Nothing is too small to save
I’ve always saved things. Beads in old pill bottles. Paper scraps with texture I couldn’t throw away. Jewelry passed down or broken, but never useless. I have drawers of it—gifts from grandmothers, friends, or just pieces I found and felt weren’t done yet. For a long time, I wasn’t sure why I kept them. I just knew I was supposed to. These past few years, working with my hands more intentionally, I’ve started reaching into those collections—and into parts of myself I’ve been holding onto just as quietly. There’s something about turning saved things into something new that feels like a homecoming. Like I’ve finally given them—and myself—permission to take up space.
Small scavenged acorn tops and a little succulent
My grandmother was the same way. She kept everything—rooms full of treasures and trinkets, memories wrapped in plastic. She once gave me a plush bear with one eyelid that never closed all the way. I named her Becky. She was horrifying and hilarious. My grandmother offered her with no explanation, and I never questioned it. Maybe it was her way of saying, Here’s something I couldn’t let go of. Maybe now it can be yours.
For a long time, I carried that instinct without knowing what to do with it. I worried about being called a hoarder. Wondered what counted as “too much.” But I’ve come to believe there’s no shame in saving—whether it’s objects, memories, or parts of ourselves we haven’t figured out how to use yet. Sometimes the things we hold onto are just waiting for the right moment to become something else.
We’re all carrying bits of old versions of ourselves. A broken belief, a childhood memory, a story we’ve told so many times we stopped listening to what it was trying to teach us. We hold these pieces until we’re ready to transform them—or release them entirely. Art, for me, is where that release happens.
When I weave, I often use things I’ve kept for years. Beads from a bracelet I haven’t worn in a decade. Yarn from a trip I almost forgot I took. A scrap of fabric from a dress I no longer own. It all becomes part of something new—something I don’t need to store anymore, because now it’s alive in another form. Now it can go out into the world.
And that’s the part I didn’t expect to love: the giving away. The freedom of making something meaningful from what I’ve saved—and then letting it leave my hands. Somewhere along the way, the fear of connecting with people—the fear of being misread, overlooked, or too much—shifted. That hesitation started transforming into a deep desire to connect through doing—through activity, through the ritual of making, through nature and tending a life that feels gentle and real. I’ve learned to build intimacy in the process: through touch, through texture, through time. We don’t always need to explain ourselves to be understood; sometimes we just need to be present, to move with intention, and let our lives become a quiet kind of offering.
Cherry Blossom Flowers in morning light
It’s not about perfection. Not everything I make is smooth or polished. Some pieces are rough, layered, a little chaotic. But so am I. And sometimes, the act of making is less about control and more about trust. Trusting that I’ve held on long enough. That the act of creating is also an act of release.
There’s joy in that. Deep, real joy. The kind that doesn’t just come from keeping things, but from knowing when it’s time to let them become something else. Not everything is meant to be tucked away forever. Sometimes the most healing thing we can do is take the thing we’ve held too tightly, weave it into something beautiful, and offer it back to the world.
That’s what I want my work to be. Not just soft or lovely or well-made. But full of purpose. Full of story. A quiet reminder that nothing we’ve carried—not even the tiniest piece of who we used to be—is too small to matter. And nothing is too small to be transformed.
