The potter and woodworker rely on the pieces they produce to bring in enough cash to cover health insurance, $15,000 in tuition for their two children, plus any other bill that comes along.
But the full-time, self-employed artists have been making it work for years with secondhand clothes, used cars and cheap vacations to lessen the burden.
Last year, Helbok made less than $25,000 from his woodworking. Baker brought in about $22,000 selling pots. So they're not exactly starving artists, but the family does have to scrimp.
Much of their clothes shopping is done secondhand at thrift shops like the Salvation Army. When the kids needed bikes, Baker and Helbok asked around for donations and ended up with about six used bicycles. Vacations are spent with family friends who can feed and shelter them.
Even as her mother details the family's sacrifices, explaining how they waited until they were "desperate" to get the couple's first new car this year, Maia takes issue with the phrasing. To her 9-year-old sensibility, they're not desperate.
She and her brother Jeremy, or Jem, 7, are both enrolled at Greenwood Friends School in Millville. Tuition for each child is $7,600 per year, according to Dena Salerno, Greenwood's director of admissions.
Family members also loaned them the money for the down payment on their home, a sprawling 15-acre plot near Unityville complete with studio space for Baker and Helbok.
Helbok started out training for architecture at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, but took up woodworking to escape a desk job at a corporation, he says. Baker trained at the Worcester Center for Crafts in Massachusetts.
Likewise, cutting boards made from bits of different wood, trivets and clocks, mean leftover scraps aren't wasted, Helbok says. And the smaller pieces take only about an hour to complete, compared to 40-120 hours for something more involved.
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