When I was a little girl in elementary school, my two favorite subjects were art and English, and yes, in that order.😊Once a week, our art teacher, Mrs. Danekurt, would open our classroom door and push in her huge cart of art supplies and my eyes would get as big as saucers with excitement! I knew I was about to be allowed an hour of fun with paints, markers, crayons, and colored pencils, or maybe all of those at once!
So, it makes sense that at age seven, when the very first Crayola Caddy was introduced, my desire to have one was that of Ralphie wanting his Red Rider B-B gun! In case you’re not familiar, the Crayola Caddy was a rotating, square yellow plastic organizer designed to hold crayons, markers, colored pencils, and paints and it came with all those things! It even had a removable crayon sharpener too! Every time I saw a commercial for this amazing plethora of art supplies all organized neatly, my heart would smile with desire, but at the same time I knew I would probably never get to have one. This was the newest, hottest toy, so of course it was pricey and being my single mom’s oldest child of five, I knew there wouldn’t be money to just go buy me “some toy I wanted really badly”. My only hope was that Santa would bring me a Crayola Caddy for Christmas.
Every Christmas from age seven on I wrote Santa a letter asking him to PLEASE bring me a Crayola Caddy and every Christmas morning I awoke to find that Santa had not made my wish come true. He would bring me something, just not the one thing I wanted more than anything else. Until finally one Christmas, when I was ten years old, there was one, last present under the tree and it had my name on it! The tag read “To: Jessica – From: Santa” and my little heart immediately started running a sprint! I tore into the wrapping paper with unbridled joy hoping this would finally be the Christmas that Santa granted my years long wish!
As I tore the wrapping off, I immediately recognized the gold and green corner of the box and knew it was indeed the Crayola Caddy! Box in hand, I rushed to the room I shared with three of my siblings and grabbed a handful of notebook paper! I blew past the rest of my family still in the living room and ran to our small kitchen table, my Crayola Caddy clutched under my arm. I proceeded to spend the next week of Christmas break using every art supply in that caddy; coloring, drawing, and painting until the paints were almost empty, the crayons all needed sharpening, and some of the markers weren’t coloring as brightly. I made picture after picture and was happier than I’d ever been!
Creating art made me feel at peace in what was a very chaotic, toxic childhood. It helped me escape from the bad things that were going on around me just like reading books did. I continued to love creating art until one day, about a year after I graduated from high school, I realized I hadn’t sat down and created art in over a year. I was in the second semester of my freshman year in college, so that was somewhat understandable considering the end of my senior year of high school and the summer after were chaotically fun, It still surprised me I hadn’t created anything in such a long time. And just before realizing this, I had also found out I was pregnant and my then boyfriend and I had decided to keep the baby and raise it instead of other options we had at that time.
Eventually, I dropped out of college, my boyfriend and I got an apartment together, and we had the first of our two daughters. Aside from the times I would color with our daughter, I simply stopped taking time to be with only myself and to do the one thing that always soothed my soul. I had more important things to do now that I was a mom and finally back in college trying to earn my bachelor’s degree.
Fast forward ten years and I now had two daughters who were 10 and 6. I had finally left my abusive marriage to their father and had started a new life on the Gulf Coast of Florida (more on all of that in future posts). Life got very busy while I raised two children on my own and continued to go to college… all without being able to drive because of my visual impairment. Looking back, it doesn’t surprise me I wasn’t drawing or painting back then. So, over time my adult and motherly responsibilities took over my life and spending alone time drawing and painting simply wasn’t possible.
Fast forward, another twenty years and my daughters are now 30 and 24 and I am in the most amazing, loving, nontoxic relationship / marriage I have ever been in and am so incredibly blessed. My life isn’t filled with drama like it was for so many years and I’ve been able to reclaim my passion for creating art.
In 2023, I was introduced to an art form called paint pouring, a.k.a. fluid art and I once again fell in love with creating my take on beautiful art. If you’re not familiar with fluid art, paintings are created by thinning acrylic paints with a medium and pouring them onto a surface to create organic, marbled designs. Instead of using brushes, you manipulate the canvas by tilting or blowing to guide the paint’s natural flow. Fluid art relies on chemical reactions and gravity to produce unique, abstract patterns that are impossible to replicate exactly.
When I say I fell in love with this creative outlet, I mean I was creating fluid art paintings almost every day! The childhood joy I experienced while creating art has once again returned and I am elated!
And the great thing is now that my daughters are grown, I have an extra bedroom that I’ve converted into an art studio complete with a couple of different tables for different parts of the creating process, and my paints and supplies are organized on the shelves in the closet… and I’m certain no little curious hands are going to come in, get into my stuff, and make a huge mess! 😁
Reclaiming my passion for creating art has brought me the peace I craved as child, has helped me get in touch with my inner child, “Wittle Jessca”, and has brought back a joy I haven’t experienced in decades!
Are there any hobbies you loved as a child but have put aside because of your adult responsibilities? Or, have you also recently reclaimed a childhood hobby? I’d love to know, so comment below.