Little Santa spoons, small angels, colorful banners and wreaths and holiday cards are adding to festivities throughout a retirement complex in Chicago’s Beverly neighborhood, thanks to an artist and crafter who is spreading her seasonal cheer.
Lesley Rokaitis is the crafter making the items and motivating other residents at Smith Village to do the same by leading workshops. She’s developed a following of fellow women who never considered themselves artistic but are now creating works that look like art, even if technically they are crafts.
“It’s been my love, and now they’ve given me a closet here to use and I’m happy,” Rokaitis said.
Before moving to the retirement village four years ago, Rokaitis, now a youthful 83, got approval bring along all her supplies.
“I said I was tired of being in my home and doing things myself,” she said. “It’s just more fun when people come in and do all this stuff together.”
Rokaitis, a former third grade and kindergarten teacher, dived into crafting when she retired 28 years ago. She had lived on a farm during much of her youth and upon retiring, “country” was back in style, she said. She and her daughter started “playing around” with crafts and, along with her husband, went to garage sales and antique shops, picking up tin pails and metal tools to use for her creations.
She’s sold her items in various stores and belongs to an artist co-op in St. Charles.
To make the Santa decorations, Rokaitis lays out about 20 silver-plated spoons — the silver ones would break, she said. She bends the handles, primes them and starts painting faces and eyes. The beard is the finishing touch.
“The shape of the spoon sort of took on a personality of Santa,” Rokaitis said. “Some would be painted with eyes that looked realistic — it just depended on my mood that day.”
She’s also made various figurines, including one she displays in her apartment of an 18-inch Santa standing next to a tree with an elf on the other side helping.
Her apartment has plenty of craft supplies, too, from the shoe boxes full of buttons she and her students paste on miniature plastic foam Christmas trees to a collection of ink stamps they use to make cards. A table is set up for her sewing machine, cards and other crafts, and she also makes masks for the area nonprofit The Emily Fund.
“I love it, I’m right in front of the window,” Rokaitis said.
She gets rave reviews from the residents who take her classes.
“I enjoy her classes tremendously,” said Dorothy Pawelski. “She’s so well organized, has everything all on hand and thought through before we even get there.”
Their artwork is displayed throughout the building.
“It’s interesting to walk around and see and say, ‘Oh, they were in my class, look at what they made,'” said Pawelski. “We’re very grateful to her and it’s wonderful to have somebody like that who is willing to help you.”
Classmate Theresa Rush said Rokaitis encourages and motivates those like her who were new to the craft, through “her enthusiasm and confidence that we can do it, when I know I’m not an artist.”
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“She’s very encouraging and it’s easy to work with someone who is encouraging,” Rush said.
Besides the creative outlet, there’s also a social element to the classes.
“We’ve got a nice little group that comes all the time,” said Rush, who has an angel she created sitting out on the shelf outside of her door. “It turns out to be a gab fest, sharing ideas.”
Janice Neumann is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.