bread and butter
Dear readers, this post has a split personality. But that’s kind of just how I am. I’m leading you, just momentarily, to a more personal place. A place of bread and butter.
I was reading this post the other day about following your dreams and your passion and it really resonated for me. Now, while it may seem that I spend most of my time in the kitchen our out photographing fun stuff with Shawn, the truth is I have a full time, totally not creative job,* just like tons of other people out there. I spend most of my day calculating things and making a lot of spreadsheets.
Then I get to go home and bake and blog and photograph and sew for the few hours I have before I am too tired to function. It’s been going like this for about the past few years with a few variables. At some point there was a lot of script writing. Sometimes there are a lot of night time bicycle adventures. At one point there was a lot of watching edits of Brainwashed Love.
It hasn’t been easy. It’s been a lot of work, to keep up all these interests and paths. Sometimes I hate that I can’t just decide on one thing. I know it won’t ever be like that for me. I want to make movies. I want to bake cupcakes. I want to do it all. Of course all these creative endeavors come at a cost. So that’s what the day job is for in the mean time. It’s the bread and butter.
In 2009 Shawn and I took that crazy leap of making a feature film. We completely produced and financed it ourselves. It was something we both knew we had to do. I’m sure it was one of the best decisions we’ve made even though it was scary. I’m still so proud of what we’ve accomplished by making a movie together. It’s something that many people dream of doing and never get the chance to do. We did it, and we did it well. Not to mention it just gave us that much more confidence for the next one.
So here I am, a bit over a month out from the first time we screened our film, thinking about how to follow my dreams. I know I have to devote as much of myself to these creative endeavors as I can stand.
I’ve realized that I love this blog. I don’t just enjoy blogging, I LOVE cute & delicious. I love that it is a place where I can sprinkle bits and pieces of all the things I create. So I’ve recently invested more time into it, trying to post more often and make it as cool as possible because it makes me happy.
I’m loving planning our wedding. It’s like the biggest excuse to craft and design ever. How could I not love that?
The one thing I’ve had to let fall to the wayside recently is Vegan Bake Sale. It will return. In a grander more splendid form. Cross my heart.
I’ve been really into practicing photography lately. I’ve always taken photos for this blog (although, in the past, all the good photos were taken by Shawn). I’m really trying to step up my game. It helps that I have a good teacher.
I’m still trying to figure out how to turn all these loves, these things I’m truly passionate about, the things that I live for, into my bread and butter. I know somehow someday this will happen, I just haven’t figured out how to make it happen yet. I’m ready though.
So I’m leaving you with these thoughts and some insanely good Beer Bread from a mix I bought at Trader Joe’s. I know I said I don’t usually buy boxed bake goods but sometimes you have to make an exception. This is one of those times.
Oh, wow. I can identify with SO MUCH of this post. I graduated from college in ’09 with my head and heart full of possibilities. I love art history and museums and film production and learning new languages and writing and crafting and baking and books, books, books! Yet it’s so difficult to translate all those myriad points of interest into something that pays the bills (cough cough the student loans). In the meanwhile, I have a job that [luckily] involves writing, so I at least get to do something vaguely related to my interests. Still, though, I dream of putting all my talents and interests into something amazing and creative and sustainable one day.
It’s fantastic that you made a feature film; I’d love to be a part of that type of project some day. It takes a lot of courage and faith in yourself to do something like that, and I think you’re well on your way to turning your loves into your bread and butter. Keep on truckin’!
…and in the mean time, enjoy that bread. Looks delicious. 😉
Love this post, Alix!
You and Shawn are the best people I know at pulling off this double-life full of creative ventures & paid gigs… and both of you are a huge inspiration! It always boggles my mind how much you guys manage to accomplish. I hope that some day I can find myself even half as productive 😉
I am in love with this post. I doubt there is a person in the world who can’t relate to this one some level. I am extremely lucky to have a creative job that I love (although I could use a better salary!) but I am always wondering how to fit my favorite non-work activities into life. I feel like there just isn’t enough time in the day to fit in cooking, blogging, running, seeing movies, reading books, etc.
Making your own movie while working is highly commendable! You must have been running on fumes.
And while accounting may not be the most exciting area of production, working in any part of film is far more fun and interesting than most people’s day jobs!
oh we definitely weren’t working on anything but the movie when we shot it. would have been impossible. so at the time, that was our job.
it really does seem like there are never enough hours in the day though. sigh.
Oh ok, phew, I was gonna say–you must have been going bonkers!
This is a really inspiring post. Thank you for sharing 🙂
I got such a good feeling reading this post.
my boyfriend always buy this beer at trader joes…. hahaha
and good to know that this ready mixture is good. maybe i’ll try sometime…
see ya
I’m totally with you on everything you said. I’m having to face the reality that my creative endeavors aren’t paying the bills (not the first time in my life!), and I think I’m gonna have to break down and get a “regular” job. I’m often working on the blog on weekends, and like you I’ve had to start taking my own photos for the blog – but I’m also lucky to have a great teacher! But we could talk about all that for hours…
Okay, onto the bread! It looks so tasty, and Ryan loves that beer from TJs. I have the coffee cake mix that I got after seeing your post about that. Now I’ll have to get this one too!