There is a difference between having time off and actually switching off. As a live-in carer, I know that particularly well.
When you live in the same house where you work, your mind doesn’t necessarily understand that your working day has ended simply because you’ve stepped away for a couple of hours. You may have left the room, but part of you is still listening, thinking and wondering whether everything is alright.
That is why I’ve been experimenting with something completely different lately: embroidery.
Creating Something with a Purpose
I’m all for trying to be a little more “green” — using reusable items, recycling and generally being more mindful about what we consume. So this time, I wanted to create something that was not only practical, but also personal and, hopefully, one of a kind.
I’ve become a little obsessed with dandelions.
There is something about them that resonates with me as a carer. They may look delicate and easily overlooked, yet they are remarkably resilient. And those tiny seeds, carried away by the wind, remind me of the fragility of life — how beautiful, unpredictable and fleeting it can be.
So, this canvas bag became my first proper attempt at turning something plain into something that represented a little bit of me — and perhaps my role as a carer, too.
I started with a simple canvas bag and a dandelion design and slowly turned it into something of my own, one stitch at a time.
It definitely isn’t perfect. I’m still learning. There are stitches I would do differently next time, and I’ve already learned a few things about working with canvas.
But I enjoyed making it.
And for me, that is the most important part.
Finding Something That Belongs to You
Care work can take up a lot of mental space.
There is always someone else’s routine, someone else’s needs and someone else’s wellbeing to think about.
Having a creative activity gives me something that doesn’t belong to the job.
For a while, I’m not thinking about care plans, medication, meals or whether everything has been done.
I’m simply concentrating on where the next stitch needs to go.
It is surprisingly therapeutic.
Not because embroidery magically makes the pressures of care disappear, but because it gives my brain somewhere else to go for a little while.
It Doesn’t Have to Be Productive
There is also something quite liberating about making something without knowing exactly what will happen to it.
I’m not even sure whether embroidery will become a long-term hobby. At the moment, I’m experimenting, learning and seeing where it takes me.
And perhaps that is part of the point.
I think we all need that little something that helps us step outside our comfort zone. Something we do simply because we enjoy doing it. Something that brings us a little bit of joy without needing to have a purpose, a deadline or a measurable result.
We spend so much of our working lives being useful to other people that it can feel strange to make something purely because we want to.
But maybe we should do more of that.
One Stitch at a Time
This little dandelion bag is only a first attempt, but I quite like what it represents.
A plain canvas bag became something personal.
A few quiet moments became a creative project.
And a little bit of carer downtime became something that belonged entirely to me.
Perhaps that’s what good downtime should sometimes be about.
Not just resting the body, but giving the mind permission to wander somewhere else.
For me, at the moment, that somewhere else seems to involve a needle, some thread and an unreasonable number of tiny dandelion seeds. 🌱
And honestly, I’m quite happy there.
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