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January 3, 2008
Check this out http://www.re-foundobjects.com/
a shop of recycled objects that have become something other than what they originally had been…pretty cool!
I’ve been thinking about how having kids changes a career path entirely. What used to be so important or valuable has lost its glow. Professionally, I used to crave the most creative challenge and would cringe at any project that resembled production. Give me that full color, bell & whistle design job with dye cuts and fancy folds! Now, although those are still fun, it’s also very nice to get production, text-formatting projects, the kind that allow the mom-brain to go on auto pilot and just crank out money-paying jobs.
I’m tracking Keri Smith, a very successful book-writing designer/illustrator. She’s pregnant with her first child and has had to let go of a few professional opportunities lately. I’m just waiting to see how things will change for her when this baby finally arrives…the 180 degree turn is right around the bend.
Working at home saves a tremendous amount of money on “work” clothes, shoes and haircuts. When I see a manicured hand my eyes roll…fingernails just don’t matter to me. These days I often have snot on my shoulders and yogurt in my hair anyway, so the perfect work clothes are a sweat shirt and Majamas!
As for the family pet…he lost rank very fast when Miika came on the scene. Now with two kids, poor Riley the cat, is the low man on the totem pole. Now he just gets pitched out the back door if he makes too many demands.
Houseplants? Nope. Can’t feed or water one more thing!
Time is so precious these days. I used to spend hours bent over my drawing board meticulously painting an insect or a leaf just for fun. Now I have to stay up all night to do an illustration because of the little hands that will inevitably reach into the paint if I illustrate by day. So illustration means coffee and chocolate in order to stay alert past bedtime. It used to be a dream of mine to illustrate an entire book, now it would be a nightmare… It’s like being on the backside of the moon, another life, another perspective. Our lives spin around our children. Sometimes I do long for about 4 hours of uninterrupted time to create whatever comes to mind, but that’s just not the season of life that I’m in. Stolen moments here and there are all that I can manage. It’s 11:48pm right now, Riley is “roow-ing” around and scratching furniture then ripping around the house driving me crazy…time to go pitch him out then go to bed!