Teacher & A Full-Time Creative

When you realize you’re a part-time freelancer and a full-time creative…

Last week, teachers all over the country went back to school for the first week of professional development. I did too. Seated in meetings I haven’t been part of for weeks, I took calligraphed notes to stay engaged while attempting to bring my brain back into the rigor and routine of the school year.

For the second year in a row, I heard a statement about teaching wanting everything from you. It’s a true statement. Unfortunately, no career can truly have all of anyone. Careers tend to rank high if we need to pay bills and are without access to unlimited funds. But, marriage and parenting often want just as much…

Even the best of us cannot give 100% of themselves to any one part. We all compartmentalize our lives so that we can prioritize our time and organize our tasks effectively.

Yet, teaching is that one profession that so many others rely on…to be able to inspire others… to plant seeds for the future…even to be able to go to work and to have fully raised, docile kids upon return, at times.

To me, a profession has to do with what you do…not who you are. However, it’s helpful, if the two relate.

In my case, they do. I am creative and I teach art, and often, the two coincide.

Still, this week, in many ways, I found myself drawing a pretty bold line between schoolwork and homework, creatively…And, in other ways, not so much.

Schoolwork

My school principal contacted me over the summer about designing a banner for a team he wanted to start at our school. The team’s name is “Team Zero” and will be a behavioral incentive for our more feisty kids.

I started working on it this past week. But, usually, when I am asked to do something by the staff, I get the verbiage and vision from the person asking me. That didn’t happen this time. So, I had to make it up as I went along….My kind of project! 😂

I decided to sketch out some ideas for a logo for the team and a slogan. Then, I digitized it all.

Here’s a peek at that.

I took a couple shortcuts since, technically, there won’t be much time to carry this all the way now that school has started. The logo was drawn in Procreate, added to a gradient background with type in Photoshop. Then, the whole thing was moved to Canva to insert the photos of the shield, etc.

Once I trace the design in Illustrator, it can be used for lots of other applications this year.

Well, we’ll see how all that works out. We don’t even have the banner yet. 😂

But, it made me feel better about not getting to participate in Type Affiliated’s 31 Day Logo Challenge after all during summer break.

Homework

At home, I’ve been practicing my calligraphy, of course, and making ‘prototypes’.

I need prototypes to show would-be clients the kind of work I can do for them. But, I would have a difficult time putting together a calligraphy portfolio without an actual project to work through. So, I’m using my own future wedding celebration to do it.

Remember these?

At the time, I only had a few minutes to tear the paper edges for this brown paper. But, while I knew I wanted to use the color brown and possibly pink or white…

I also wasn’t sure about torn or cut edges, the actual color or shape of the paper, or the ink I wanted to use. So, I played with that this week.

Here, I got to play with walnut ink versus gouache acrylic in portrait pink.

Walnut ink is now, hands down, my favorite ink in the whole world for practicing.

I used walnut crystals to mix a whole batch. I don’t even know when, if ever, I could use all the ink up! On the other hand, the pink gouache was very cute! I don’t need to use a lot of it to make ink. But, I thought it was a little finicky to get good flow, and it doesn’t rinse out of my new, second favorite nib as well either (the Hunt 22). Plus, I’m not sure ‘cute’ is what I want. I’m going for ‘fire’!

I’m just playing. 😂 Best I got is casual elegance.

That’ll do.

Still, I felt the pink ink put me in mind of adding small florals along with a wax seal to the tops of the cut-edge, more spacious cards. While all of that could be labor intensive in the end for a small celebration, it could be a really nice touch. I’ll sleep on it…

Now, mind you, I don’t know anyone named Quincy, George, Celia….definitely don’t know anyone named Geneva. But, they don’t have to be real names until I figure out my whole vibe anyway. They’re just prototypes. Besides that, I read where it could take 20 nibs to get through a whole project. 😳 So, ordering in bulk is something I’m going to need to look into at some point because this little stash is going to get me nowhere fast.

In the meantime, while I figure all that out, I’ll keep working on my calligraphy for when it all comes together.

There’s plenty enough homework to do, for sure.

Conclusion

It just dawned on me very clearly, for the very first time, that who I am infiltrates pretty much everything else, including what I do. Being a part-time freelancer doesn’t negate the fact that I’m still creating around the clock…that as all over the place as I am going back to school, there’s the one constant of creativity.

It’s always interesting to me that amidst all the noise, the simplest truths are always staring us right in the face.

What a comforting thought. 🥰