Where do you find the time?

This is a common question I get about my quilting. My answer is that I don't find the time, I make the time.

Several years ago, when I still had all three kids at home and my husband was working long hours running his appliance repair business and I worked full time, my mother was having health issues and ended up in a nursing home. I was very stressed and I didn't have time to do much that was just for me. I was not a happy person. My sewing room was about 9' X 12' and I shared it with a huge upright grand piano and all the stuff that didn't have a different home. Needless to say, I wasn't doing much sewing and I was not a very happy person at all.

About 5 1/2 years ago, Larry's business was doing well so I didn't 'have' to work anymore so I quit my job to stay at home. From the moment that decision was made, I was a different person inside. I started sewing again. My sewing room wasn't any bigger and nothing else had really changed other than my oldest was off at college.

I had discovered my 'passion' - I need to be creative. I need to sew and especially, I need to make quilts. It is my mental health therapy.

Much has changed since that discovery. Larry had knee and back surgeries so I am now working part-time with him, my mom died, my second child went off to college and has graduated and my oldest got married, finished college (well, almost) and had a baby. With the girls gone I got their room for a sewing room and I got my supplies mostly organized. When I get home from work I greet our son (a high school senior this coming year) and the dog, check email and blogs and then get to some sort of project. It keeps me sane.

I think that each of us, especially mother's with full and crazy lives, need to find that thing that keeps us sane and balanced. We need to step off the hamster wheel and take a few moments every day for ourselves. When my kids were little I chose to sit down with a book or some embroidery or something while they were napping instead of doing the dishes or cleaning the house or whatever. Other times I would get up before everyone else and have a cup of coffee and read a book and enjoy that peace that would be shattered as soon as others were awake.

Okay, I will get off my soapbox now as long as you figure out when your mental health moment is going to be each day!