping me from doing, well, anything.
i have a lot of interests. so what? instead of trying to
change that, i am going to embrace it. as a kid, i wanted to be a million
things. in college i picked my major and then i took as many different art
class electives as i could possibly fit into my schedule. the only thing i’m
going to focus on is doing. it doesn’t matter what, it doesn’t matter how big
or how small. i am a creative person and it’s going to find it’s way into
everything i do. i may find my niche eventually. or not, my resume may just
keep getting longer and longer. i’m fine with that. in the meantime i’ll just
be creating. something. anything. less reinvention, more invention. and i’m
going to write about it along the way.
