Hi! My name is Diane and I have a lot of hobbies.
And I mean a lot. Too many. To the point that I have started this blog.
So I can share everything I’ve learned about what I love doing in hopes that the joy I have in doing them will inspire you to pick something up for yourself.
While hobbyists get a bad rap for trying many things for a short period of time before giving up or moving on, I’ve actually held onto most of mine! My Scorpio Sun and Mercury-Pluto conjunction makes me obsessed with whatever I’m into — and I somehow turn everything into an existential deep dive.
Because my hobbies aren’t just things I do for fun; they end up teaching me a lot about myself and the world around me.
Now, I won’t be writing about every hobby I have (although my Sag placements would love for me to), but these are the ones you’ll find me sharing online:
🍪 Baking
I started baking in college and thanks to my Libra Jupiter, I was always really good at it!
Since my family isn’t big on sweets, I spent a lot of time re-working and scaling down recipes from food bloggers and recipe developers. That led me to create my Cake Pan Converter Spreadsheet which converts the metric units of any recipe into 25+ different pan sizes and is what I use for all my small batch recipes.
I also made a FREE Recipe Scaler that lets you scale recipes up or down 2-4x. Perfect for when you want to make just a few muffins or a whole extra batch of cookies!
🏠 Running a Home Bakery
In May 2024, I impulsively launched Cookie Cazimi after my jiu-jitsu instructor encouraged me to sell my chunky cookies upon hearing I gave some away as Christmas gifts while he was in Hawaii.
Before I knew it, I had a booth at the farmers market, selling chunky cookies, crookies, and brookies to a steadily growing customer base. Since then, I’ve learned so much about branding and recipe development, as well as how to legally run a profitable home baking business under cottage food laws.
I have this inside joke with myself that “Past Diane” always has my back — she’s always researching, organizing, and creating something I’ll end up needing later on (even if she doesn’t know it at the time).
If you’re interested in starting a home bakery (or any small business), grab Past Diane’s FREE Annual Budget Template to track your income and expenses over the entire year, not just month-to-month.
🔮 Tarot & Astrology
Looking back, I’ve always been around the occult and spooky-ooky like a true Scorpio. As a kid, I pulled tarot cards and performed rituals with my friends at sleepovers LOL
My cousin re-introduced me to “real” tarot and astrology in March 2020, right at the start of my Saturn return. And I went down a rabbit hole into learning tarot’s history and symbolism as well as evolutionary astrology, which is a branch of Western astrology focused on soul growth and past lives.
Since then, I’ve seen my fair share of astrologers and psychics to basically figure out what I’m going to do with my life because I always felt… not right. And what’s so interesting is they’ve all said more or less the same thing.
1️⃣ I could totally do this as a profession since my 8th house of psychological mysticism apparently goes crazy, but more so that I’m not meant for a job-job because that’s not what I’m called to do.
2️⃣ I’m meant to heal my inner child through my creativity and self-expression.
3️⃣ I need to share who I am (and all the internal bullshit I’ve sifted through from the 8th house) with the world — because my 9th house of wanderlust and publishing is just as crazy.
Honestly, I think Saturn squaring up against my 8th house Sun has always kept that happy, silly girl who was trying to summon ghosts in her friend’s living room from living through me.
And putting myself out here online is my way of learning how to let her lead again — to find joy in my everyday life, not be possessed 😬
🌐 Where to Find Me
📝 Blog
Visit www.thedianecollective.com
Read about baking, tarot, and astrology! You’ll find small batch recipes, home bakery insights, and reflections on creativity and everyday life through tarot spreads and astrological transits.
🎥 YouTube
Subscribe to @thedianecollective for videos on baking, tarot, astrology, and more!
Follow @thedianecollective for short-form videos, stories, and updates in between uploads!
☀️ Cookie Cazimi
If you’re in Southern Maryland, come visit me at the La Plata Farmers Market every 1st, 3rd, and 5th Saturday from 9 AM to 2 PM (April – November).
Follow @cookiecazimi on Instagram and Facebook for market updates and new flavors.
🌸 My Offline Hobbies
✂️ Sewing
In 2022, I decided to learn how to sew — for no particular reason. My mom, who made her own clothes in the ’80s, took me to the local sew n vac shop (because those two things go together, I guess) to buy my first sewing machine, and from there I found a nearby sewing studio that broke everything down for me.
Sewing is both humbling and encouraging. You start thinking it’s impossibly complicated, but even experienced sewists will say: “No one really knows how it works, it just does.”
Because at the end of the day, sewing really is just cutting things out and putting them together.
I started out making totes and dog shirts before moving on to garment-making. The problem was that I focused on projects that sounded like they’d challenge my skills instead of things I actually wanted to wear.
As a result, I ended up with a pile of clothes that just hung in my closet.
Now, I’m more intentional, only buying patterns of clothes that I would actually buy to wear, which has led me into the world of pattern drafting as well!
🥋 Martial Arts
If you look at my birth chart, it makes sense that I’m into martial arts (my Cancer Mars trines Pluto). But, I know it doesn’t when you compare it to all my other girly girl hobbies lol.
I took my first class in summer 2014 for only about 3 months before I got into a car accident. And I picked it back up 5 years later and haven’t stopped since.
Right now, I practice jiu-jitsu, judo, and kickboxing. I’ve scaled back because of Cookie Cazimi, but I try to go to class at least 2-3 times a week.
It’s great exercise and I’m jacked af now because I can do 5 full range of motion pull ups, which is now my greatest party trick.