This 'Detroit lover' shows her gratitude through handmade Christmas cards

Scott Talley, Detroit Free Press
·6 min read

Alina Johnson has the kind of laugh that is infectious, regardless of the time, place or circumstance. The native Detroiter’s smile is just as memorable.

But for the past two-plus years, the 1987 graduate of Cooley High School, who grew up on St. Marys Street off Outer Drive near the Crary/St. Marys and College Park neighborhoods, has had limited opportunities to share some of her most endearing qualities with others, particularly potential business clients. And this has presented a problem that even Johnson’s laugh and smile cannot mask.

“As a consultant, people want and need to see you in person. But because of this pandemic and COVID-19 restrictions, we are still often physically separated from meeting people,” said Johnson, the owner of Detroit-based Johnson Consulting Services LLC. “The government has tried to help with the ARPA (American Rescue Plan Act) funds and other legislation that has passed, but a lot of us are still struggling with the everyday task of just meeting folks. And any consultant has the same challenge.

"If the internet is your only way of meeting new people for business, you’re in trouble, because people think what you’re sending is spam. For a consultant, it’s the worst thing and it could be the death of a business.”

Alina Johnson, the owner of Johnson Consulting Services, works on creating handmade holiday greeting cards for friends and family at a workstation in the bedroom of her home in Detroit on Dec. 13, 2022. Johnson sometimes carves out substantial time to make the cards where she incorporates calligraphy and origami envelopes and also sells her creations to Detroiters and other local people who care enough to give cards that make a personal, heartfelt statement during the holiday season.

Despite the somber tone of Johnson’s statement, during a late Tuesday morning, less than two weeks before Christmas, the entrepreneur appeared to be full of life as she engaged in a game of "Beat the clock" with her Christmas card list. But before she could mail the cards at the nearby main post office on West Fort Street, Johnson had to first finish creating the cards — by hand. Sending handmade Christmas cards written in calligraphy is a task that Johnson had not taken on in about 10 years. And the origami envelopes she created for mailing were a first for her. Nonetheless, Johnson said a need to express gratitude moved her to “go the extra mile” in a personal way, through the holiday greeting cards and thank-you notes she was sending this year to family, friends and clients.

“This year has been particularly challenging, and there were more than a couple of times where I wanted to give up, really,” explained Johnson, whose business focuses on “auditing, consulting, schooling and signing” and was launched in 2020 before COVID-19 began to appear in Michigan that March. “But late in the year, actually, I got some good news that prompted me to continue and move forward, so I have a lot to be thankful for.”

At that moment, as the noon hour approached, Johnson stopped short of saying what her good news was. Instead, she turned her attention to a variety of pens, markers, ink, nibs (the metal tip of the pin that holds the ink) and sheets of paper, including a fluorescent lime green that she folded into origami envelopes; and rainbow paper, which Johnson deftly transformed into multipurpose, decorative curls. Planted at a small round table just a few feet from where she lays her head after a busy workday, Johnson on several occasions, said: “I can’t find anything.” But she later made it clear that on the inside, she was in a good space.

Alina Johnson, the owner of Johnson Consulting Services, works on creating handmade holiday greeting cards for friends and family at a workstation in the bedroom of her home in Detroit on Dec. 13, 2022, while incorporating a section of lyrics from their favorite Christmas song by the Temptations she looked up on her phone. Johnson sometimes carves out substantial time to make the cards where she incorporates calligraphy and origami envelopes and also sells her creations to Detroiters and other local people who care enough to give cards that make a personal, heartfelt statement during the holiday season.

“This is how I relax,” said Johnson, whose calligraphy appeared on 700 invitations and table settings when former Detroit Pistons forward John Salley and Natasha Ann Duff were married in Detroit during 1993 at the Cathedral of the Most Blessed Sacrament. “Plus, art is so much fun. I love color and I love matching fonts with color. The fun is figuring it out.”

Johnson credits her parents, the late Linda S. and Eddie C. Johnson, for instilling her strong work ethic that allows her to create cards for hours at a time, while also grinding away as an entrepreneur, without taking any days off during the year.

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“You were identified by your job during my parents’ time, and my father worked 36 or 37 years at Ford sewing car seats, so we were a Ford family,” said Johnson, who later revealed that the good news she received during the latter part of this year was a contract from the Detroit Public Schools Community District, which will allow her company to enrich K-8 students through programs, including financial literacy, and college and career preparation. “My mother was a psychiatric nurse, and she was known as Nurse Johnson. If she was alive today, I wouldn’t be able to keep her in the house because she would want to go out and take care of people who are suffering during COVID.”

From her parents, Alina Johnson says, she also acquired an early appreciation for her city.

Alina Johnson, the owner of Johnson Consulting Services, shows the first holiday greeting card design she made for her business while working on creating handmade holiday greeting cards for friends and family at a workstation in the bedroom of her home in Detroit on Dec. 13, 2022. Johnson sometimes carves out substantial time to make the cards where she incorporates calligraphy and origami envelopes and also sells her creations to Detroiters and other local people who care enough to give cards that make a personal, heartfelt statement during the holiday season.

“I am a Detroit lover!” proclaimed Johnson, who strayed just a little outside the city limits during her adult college journey that included earning bachelor’s and master’s degrees from the University of Michigan’s Dearborn and Ann Arbor campuses, respectively. Those degrees helped prepare her to later work in Washington as a federal auditor during the Obama-Biden administration. “People asked me: ‘Why did you come back to Detroit?’ And I said, 'If you knew Detroit like I do, you would come back too.'

"There’s a difference even at the airport. With people from Detroit, you hear: ‘Hi.’ ‘Good morning.’ People will let you know if they’re from the east side or the west side. And there's joy when we greet each other. And nowhere is that joy more important than it is in Detroit.”

True to her Detroit roots, Johnson is passionate about music, which comes through in the holiday greeting cards she made this year. Before creating the cards, she asked the future recipients the name of their favorite Christmas song and Johnson then incorporated a verse from each song into the card she made for that person. In the case of Johnson’s dear cousin, Autry Slay, who selected The Temptations’ rendition of “The Christmas Song,” the line included in his card was: “To kids from one to ninety-two.” Johnson said others in her close circle listed Christmas favorites sung by Mariah Carey, Nat King Cole, Take 6, Boyz II Men, New Edition and more.

With all of the personal touches, Johnson estimates that she spent at least 24 total hours creating her handmade cards this holiday season. But Johnson insisted that she was not seeking perfection.

Alina Johnson, the owner of Johnson Consulting Services, shows a handmade holiday greeting card she made for her best friend that incorporated lyrics from her friend's favorite Christmas song by Mariah Carey that she wrote in calligraphy at a workstation in the bedroom of her home in Detroit on Dec. 13, 2022. Johnson sometimes carves out substantial time to make the cards where she incorporates calligraphy and origami envelopes and also sells her creations to Detroiters and other local people who care enough to give cards that make a personal, heartfelt statement during the holiday season.

“I don’t necessarily do the right colors, they’re a little off, and that’s always fun,” explained Johnson, who also is the proud mother of Milan Johnson and sister to Danita Miles. “Sometimes the cards are a little off-center and that’s fun too. Not too perfect, that’s how I would describe them, because I don’t want it to look like you bought the card from a store.

"I can’t say that I’m hoping for any particular response, just a smile maybe, and I’ll be happy. I just know I have a lot to be thankful for, so we went the whole nine this year with the handmade cards.”

Scott Talley is a native Detroiter, a proud product of Detroit Public Schools and lifelong lover of Detroit culture in all of its diverse forms. In his second tour with the Free Press, which he grew up reading as a child, he is excited and humbled to cover the city’s neighborhoods and the many interesting people who define its various communities. Contact him at: stalley@freepress.com or follow him on Twitter @STalleyfreep. Read more of Scott's stories at www.freep.com/mosaic/detroit-is/.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Handmade holiday cards are Alina Johnson's way of showing gratitude