Introduction

Hi! My name is Nicole, but Nickole and Dymes has always been how I’ve thought of my creative ventures, way before it was a business and even before it was just a hobby. So how did Nickole and Dymes come to be?

When I was in grade school, a friend noticed that my name sounded a lot like the loose change you’d find in the bottom of your mom’s purse or in the cup holders of your car. She very quickly started calling me Fifteen Cents. I tried to negotiate that up to at least Quarter, seeing as my last name sounded like Dymes and the ‘s’ suggested multiple coins. My friend didn’t agree, so it stayed Fifteen Cents. She even tried to sell me at recess on multiple occasions, pulling me along behind her around the playground, saying something like, “Fifteen cents! Just fifteen cents!” Luckly, no one took the bait.

Now, I do have to take a moment to say this: we were innocent kids in the school yard, and this took place long before we knew anything about the cruelties of the world. So, looking back, it was kind of endearing. Even if I still think I was undervalued. ;)

Anyway, the nickname stuck and slowly morphed my actual name into Nickole and Dymes in my head. Sometimes, when introducing myself, I’d accidentally pronounce it like nickel instead of Nicole, and people would ask me to clarify.

Fast forward several years (and no, that doesn’t make me feel old… okay, it does), and we come to the part of the story where Nickole and Dymes is starting to become something more than just a nickname and creative hobby.

Like everyone else around the world, the year 2020 did not go at all like I expected it to go. Well, the first couple of months were close - I was still able to make a trip to Florida, visit a friend, and spend a magical day in the Wizarding World at Universal (TAKE ME BACK!). But a few days after returning home, the world shut down. And so did I.

While the world’s shutdown was fairly quick, mine took a few months to slowly build. At first, I still spent some time with friends, attended a weekly bible study, and went to work as usual. But when people in my small town started to get sick, I retreated into a shell, became a husk of the person I had been before. Anxiety and depression became the norm for me… and after discovering some things about myself (which we’ll discuss in a later blog), I finally started to come out of that shell.

After a lot of prayer and reflection, I eventually quit my full-time job and focused on my mental and physical health for a few months. When you no longer know what it feels like to go 24 hours without being in a hyped-up, anxious state, it may be time for a reset. During that time, not knowing exactly what was next, a dream of what Nickole and Dymes could be started to come to the surface. And so it was that Nickole and Dymes Creations was born at the end of 2022!

I started creating again - taking photographs, painting pictures, designing graphics, and writing songs! The plan is gradually to do a bit of all these things and put them out there for the world (or at least a few people), eventually building a small income from it.

When you set out on an adventure, you can have every last detail and stop along the way planned out to the last minute, but life doesn’t always go as planned. Sometimes it brings hardships and unexpected sorrow. Sometimes it’s just different. But sometimes, it’s better than you imagined!

If you’d like to support Nickole and Dymes Creations as it starts out, visit my Etsy shop from time to time to check out the newest digital (and eventually physical) products. If you’d like to be a patron of Nickole and Dymes, visit my Patreon account for details on how to get started! Even liking and sharing posts from my Instagram (nickole_and_dymes) and Facebook (Nickole.and.Dymes) accounts makes a huge difference.