Crafts can be healing

I’ll introduce myself a little. My name is Rachel and I’m in my 30s. I am disabled so I do have a lot of free time that I spend mostly watching movies/TV shows and reading. I have been doing a variety crafts since I was very little. My mother would invest in all types of products to help entertain me while I was waiting for doctors appointments or in the hospital. I would make necklaces with beads. For a while I was very invested in making beads out of paper.

As I got older I switched into making soap, painting glassware and baking. In high school I started baby-sitting and always brought some type of project with me to do with the kids. It helped that one of my first baby-sitting jobs was for a family that belonged to school that didn’t allow TV or even really dolls with faces(CREEPY!!). I had to get creative very early. I rarely ran into a parent who was unhappy that I didn’t just stick a movie in. I’m so happy that the internet has made it easier to access crafting ideas for young children.

My parents did always try to instill in me that perfection was never as important as having fun making it and most mistakes the person you are giving it too won’t even notice. Something I really do wish I took into account more. The only bump in that road was when I made a bird house for my grandparents when I was around eight years old. My grandparents lived on several acres in rural area after moving from LA but kept that attitude. I painted the birdhouse in shades of blue because those were my favorite colors at the time. A few months later we were informed that it go painted over because it ‘clashed’ with their house. For the most I’d already accepted at the point my grandparents were normal and would never behave as such. But I do get annoyed at anyone I see wanting perfection from child artwork.

In college I’d mostly moved on to writing and baking as my creative outlets. I do stick mostly to fanfiction. I have outlines for one original fiction story and one non-fiction that someday I’ll write. Baking is something I truly enjoy doing because while I it can take some out of me it still makes a lot of people smile, especially when it is a surprise. One Christmas I did attempt to make a TARDIS gingerbread house. It was a fantastic failure but lots of fun. I did get to discover the reason the 10th Doctor regenerated, the TARDIS door crushed him.

The newest area of crafting that I’ve moved into is cosplay. I’ve only made two at the moment- Bombshell Batwoman and Medieval Hawkeye. While I suffer from varying degree of social anxiety I have discovered when I’m cosplay that I am much relaxed in crowded situations. I think my next attempt might just be a gender flipped Winter Soldier. I’ve never tried making any type of armor but it could be lots of fun.

I really do think crafting helped so much when I was younger in finding an identity outside of my illness. It was also a great way to get to know the kids on pediatric floor. And nothing is a great ice breaker then giving someone homemade baked goods. Now I just have to put that same amount of enthusiasm into my writing.