Preferring instead to take on full-time employment, Julia joined the staff of The Family Place. Thin Air Studio became one of the worksites for the Families Learning Together Program, where participants could see “retail in action” and learn some basic skills. 

“I wanted to go in a new direction, not do all that traveling again. I’m very interested in making this a go. I can really take a bite out of this,” Dickenson says, referring to three new jewelry lines she created with Families Learning Together. 

First, basic jewelry making skills were taught and honed with a line sold last year at the Family Place Gingerbread Festival: beaded bracelets and earrings sold out before the end of the day. Next, a floral line was designed and sold out at Floribunda 2007, where participants felt the “worthiness and sense of self that comes with the success of a sale.”

Now, a new line with a program-defining “JewelriO” charm will be handmade and made available at local venues. National retailers are being approached to pick up the line.

Why the cereal “O”? Julia says, ”It’s a universal sign of parenthood. Who hasn’t given their child some of that cereal? No matter who you are or what you do, if you have had a baby, you all have the same stuff’ - diapers, feeding, sleep challenges. It’s parenting on every level.”

Thin Air Studio is located at 295 Main Street in Norwich, VT.  Julia Dickenson is also at the Farmer’s Market in Norwich. The new design line from the Families Learning Together Program can be seen at out website: the-family-place.org.