To feel sad I'm giving up my hobby, before it started really?

[Ohreallyreally]

Just wanted to share my self-pity with a bunch of strangers on the internet.

Late 2020 I started picking up ceramics as a hobby, and playing with clay and ending up making really bag mugs and bowls - I loved it! Mid 2021 had enough money spare (thanks lockdown savings) to splash on a kiln to take my hobby into having actual usable items. I fired it once then got pregnant, and couldn't stand the smell of clay whilst pregnant, so didn't do much during pregnancy.

I suffered from bad PND, so a few months after giving birth, my husband kindly bought me a cheap pottery wheel as a way of carving some time out for me to be me, and not just a mom.

However there has been countless reasons why I've not done any since, including:

• I can't look after my child and do this at the same time (I get messy) and don't want my child around the hazardous clay dust or the super messy wet clay. Meaning i need my husband home for me to do it.

• By the time he's home, dinner is cooked, baby bathed and bed, its well past 8pm and I'm exhausted - I have enough energy to read Mn and sleep. Weekends I'm usually catching up on DIY, housework, seeing family, or studying for my degree.

• I'm not very good, and not improving due to lack of practice, which is disheartening.

• The cost to fire the kiln (required twice per set of pieces, for 10 hours+ each time to well over a 1000 degrees) is now around £15 each fire, whereas in 2021 it was £5 if that.

Every time I walk past them it makes me sad - I have visions of me making beautiful dining sets, or mugs, or kitchen utensils, or anything really. But in reality, I've not touched it since early 2021 except for a few dabbles.

Looking forward I just can't see the time to do it, I go back to work full time soon, then next year want to TTC again. My first is hard work so I imagine 2 will be non-stop.

Annoyingly, over mat leave we've accumulated a sizable bit of debt (unexpected bills!) on the credit card, and I've started thinking if I sell the kiln, wheel and glazes I could probably re-coup a bit to pay off some debt (about a third of the debt) so we're more financially stable in this shit economy if our jobs go tits up.

I started taking pictures yesterday of the equipment and I had a little cry whilst doing it, I feel like I'm packing away something I could have been really passionate about, if I had the chance to put the energy to it.

I don't want to sell it in reality, but its literally sitting there not being used, so I feel wasteful leaving it there being taunted by the fact I don't have the time nor the energy to put to it.

I'm not sure what I'm looking for really, maybe to be told that other people have had to sacrifice their potential life hobby for the sake of being a mother, or maybe I'm looking to be told I'm being dramatic and to keep it. I'm not sure - I think I just wanted to have a moan aha - so apologies for the long pointless post I guess.

It's up to you, of course, but I'm on Team List It; all the ceramic kit is making you unhappy because you can't use it. And that in itself will make you feel overwhelmed.

However, you obviously do need a creative outlet. Have you come across Julia Cameron 's book 'The Artist's Way'? It might be helpful to see where that takes you...

This phase of your life won't last long. Enjoy your child, and your lovely husband. Good luck!

Give yourself permission to live in the here and now and enjoy what you have now. Make a plan to buy the materials again in 5 years time.
In the meantime, take some time for self-care. MN and Netflix are perfectly good enough downtime activities. Maybe try some sketching or cross-stitch or embroidery or knitting that you can pick up and put down easily without needing all the paraphernalia or the mess.
It is OK to acknowledge that maybe now is not the right moment for pottery. And that you are better off freeing up headspace from worrying about money or time or energy or the physical real estate occupied by the kiln.

I agrée with selling if there is a class near you, it would make things much more practical on a Saturday morning for example, and you’ll feel good about the debt. And in classes you’ll feel progress as well.
Then as PP have said make a mind plan to buy it again in the future

I actually think it is amazing you got this far with your hobby, which is far more than I have ever achieved from one, but if it were me, I would sell it and find a pottery class instead. Apart from anything else, £15 a fire is probably as much as or more than a class where you would get out of the house, meet people, and have no clearing up to do.

If you wanted to do it, you would find time, OP. You don’t want to at the moment, because you’re tired and overwhelmed, and looking at your equipment is making you miserable because it’s expensive and unused. Take the guilt off for now, and find a class where you can make a commitment to ceramics on a more manageable scale for the moment.

I’ve a dolls house to make, I’ve had it 33 years, all flat in a box, cost a lot of money, one day, when I’ve the time I will enjoy making it.

OP if space is not a problem I’d just keep it until you can use it and look forward to that time. In 5 years time your child might like to do it with you.

Once you have a toddler that needs entertaining, you've got a perfect craft opportunity for them - wonky handcoiled pots, strange five legged creatures that when you say 'that's wonderful - can you tell me what it is about it?' you find out that they're supposed to be a dog, hand and foot prints preserved - all there forever and, more to the point, you won't have quite so much play-do or plasticine ground into the carpet or mixed into that generic puke brown shade where they won't keep the colours separate.

And once they're at school, they're far easier to leave in the living room watching shit on TV on a Saturday afternoon whilst you get on with 'proper' stuff for your own pleasure.

So I think keep it. It's busy right now, it would cost far, far more at a later date to replace it all, you can get some use from it and a pause is better than abandoning it all in its entirety.

I think the above is a great response.
Keep it and do it when you can. Even if it's months before you get to do any pottery it's nice to know it's an option. You may go through phases of not doing much and phases when you do a lot. That's okay.

I have friends who give up kayaking - get rid of all their kit only to want to get back into it again and have to buy the whole lot all over again.
Just keep it. It will be cheaper than selling and rebuying.

Just another mum coming on to say please don't give up your hobby. How many men do you know as dads who give up their golf clubs, memberships or the football season tickets? My hobby is ceramics, but the study of ceramics. I fell into that before DC was born, but when they were tiny 6x a year I would rush to London for lectures, be back just in time for tea. Their DF managed. When we divorced I couldn't manage so needed to stop physically attending lectures for years - although I did take 1 DC to 1 meeting. I couldnt make anything longer, like a study weekend. But I have kept going with this and am now finally starting to find more time. I was even asked to be on the committee of one of the oldest ceramic societies - not quite right for me just now - and I think I was only asked as I was the only one not drawing a pension!! But finally I am now thinking I might start another course. #backontrack

With this kind of thing it's impossible with small children, so look at it as a pause rather than a forever "giving up". It wasn't until my child went to school that I found a little bit more time and even then until they were 9 or so that I found spare time outside of work for other things. But I am a LP so hopefully you will find time before then. It's hard esp when you are creative at heart! But you will get there. Maybe you need a less hands on hobby in the interim - something more easy to pick up and put down like a sketchbook or something small scale and less messy around the kids. You'll get your time back eventually!

I can relate. I bought a lovely sewing machine before I fell pregnant and was developing my dressmaking skills. Now I have a 5MO and not much time to do sewing.

Occasionally I get DH to look after DD so I can do a small job but I haven’t tackled anything significant. I made a vest for DD over a couple of weeks, just grabbing a little time whenever I could. But there are more important things to do in the house at the moment, so not starting anything new.

Not sure when I will be able to pick it up again properly but look forward to making DD cute outfits.

I think you should hold onto your equipment for now. Ask DH to look after DC for a few hours this weekend and see if you can get back into it.

Definitely keep it op. Sometimes though I want to scream at pp about when it all gets easier ?!! I have older kids now , all primary school but Im back working loads now…. I’m a painter and I’d love more time to paint and my dh and me do swap over but there’s so many activities and I have 3 dcs . I’ve actually found the workload more work now the dcs are older and I’m still exhausted in the evenings ( and my kids all sleep through but literally woke for years ) . I still find it hard to find time….. wish I didn’t but I do. We have no family support whatsoever either. I guess weekends are possible if your dh takes over op. Is that a possibility?
Im lucky in that I have school holidays off so I’ll try more then but have to say I still struggle with time..

Pack it all up and get it out in five years time. I picked up a very old hobby just recently which I could never have done when DS was little.

It'll be there when you're ready

@Merryclaire my hobby is sewing as well and I find now my youngest is at school I'm managing at least one new garment a month, sometimes more.

Between 0 and school age I got the odd bit done here and there, but I just didn't have the energy to do it properly.

come and join us on the Stitch and Bitch threads, be warned though we are all terrible enablers when it comes to pattern and fabric buying.

Sell it and go to an evening class! My dad is a very good amateur potter (slab pots not turning) and for a decade he just went to evening classes in local schools/uni/studios and made pots there. He did eventually get a kiln (and we did a raku firing in the garden once, which was fun) but would still go to classes just for the craft/social element.

You will meet people who can help you get better, someone experienced will fire the kiln (actually really hard to get right) and zero messy clay/clay dust in your home. And you can get the money/space back.

Get your OH to do bedtime one night a week and go do your passion!! Somewhere you don't have to clean up all the mess 😜

I feel your pain! I took up sewing before I had children, and would love to continue it, but I just don't have the time. I work a lot of evenings and my kids are around before I go to work, so I know I wouldn't manage to get through a project. I feel sad, but like a PP said, I feel hopeful that I'll have time in the future. I'm lucky that sewing is cheap, and I've not invested much in it other than buying some needle and thread.

I think this is true, except I think you need the drive that talent and passion bring.

I am a decent writer and like many people, hoped one day I'd 'find time' to write.

Then

Posted too soon!

...then one day I got time and Lo! I still didn't manage more than a page.

However, once I found my passion and something that I was really good at, I couldn't stop 'finding time' to do it.

I think op needs to stop berating herself about making pots and wait to find the right activity for her.

Keep the stuff! When you are in the depths of pre-school parenting, especially with PND it feels like it will never end. But it does. The kids go to school, and you get some of your life back. Then they become teens and you get more of your life back. Then they leave home and the years seem to have suddenly sped by. You will have all that time on your hands, mortgage paid off and you can devote your time to thehobby you love. I know someone who took up pottery in retirement and became quite famous and ended up selling for £££. Keep your interest alive by looking at ceramics exhibitions and doing sketches for designs. When DC are older, let them make coil pots while you do some proper throwing.

OP, I am a hobby potter and you have been given some amazing advice here. I hope you don’t mind, but I am going to send you a DM - feel free to ignore if you do mind!

In the meantime, I would suggest that you take the pressure off yourself and when you get some time, just play with some clay. Don’t think about making any functional pieces, just play with the clay - enjoy the feel of it, push whatever you are making to the point of destruction so you learn the limits of the clay etc. Don’t fire anything - just play with the clay and then re-cycle it. It’s the best way to improve and learn about what suits you and you can do it in small units of time. All the very best to you.

I vote for keep it - if you have space. You sound sad at the idea of getting rid of it, and honestly, it will be such a false economy to sell it now then find you want it back again in three or five years' time.

I promise you do get the time back.

I'm not sure how old your baby is, but there will be a time when they aren't putting everything in their mouths, when they could be allowed to get gloriously messy alongside you every once in a while. Probably not creatively satisfying for you, but maybe quite fun and a way to feel as if you're not losing sight of your hobby entirely?