Building a Creative Life in the Margins
The reality check is real.
I’m Stacey—a wife, mother, educator, and live event artist.
That’s a lot of hats. But, truthfully, most of my days are already spoken for before my business even begins.
A closer look would tell you:
I’m a second-time wife,
a mother of two (one an adult Black male, the other an adult with special needs and behaviors—both with worries of their own),
and an art teacher at a local charter school serving approximately 200 students, many of whom also have special needs.
On an average workday, I’m up at 5:15 AM getting my daughter ready, and I’m walking back in the door somewhere between 5:30 and 6:00 PM. By then, she’s often catching her second wind, not settling down until around 10:00 or 10:30—leaving me just enough time to respond to a few emails before getting to bed to do it all over again.
At my day job, I carry a few additional responsibilities—our school newsletter and late buses. But for the past month or so, I also took on completing the school yearbook.
And honestly? Given my home life and my existing workload, I didn’t really have the capacity for it.
Not that it couldn’t be done—it clearly could.
But I knew as the current newsletter editor and the way that I would approach it… it would push me past a healthy edge.
I was right.
With a little Canva, Photoshop and the native yearbook program, it turned out to be a beautiful yearbook, if I do say so myself.
And I got sick right after it was finished.
As I write this, I’m still recovering from the nights I spent staying up to complete it.
At the same time, my calligraphy and event calendar has been lighter than usual.
I completed a meaningful in-studio project.
I spent time with newly retired Delaware calligrapher, Riva Brown—which was not a live event, but an event just the same. She showed me so many of her perfectly beautiful pieces that combined art and calligraphy so seamlessly that it re-inspired me all over again for this craft we love.
I also spent one lovely evening engraving with Marie of Maiden September. I love that she humors me creating all this content that I almost never show. 😬
Click the photo with sound on.
And I had one afternoon at Nordstrom at the King of Prussia mall engraving for Creed.
Click the photo for the story on the reverse side.
Aside from a couple of in-studio projects, my live event calendar doesn’t really pick up again until May.
And I can only see that as God extending grace—so that I would end up sick… and not completely run down beyond recovery.
Still… if I’m honest?
I don’t know a single event artist hoping for fewer gigs.
The truth is, I live in two different creative realities—and they don’t pull on me the same way.
Teaching is high-touch, unrelenting work. It’s managing a range of personalities across the day, holding space, keeping students safe, and educating them—whether they’re ready to meet you there or not.
And as an introvert? That kind of output costs.
Live events, on the other hand, are energizing. They place me back in the act of creating—engaged, responsive, and fully present in the work itself.
They’re both creative. But they are not the same.
Each one requires a different version of me to show up.
That’s why when I leave my home for a gig, it has to be intentional. It has to be meaningful. It has to feel worth it.
Working in the margins of my life requires nothing less.
It’s where I find the energy to return to my life with joy. It’s where I feel most aligned with what I was created to do.
Outside of Christ Himself, creating art is where I find purpose and meaning. It’s the place where I get to say: I was here. I used what I was given. I didn’t bury it under the weight of life.
But what happens when your time is claimed by one thing…and your identity is tied to another?
I’ve been sitting with that question more than I expected this season.
