Creativity & Connection During Hard Seasons: Voices 48 With Ashlee Gadd

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Living a creative life with small children underfoot is a challenge in any circumstances; doing it while running a business during a global pandemic is another thing altogether. For this month’s Voices interview Sarah chats with her good friend, fellow podcaster, and all-around good human Ashlee Gadd, founder of the wildly popular Coffee + Crumbs community. Ashlee shares thoughts on quarantine parenting, social media connection AND social media breaks, adjusting expectations when you’re an Enneagram 3, and how her writing and photography practices change during different seasons of motherhood. We also chat about home decor, home-wrecking toddlers, and more. Join us!

This episode was recorded on May 21, 2020.

A NOTE ON EPISODES RELEASED DURING COVID-19: Things change so quickly these days–including recommendations for health and safety, as well as our own thoughts and feelings–so you may hear things that feel a bit dated if you’re catching up on older episodes. Just know that we’re experiencing this in real time just like you, and that we’re working hard to follow the latest recommendations for the safety of our families and our communities. We’re also working hard to bring you timely, relevant podcast episodes in a world that’s changing very quickly.

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Links we mentioned (or should have) in this episode:

• Coffee + Crumbs
• The Coffee + Crumbs 2020 Mother’s Day Brunch
• The Magic of Motherhood book
• Coffee + Crumbs Patreon Community (this is where the podcast is being published in 2020)
• Ashlee’s personal blog
• Ashlee’s Instagram
• an example of Ashlee’s “experiment” with free-writing / poetry this year

View this post on Instagram

she calls herself a writer but— some days, she cannot string together words to depict this nightmare from which we cannot wake up. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ on those days— she reaches for her camera and wanders the house, like a nomad, desperate, rummaging for pockets of sunshine and joy and something else she cannot name. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ she follows the glow from glimmer to blaze, room to room, mirror to mirror, dust to dust, ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ and it’s there, in the shadows, that she finds what she didn’t even know she was looking for: ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ hope, a reminder— light always wins. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ the darkness has not overcome it.

A post shared by Ashlee Gadd (@ashleegadd) on Apr 24, 2020 at 10:27am PDT

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View this post on Instagram

My kids have been begging, and I do mean begging, for one of those “interactive” shirts, you know the ones with the sequins you can flip up and down? I find them somewhat obnoxious but the last time H&M had a big sale, I grabbed a lion sweatshirt that wasn’t terribly annoying in the only size they had left. My mother-in-law quickly found another one. Last night I asked the boys to try them on and when Carson ran into the dining room I noticed a flash of light on the wall. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ Turns out sequins work like a disco ball when the light is just right. ✨ ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ They danced around and asked me to take pictures of “fire” coming out of their arms, mouth, etc, and for a few minutes, right before bedtime, I got to be A Fun Mom. It felt good. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ I’m signing off Instagram for the month of August to focus on my marriage, my children, my mental health, and to reap the full benefits of our @coffeeandcrumbs sabbatical. I’m asking God to remind me over and over again this month that I am loved for who I am, not for what I do. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ And if you need to hear that tonight, I’m happy to say it again: you are loved for who you are, not for what you do. ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀ See you in September, friends. ?

A post shared by Ashlee Gadd (@ashleegadd) on Jul 31, 2019 at 10:05pm PDT

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All photos property of Ashlee Gadd; used with permission.