Making and Finding JOY

• Posted on 5 December 2019
• By Kate Lamontagne
• 0

Kate is finding joy in making artisanal offerings for her store again.

It has been nearly a year since my last entry!  This is rather normal behavior for me.  I do this exact thing in my journals also... I have journals with pretty covers and a few weeks of good intentions worth of entries.  But then I fall off.  I don't know why. 

But wait, I DO know why!

I am a Maker.

My fingers are rarely idle.  I have intimate relationships with ice packs and CBD cream for the aches.  I have crazy JOYous conversations with fabrics and yarns and colors.  This is my life, it is my defining characteristic I think.  That I make things, and that is always my first choice.  Ask my family. I'm not kidding. :)

I feel my creative roots calling, and so at this time in 2019, there are more things in my store that I have made than in the last 15 years.   Kamala Boutique began as an outlet for my designs- handbags mostly.  In fact, the first store of mine in Holliston was called Kamala Designs, and some customers still refer to it by that name. 

I changed it to Kamala Boutique because 'designs' was too ambiguous for the general public and people could not figure out what I was.  So I morphed a bit.  And grew.  And in that growing, moved away from making. I got caught up in the amazing array of offerings from my vendors, carefully curating a fantastic and heartfelt selection for you.  Shopping for Kamala turned into a more than full time job in itself. 

On top of that, I have been spending many hours keeping my web store current and exciting for you. So balancing it all is a daily practice.  I am allowing some things to rest occasionally so that I feel less stressed.  (I also have an amazing team working for me, impossible to do any of this without them!)

And I am so happy to be answering the call to create items for my store again!

I hope that in my JOY, you can feel my happiness come through my artisanal creations. It is a little like the movie "Like Water for Chocolate" where the cook's emotions entered her food and everyone who ate her meals would feel what she felt.

May everything I create bring you comfort and JOY as well. 

In these weeks of increased pressure from the media to jump into the frenzy of shopping, I gently send wishes of quiet and ease, to be able to smile and enJOY the holiday lights!  and if you are a Maker too, the down time to be able to enJOY that process.

Give yourself the gift of finding a place that completely lights up for the season and walk through them with the eyes of a child.  In Holliston MA, you can do this at the Fatima Shrine.  

What is lit up with JOY in your town?