The other night I was sewing in my craft room and Tonks came in to make sure I didn’t feel alone. Anybody with a cat will know how this went. I had been watching a documentary about arts and literature, and in my rage got writing. This was the result!
The night I wrote the poem. She promptly sat on it.
A night with Tonks
It’s Tuesday night and I’m here in my room
Trying to sew a small gift
And here she comes in (with a sly little grin)
“Aha! You can’t sew! I must sit!”
I change what I’m doing and pick up a pen
(As she sits on the small square of fabric)
“Oh no, I must eat it, you can’t write there!”
And she snacks on the ink like a maverick.
‘Right, no problem’, think I, as I move to the floor
Where I lay out the entire design
I put down my pieces and nearly complete it
It’s going well! It’s going to be fine!
But now she’s drinking water out of my glass
She really can’t be that thirsty?!
With a sigh I get up and chase her away
To the floor! My work’s getting dirty!
My scissors are abandoned, I can’t take a chance
Of her putting a paw into those.
I wanted to have a productive night crafting,
This isn’t the evening I chose.
With a cat in the room things are never the same
But shut her out and I’ll feel all the guilt
It’ll take twice as long, and need a good wash
But it’ll be ours, this small little quilt.
Tonks with all of her toys.A contented cat lying on the floor.
(Sewing a Quilt?!)
The quilt that I’m sewing has a subject that Tonks wouldn’t like anyway – you’ll understand when I show it to you! Even as I’m writing this she’s messing around with the fabric. My sewing time at night is definitely massively reduced by the cat. Gotta love her..?!
Anybody else’s cat do this?
Much love,
Corrie xx
Will I ever be able to brush my hair in peace again??
It’s your favourite time of the month – September 2016 Resolutions! Even though I waxed lyrical yesterday about how much progress I’m making in my WIPs, my monthly crafting resolutions are still suffering. I’m struggling to keep up with the Ravelry group (although the members have been super patient with me, which I appreciate so much) and my blogging has been less frequent now than ever in the history of Plutonium Muffins.
I maintain that I need a pin board or something above my lovely desk to help me out with it! I’m feeling much better about things now that everything in my life isn’t totally new. Watch this space!
August 2016 Resolutions recap
In August I resolved to:
Finish knitting mum’s birthday present. No, I haven’t done this yet – I’m going to talk about that in detail in a blog post later, but basically it’s knitted in eyelash yarn. You’ll see why this is causing delay soon!
Complete another row of the leopard cross stitch. Completed…but I also put it to one side as once I realised it wasn’t going to be ready in time for the specified birthday, I needed to make a birthday present for that person! I will pick it up again later. This’ll probably be in 2017 as I need a break from it for a bit. Let’s not forget I also have to finish the Dr Who scarf before our next anniversary. (Boyfriend sweater, eat your heart out…)
Pick out a fabric for curtains in the lounge. We went to the local fabric shop but they didn’t have any that fitted the colour scheme. I think I’ll need to go to a home furnishings shop, and the budget I have doesn’t stretch to that quality of fabric. I’m going to park this for a while and put up with my disgusting, disgusting curtains for a while.
The leopard cross stitch – parked for September 2016 now.
September 2016 Resolutions
This September I can set resolutions for a few things. I’m also starting a new course which is totally relevant to Plutonium Muffins – you’ll find out about that too!
Sew a quilt for a birthday present. I expect this to take up the majority of my time. I won’t talk about it in too much detail right now because the plan for it may change depending on time. This is an heirloom present-worth birthday though, so I hope to have something really cool to show you at the end of the month!
Fix my spinning wheel. Tonks was catching flies in the lounge one evening and slipped off the windowsill. She fell onto the spinning wheel, which fell over and cracked along the glue line that holds the hub together. I’m going to have to take the whole thing apart and re-glue it together. At the same time, I might take the opportunity to do some sanding and re-varnishing. I’m on the fence about it as I’m desperate to get it back together so I can get back into my daily spinning. It would be nice to make it look a bit more cared for than it currently is, though!
Tonks looks all innocent, but don’t trust that devious little face!
I’m feeling so much more organised with my desk set up, and I’m positive that things going forward are going to be much more efficient! In other good news, I passed my probation at work today. Things are looking up!
The mother of all WIPs is life in Bristol, which as you can imagine, has been busy! With this post I am kick-starting Plutonium Muffins into action ready for Christmas crafting and beyond. I’ve now been at my job for three months, and lived in the new house for the same amount of time, and am starting to feel more settled and ready to start the process of living my crafting life again.
The biggest of the WIPs
I thought I’d just take some time to update you on what has been going on before I launch into my crafting. Although I’ve been quieter than usual, I haven’t been idle from a making point of view…however, until now my computer hasn’t really had a place to go and I don’t really do blogging on my lap in front of the TV as my RSI is made far worse by lap typing. So there’s the excuse and/or explanation for the lack of blogging! Right, what have I actually been doing?
Our house has been biggest of many WIPs. We took on a three bedroom house in south Bristol, with space for John’s office, guests and crafting. The guest room doubles as my craft room – which, as we haven’t yet bought a spare bed, is actually only my craft room! It has been a nightmare sorting it all out, and I haven’t even got all my craft stuff here yet. It was unfurnished, and we have only ever lived in flats in London where everything was provided. The first night in the house was a bit of a shock – we had literally nothing. We are slowly populating the rooms, but it has meant that stuff is still all in boxes, with nowhere to go.
My brother also moved at the same time, and I bought some of his old furniture off him. As well as some essentials (a bed!), this meant that I also had a spare bookcase for the craft room, which now holds some of my stuff. Don’t let the photo deceive you – it looks like a lot of stuff (which it is) but is only a small fraction of my equipment, books and tools. This is my craft stall table – basically a glorified trestle table. It works well as a sewing table, and will keep that purpose because when we get a bed in here I will be able to fold it up when we have guests. This is also where I am now able to do some blogging!
My lovely desk! It needs a big pinboard above it.Bookshelf crammed with a small fraction of my equipment.
I’m going to have to do a massive de-stash at some point. I would love to keep doing craft fairs, but I can’t keep some of my personal stash. I have literally trunks of the stuff – stash WAY beyond life expectancy, and I’m still young! I’ve been trying to do things that use yarn up faster than knitting (machine knitting, I’m looking at you) – but at this point I’m not good enough at machine knitting to risk putting some of my most loved yarns through it. Weaving has also been keeping getting rid of some of it, but I’m finding that almost slower than knitting as I’m not good at that either!
It’s still a mess (there’s a reason you haven’t seen the whole room), but it’s better than it was.
So that’s all for now! I’ll be back soon with some big projects to show you. Here’s a sneak preview of Tonks ‘helping’ with a sewing/designing project!
It can’t possibly be mid-August already! How the heck did that happen?? I couldn’t believe it when I checked the last time I had blogged, and saw it was the 7th of July. The month has been so busy. It’s been so hard to adjust to full time work in an office that isn’t at home! The ‘commute’, a twenty minute walk to and from work, seems to take a lot out of me. In a good way – although I’m sure you now understand the reduction in blog posts!
That’s not to say this will become a ‘one post a month’ kinda place. My craft room is nearly open for business, and once my laptop has a home I will be able to get on it more regularly!
July Update
Playing with my family in Bristol in July!Playing with my garden. It has a long way to go.Fibre craft at Sidmouth Folk Festival.Flowers that were crocheted by my students at Sidmouth Folk Festival.Rock chick 80’s Corrie.Origami butterflies in my office.My drop spindle collection is rapidly growing.
In general life, things sprint along at a pace I can barely keep up with! Work is great, Bristol is great, I am feeling generally great. Here’s a whistle-stop tour of what went on in July and the beginning of August:
I celebrated my birthday with many of my friends, a number of whom bought me a silver-smithing course as a present. I was flabbergasted and delighted, and cannot wait! It starts in September – watch this space.
I had my mum to stay and she helped me sort my house out. We went nuts with succulents.
I taught spinning at Sidmouth folk festival – my pupils were very accomplished and went on to crochet flowers and make necklaces using beads they had carved out of soapstone during the same craft workshop.
I went to a hen do dressed as an 80’s rock chick, and thought my eyes would be black for the rest of time. We had a wonderful day at an activity centre, bouncing on trampolines and playing dodgeball. It was amazing, and highly recommended!
My team and I decorated our desks for the Rio Olympics – using origami butterflies! It took hours and hours to make them all and put them up, but looks just stunning.
I went on holiday to Cornwall and used my wooldar to find the only shop in Porthleven that sells drop spindles. My souvenir spindle collection is growing nicely!
July Resolutions
In terms of a July Resolutions Update, I had a relatively successful month, although I also spent a lot of time in the evenings collapsed in an exhausted heap in front of Big Bang Theory.
Finish knitting John’s Dr Who Scarf – I reached the halfway point and now can’t find a ball of yarn. I need to order a new one. He might get it before our fifth anniversary in January (bearing in mind it was his fourth anniversary present. I don’t do well at deadline knitting.
Finish knitting mum’s birthday present – errr…I plan to get this done this weekend. It’s sitting next to me. Waiting. This is also late, sigh.
Finish page one of my cross stitch leopard – yessir I did indeed!
Fix Garland – sorted and wearing with pride again.
Halfway through the leopard cross stitch.
August Resolutions
Bearing in mind that we are already halfway through August, I resolve to:
Finish mum’s birthday present
Complete another row of the leopard cross stitch
Pick out a fabric for curtains in the lounge – in the photo below you can see my curtains. They are awful – I got them in a charity shop for £3 and they were only a stopgap while we needed privacy in our house. We’ve been here for two months now…it’s time to replace them!
Tonks enjoying our new armchair, accompanied by our delightfully disgusting curtains.
I’m sure by the end of August I will have finished binge watching Big Bang Theory. If anyone has recommendations for what to watch next, I’d love to know!
I’m tardy on my July Resolutions, I haven’t updated you on my June ones, and I’m just a bit tardy in every respect. Sorry! Work is fun…but oh my goodness I just want to relax when I’m at home. While I find blogging enjoyable, it’s not really relaxing because there’s a lot of process that goes in – photo editing, copy-writing, making sure the thoughts that spew from my brain make sense to you…
I’m going to have to figure out my blogging schedule, but for now here are some resolutions.
July 2016 Resolutions
The most ambitious of my July Resolutions is to complete the first page of this guy.
I really don’t want to start anything new, and I have a lot of projects on the go that I need to get done and dusted and out of the way. So here are my lofty ambitions:
Finish knitting John’s Dr Who Scarf – I’m a third of the way through, hurrah!
Finish knitting mum’s birthday present – I just have to pick up stitches along one edge. You haven’t seen or even heard about this before! It’s now two months late. Ugh.
Finish page one of my cross stitch leopard – I’m so, so, so in love with this guy – my latest video update on him is here. I finally did the eyes this weekend, and I am really enjoying stitching every stitch.
Fix Garland – I’ve got a problem on one of the bound-off sleeves and need to fix that. Not entirely sure what happened, but the stitches are starting to run.
All written down they don’t look like too much, but they really are. It’s going to be interesting!
One of my colleagues has a birthday this weekend, and we celebrated at work today with a little quiz! The colleague in question like gingerbread and buys a gingerbread man to go with his lunch at least once a week, so I decided to bake up a batch. I haven’t really done much baking since university, which is insane cos I used to be really in to it! I had a lot of fun, and they looked great – so I think I may have to get into the swing of baking again.
Tasty tasty gingerbread men!
In other life news, it’s my birthday on Monday! I’m not very excited about it, I’m starting to feel that dread of “errrr I’m getting older” that people have been warning me about for years, even though I’m probably not even going to officially be in my late 20’s. Ah well. But I’m looking forward to giving myself some “it’s my birthday I can do what I want to” crafting time. I mention my birthday so that I can post this video, which I took on my birthday last year. We were in Sydney and went whale-watching. Can you believe it’s been a year already??
It’s time for the next Plutonium Muffins update…we’ve moved to Bristol! I started a new job on the 10th of June, and while it’s going well so far, I am absolutely shattered! It’s been a while since I’ve worked full time, and as well as that we’ve also moved into an unfurnished house. You can probably imagine how much there is to do, and how little time I have to do it!
My main excuse for the utter silence around here is that my laptop has been in the shop for repair (not my fault!) and we only got connected to the Internet last night.
Living in Bristol
Our house…in the middle of our street…
A few weeks ago, John and I came to Bristol to look for a house. I’d been applying for jobs for months, and we decided to just come to the city and find a home because it was taking a long time to get anywhere on the job front! By a wonderful chance, I got asked to an interview that same week. We saw a lovely house that we loved, returned to London to wait while my interview was analysed and our offer on the house considered…and within ten days my life was turned upside down as I walked into my first day on the job!
We moved at the beginning of June and are now in a house in the south of the city. I have a twenty minute walk to work and better than that, a five minute walk to a nearby craft cafe (Craftisan). You just know I’ll do a review of that soon!
Our house has three bedrooms – and you just know one of them is going to be a craft room! Unfortunately, I haven’t managed to actually bring most of my crafting stuff up yet. I’m most sorely missing my sewing machine, as with the Sewing Bee and a lack of curtains, I’m feeling really inspired to sew at the moment! Bristol also has a lovely fabric shop that has very reasonable prices close by…watch this space.
I’m loving kitting out a new working wardrobe again!I’ve been to see the Gloucestershire cricket team play! #goglos
I have been doing a bit of cross stitch, and I’m also (finally) working on my Dr Who scarf again. The Dr Who scarf is in Cascade 220, and is absolutely beautiful. Sometimes you just need the monotony of row upon row of glorious, squishy, simple garter stitch to decompress after a hard day of learning about corporate tax, hours of taking minutes for meetings, and meeting over 200 new people in one fell swoop!
I’ve been particularly enjoying knitting in front of the football. Living with my parents, it was impossible to watch football as they are so not interested in it…I’m loving having my own home in which I can watch the national sport and spread my cut ends of yarn everywhere knowing that I’m the only one who has to worry about cleaning it up!
Progress on Leopard’s Gaze cross stitch!Tonks is loving the yarn!
I’ve got lots of crafty resolutions to share with you – as is always the way, now that I have less time to craft, my ambitions are loftier than ever!
Stitch Maynia 2016 is over! I had intended to post weekly updates of my progress….I didn’t get to posting the photos, as you may have noticed! I’ve been job-hunting and house-hunting in Bristol for the last few months, and the big news is…I’ve been offered a job! So next week I’m moving to Bristol, into a house with space for a craft room* (OK it will be a ‘spare’ room, but you all know what that means) and a shiny new job.
I did keep up with my Stitch Maynia starts, and here they are for you!
Stitch Maynia Starts for May 2016
May 1st: Cross Stitcher Needle Case – this is a free kit that came with Cross Stitcher Magazine Issue 304. I’ve been obsessed with needing to keep my needles safe recently as I’ve lost a lot of them, so this is my attempt at that!
Cross Stitcher Needle Case started on May 1st.
2nd, 10th, 11th, 14th, 15th and 31st: Plum Street Samplers Days 2 – 7 – I started this sampler in April and decided that starting a new day could count as a new start. More information on the actual samplers is here. I had originally planned to only do Days 2 through 6, but I had to change up my plans slightly because I went to London and forgot to take a couple of the kits I had planned to do. Day 7 replaced the Durene Jones Peacock I had been planning to do.
I made loads of progress on the Plum Street Sampler. I finished the border on the 1st of June, so that doesn’t count, but I didn’t take a photo before!
3rd: New Zealand Bookmark, a kit I bought in Arrowtown. This was my first experience of blackwork, and oh my goodness I loved it! I finished the piece the same day I started it, although I haven’t yet washed it.
New Zealand by Lyn Manning
May the 4th be with you: A little “I Love You” kit I bought from Hobbycraft. I stitched this in the pub, and didn’t get anywhere near as much as I wanted to do finished.
“I love you” on the 4th of May.
5th: The Liberty building, a cross stitch kit I bought at Liberty two years ago when I was with Melanie! I was really unimpressed with this kit – a lot of my framing allowance on my fabric is taken up with selvedge, the needle had burrs on it that frayed and cut my floss, and the pattern is hand-drawn and poor quality. I got a small amount done as I did this start just before bed and was tired!
A Liberty kit on the 5th. I was really unimpressed by the quality of this kit, bought from Liberty in London. Don’t recommend.
6th: Bunch of Dandelions – this was another ‘pub job’, and as you can see I got loads done! It won’t take me long to finish this one.
A fair amount of stitching time on the 6th of May – daffodils from Hobbycraft.
7th: A lovely Sailing Boat kept me company while listening to the Outlander series. I ‘read’ a lot of books via Audible as it allows me to get my literary stimulation while also keeping my hands busy – in the chapter I listened to while stitching, Jamie and Claire were sailing across the sea and it was a very appropriate start.
A sunny sunny ship for the 7th of May.
8th: This was a free kit that I got years ago. I did so little it’s almost laughable. I was tired.
A free Fizzy Moon kit, started on the 8th of May.
9th: On the 9th of May I was even more tired than the previous night! I literally forced myself to turn my light on, put in four full crosses, then turn the light off again. This was the hardest start for me in the whole month.
Token effort on the 9th of May because I didn’t want to miss a day! A little DMC kit.
12th, 13th and 21st: Things started to get easier, and three separate Durene Jones patterns were started on one piece as an intended decoration for when we move house. I am loving how these are stitching up, and have already nearly finished the whole thing. Stay tuned!
These cat patterns are free from Durene Jones Facebook page.
16th, 17th, 18th, 20th and 22nd: Similarly to the cat piece, only Durene Jones also has little doggy patterns that I decided to combine into one piece. There was a lot of boring grass.
A little black dog to remind me of my gorgeous Chase!
19th: I love penguins, and I loved the bright colours of this guy. This start happened while I was watching something very upsetting on YouTube (bring the tone down Corrie) so it was a welcome distraction!
A funky funky penguin cross stitch kit.
23rd: Another beach hut! I left Devon for the rest of May at this point, so I was confined to kits and pre-prepared packs that I had sorted out. We stayed in a flat owned by a bit of a surfer dude – again appropriate!
Who doesn’t love a good beach hut? These are a British Institution.
24th: I had a job interview and just could not get on board with the Gingerbread Man. It was another hard stitch.
Little Christmas Gingerbread Man.
25th: This was a really fun stitch. I was really on board with DMC Mini Kits by this point – they are excellent, and I definitely recommend them to everyone.
I’m not going to stitch the music notes into this ,but it was one of my favourite of the DMC kits I started during Stitch Maynia.
26th: This was a free kit I got at CHSI stitches. You can probably see how different the kit is with comparison to the picture. I was not impressed with the fact that it’s not the same – I was looking forward to stitching up Tatty Teddy! The birthday cake was cute though. I entertained the idea of finishing this for John’s birthday the following day…but didn’t follow through on that one.
Birthday cake and NOT Tatty Teddy as advertised…
27th: I cannot for the life of me imagine why I bought this kit. The best that can be said is that I got a lot done in 20 minutes.
A single daffodil. Boring.
28th: I chose to start Box of Delights today – using the gold and black colour scheme. This is a free pattern by Elizabeth Almond. I was scared of it (hence avoiding it for ages) but once I started I just LOVED it. Blackwork is my jam. The first picture was one nights progress, the second another nights progress that I did on the 30th after starting that day’s start, as I just loved it too much and my light was too bad for the Queen Bee.
I think this was the start of a beautiful relationship with blackwork.Too addictive and I had to keep going on this start.
29th: I had intended to start a Christmas ornament kit that I got with a magazine last year, but I forgot the pattern at home when I left for London, and didn’t have it! So instead I started and finished a butterfly that came with Cross Stitch Crazy in April 2016. This was beautiful and an addictive stitch.
A gift card butterfly that came with Cross Stitch Crazy in April 2016.
30th: I put off starting this all month, and by the 30th had no option. The Queen Bee Needle Case is by Primitive Hare, and I fell in love with the pattern when an image of the final product was shown in her promotional material, and had to wait literally months to buy it. I wasn’t too sure about my fabric choice – it’s so small that I literally can’t count the HPI as I lose count each time! But I did eventually start it, and it’s not as bad as I thought. I don’t love it yet, but once I’ve sat down and actually had a go at it I’m sure things will be better.
These hexagons took a deceptively long time to stitch. Very, very fine work this one!
I’m so behind on my blogging because sorting out real life has been hard work! Stitch Maynia starts have also taken up the time I would normally spend blogging – so although I really enjoyed the month, I won’t be doing a start a day challenge for anything other than Maynia again, as I value my blogging time! It was great fun, and I will participate next year – even if it’s an effort to finish this year’s starts by the end of May 2017!
Did you have a go at Stitch Maynia? Were you successful?
I’ll catch up with the blogs as and when I can. I have some super exciting craft shops to tell you guys about!
Much love,
Corrie
*For those of you in the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to John, he has a spare room to himself too so he can have a nice office. Although he seems to think this will also eventually become a craft room. He’s probably right.
I’m super excited about my Stitch Maynia challenge, which I started on the 1st of May and will continue till the 31st. The idea is that you start a new cross stitch piece every day – the actual challenge runs from May 1st to 15th, with 15 new starts, but I’m expanding it. It was started last year, and is centred around the Facebook group of the same name – if you’d like more information, let me know or search for “Stitch Maynia” in Facebook, and you’ll find it!
Stitch Maynia – The Challenge
Although the actual challenge is meant to be 15 starts during May, a lot of people are changing it to suit their own desires. There are people who are just ensuring they do a few stitches in one cross stitch piece every day, some who want to finish a particular number of stitches by the end of the month. Some people start a new motif on a piece made of many smaller motifs every day, others are doing 31 starts – one for every day of the month. There’s even someone doing two starts every day for the entire month.
As a community, everyone is pulling together and having a really good time sharing their work towards the challenge. This is something that I love so much about crafters – on the whole, we are a supportive, friendly bunch for whom the sky is the limit!
My Stitch Maynia
Stitch Maynia project on May 1st – a needlecase from Cross Stitcher magazine.I worked on this on the 2nd, 10th and 11th – my effort on the 11th was a token one, but I was pleased on the 10th!Started and finished on the 3rd of May: New Zealand by Lyn Manning“I love you” on the 4th of May.A Liberty kit on the 5th. I was really unimpressed by the quality of this kit, bought from Liberty in London. Don’t recommend.A fair amount of stitching time on the 6th of May – daffodils from Hobbycraft.A sunny sunny ship for the 7th of May.A free Fizzy Moon kit, started on the 8th of May. I was very tired this night!Token effort on the 9th of May because I didn’t want to miss a day! A little DMC kit.A free pattern by Durene Jones (click the image to go to my blog post about her). Lots of work on the 12th of May!
Although I’m doing weekly updates on my YouTube channel, I know that not everyone who is interested in the challenge wants to watch me ramble on about it in video form – so guys, this one’s for you!
I’ve done 12 starts so far, and I am honestly loving every one of them. The incentive to put just a few stitches into a piece every day is brilliant, and I’m going to continue making sure I make time for just a bit of stitching every day going forward beyond the end of the month. I’ve turned it into my ‘just before bed’ activity – when no screens are allowed, and I give myself twenty minutes to unwind (ten minutes of which are spinning…stay tuned for that blog post…). Sometimes it has been more, sometimes less. There have been days in the last two weeks where I’ve just been so tired that more than five or six stitches has been too many – but every one counts!
I’m not sure when all of these starts will get finished, but as another chapter in my cross stitch journey, this is one of the highlights. Are you participating? Do you think you would be able to? I’ll talk about my motivation for it in the next blog post!
Last year I converted some emoji into cross stitch patterns because I was doing workshops teaching people craft, and I wanted something topical that they would enjoy stitching. I’ve just reached 500 subscribers on my YouTube channel, and as the majority of my subscribers are crafters, I’ve released these patterns!
Free Emoji Cross Stitch Patterns
They’re free to download, and can be found at THIS LINK. I would love to know if you ever stitch them, if you teach your kids how to stitch with them, or if you have any other emoji that you would like to stitch. I had a lot of fun with these guys, and have used them to adorn things from tea towels to baby bibs…there’s a lot of versatility in them!
My stall at the festival where I taught stitching – look closely, you can see all the emoji cross stitch samples!
Thank you all ever so much for supporting my crazy videos, there’s a lot of noise from dogs, cats, tumble dryers and boyfriends, and a lot of other, better stitchers do a lot more amazing, impressive things. I really cannot thank you enough for spending a few minutes with me every week!
This wasn’t meant to be a ‘buy my stuff’ post, but I do want to mention that I also have a few other free cross stitch patterns, and some paid ones too – if you ever feel like supporting Plutonium Muffins, head over to my Etsy shop to check them out.
My Stitch Maynia challenge continues apace, and if you want to check up on my progress then stay tuned – I’ll do a little show and tell for you later. In the meantime, I’m off to go stick my hand in my ice bath and see if it’s time for me to start knitting again…
May Day is without a doubt my favourite holiday of the year. There’s no preparation required, I don’t have to worry about buying or making presents to tell everyone I appreciate them in a material way, and best of all, it celebrates using the best of the UK folk traditions across the United Kingdom. It’s a chance for everyone to have a big ole party with their whole village, enjoying each others company for the sake of the company alone, and it also heralds the fact that spring has sprung!
May 2016 Resolutions
Deliberate Practice – one of my May Resolutions is to get better at handwriting!A whole load of A’s. I was only happy with one of these!A load of B’s, none of which I liked.
I didn’t set myself any April resolutions this year. I was feeling overwhelmed by everything that had to be done, my mum was away, I didn’t have any idea what I was going to be doing about life, and I just felt like I could barely plan four hours ahead, let alone four days or four weeks. Sometimes, it’s OK to just accept that the best plan you can have is none at all. It worked! I’m back and raring to go.
I’m also bullet journalling again – it has been about two years since I did this, and I’m enjoying it a lot. As part of this, I’m working on my hand lettering. There’s a way to go yet.
Stitch Maynia
Planned patterns for Stitch Maynia 2016 (not in order)My first start for Stitch Maynia 2016, a needle case!
I’m also going to be doing a challenge this May! I’ll be starting a new cross stitch project every day of the month. Hundreds of people around the world are participating in the challenge, and if you want to find out more then I suggest you head over to YouTube and type in “Stitch Maynia”! I’ve prepared my projects, and these will be previewed on YouTube when my video (finally) uploads. Yesterday I started working on a needlecase, a free kit that came with the last issue of Cross Stitcher magazine.
You’ll find out more about this later on, but I wanted to mention it so that it doesn’t come as a total surprise!
Corrie's blog about fibre crafts, followed by whatever other creative pursuits take my fancy. A healthy source of fibre! Originally inspired by Pluto and Canadian Muffins.
