The Labor behind events
Behind every *beautiful* gathering is a whole lot of invisible work - & usually, a lot of women moving mountains to be there.
Events don’t just happen.
Before anyone walks through the doors, there has already been an enormous amount of thinking, planning, rearranging, lifting, asking for help, & problem solving as we go.
There are emails & decisions. Products to source or make. Tickets to sell. Clothing to steam. Prices to calculate. Signs to create. Cars to load. Children to coordinate. Tables to carry. Displays to arrange - & then rearrange when they don’t look the way we pictured them in our heads.
The finished event might look beautiful.
But the magic almost always starts as a mess.
& while beautiful events are planned, regular life is still happening.
The dishes still exist. The laundry keeps piling up. The kids pick up & drop-offs & the needing of us while we are trying to tie the final touches. Families schedule have to shift & a labor that usually falls on us, has to fall elsewhere.
That is part of building something as a mother: when we show up somewhere, there is often an entire invisible structure of support, sacrifice, & rearranging that allowed us to get there.
A friend once said that if a woman showed up, she probably moved mountains to be there.
That stayed with me.
So many of the women vending at Mother Lion were also mothers. Behind each table was not only a business, but a life that had to be rearranged around it.
Someone helped with the kids. A partner loaded the car. A bedtime was missed. A family gave up part of its weekend. Work happened late at night, early in the morning, or during whatever scraps of time could be found.
None of this diminishes the joy of being there.
We can feel deeply grateful for the opportunity & still acknowledge what it required. We can love our work and recognize the help that makes it possible. We can create something magical without pretending the process was effortless.
This is an homage to every woman who brought a piece of herself to Mother Lion.
Every product represented someone’s time. Every display began as an idea. Every woman standing behind a table had done the visible work - so much more that nobody in the room could see.
That is what made the event feel special.
It wasn’t only about what we were selling. It was about being surrounded by women willing to believe in their ideas enough to do the inconvenient, exhausting, vulnerable work of bringing them into the world.
Especially the mothers.
The women answering questions at their tables while simultaneously thinking about the children waiting at home. The women who had coordinated childcare, packed snacks, given instructions, called in favors, and moved the pieces of family life around so they could stand there and say:
I made this. This matters to me, too.
An extra acknowledgment belongs to the organizer and owner of Mother Lion.
Hosting an event isn’t simply opening the doors & welcoming people inside. It is carrying the vision long before anyone else can see it.
It is managing the decisions, communication, logistics, timing, physical work, unexpected problems, & responsibility of creating a space where everyone else gets to shine.
Mother Lion created more than a beautiful event. It created a room for women to bring their work, meet one another, be discovered, and feel part of something larger than their individual businesses.
That kind of space doesn’t appear on its own. Someone chooses to make it - & then does the tremendous amount of invisible work required to make it real.
The photographs from an event tend to capture the finished version: the flowers, the clothing racks, the thoughtfully arranged tables, the conversations, & the people enjoying what was created.
They rarely capture the hours before or the exhausted drive home.
But both versions are true.
There is the magic everyone sees - & the mess, labor, support, & sacrifice that made it possible.
Events don’t just happen.
Women make them happen - & rarely alone.
