The Colour Purple

And I don't mean the movie. I mean the actual colour.

Hullo lovely people of the internet - I realized last time that I never actually say hullo and that seems a little rude of me some how. How are we all today? It has been a very spring like weekend and I not sure if my mildly loopy mood can be blamed on that or not. At the very least we can blame it for all my customers being in a good mood today and consequently me not coming home angry or frustrated - so win!

Maybe I shouldn't say blame - its not a bad thing in the slightest to have a small taste of spring after a cold cold winter. Even if every one knows that it wont last. August is never nice weather - and its only next week away. How crazy is that! Some one mentioned to me today how many pay days it was till Christmas - and that in itself is a terrifying thought not worth thinking about. At the risk of repeating myself, I never believed my parents as a kid when they told me that time speeds up as you get older. The year seemed to take so long to pass back then. But oh my were they right. 

Not much to report this week. The man has been away all week so I have had piece and quite to get along with things. And as much as I miss him, it has been quite nice to have the house to myself. We currently live in a very small, one bedroom house so it sometimes feels as though we are living on top of each other - I will be glad to have him home at the end of the week.

Him being gone has made me realize one thing though. I need to lose weight. Before I moved to Dunedin, so we are looking at... three and a half years ago now - I lost 25kg. I have always struggled with my weight, and that was such an achievement for me. I finally felt comfortable with myself. But now I have gained it all back. The majority of it since moving in with the man a year ago and letting him prepare all the meals. Not happy about that in the slightest. I wont harp on about it here though, I am debating with my self whether to set one of the pages above for tracking my progress, putting it out in the open for accountability or maybe start a sister blog dedicated to it. I don't know, we'll see. 

That revelation didn't stop me stitching though. I feel like I got quite a bit done with out the distraction of another person watching movies around me. 

I started with Eleni again.

So very much purple. I am really please with how she is looking - and how much I have got done. She was only started a couple of weeks ago after all, and I'm not the fastest stitcher out there. Its also a really enjoyable pattern to work on. I think I will definitely have to investigate others by this designer. But I can't lie. I got really sick of purple.

And since I am apparently insane, instead of grabbing out one of my WIPs to counter act the purple, I started something new.

Just a little freebie sampler from Jardin Prive. Not entirely sure that my fabric is going to be the right size - its 28ct antique white even weave of some description (monaco I think?) - but I guess I'll find out soon enough. I can always jiggle the pattern around to make it fit I guess. Again, just using the DMC conversions floss wise.

That's about all there is for now. Time is about to become precious. Back to 6 day/50 hour work weeks for the next three weeks and I want to start going to the pool again a couple times a week as well as trying to go for a hill work or two each week. Not to mention course work that I still have not done. Oops. 

We'll make it work.

Till next time....

Another Day

Real life always seems to get in the way of our hobbies, doesn't it? Now, don't get me wrong - I love my man and my friends, my job and work mates are wonderful, my course work I'm ambivalent to but it's for my job so we will claim that for a win. I just wish it left more time for hobbies. Maybe if we had more hours in a day or didn't need to sleep. Maybe if I was a twilight vampire.

Jeeze, did I just admit to knowledge about Twilight vampires? Lets maybe move on shall we?

Last time I posted - which was far too long ago - I mentioned that I was sick. I still am, surprise surprise. This cold that has been going around the city is kicking me (and everyone else that has had it by all accounts) around pretty hard. The extra infections have cleared up and the antibiotics have been finished, but still the hacking cough continues a month later. Oh joy. That's no excuse for a late post however. Although I guess "lateness"  is a relative term when I haven't really set "rules" on these things.

That is something I have  been thinking about over the last week or so. I was thinking about my stitchy bug and my reading bug and how they seem to come and go. Both are back now, incidentally and I will get into my progress soon, but I was thinking about these things while trawling through Facebook and YouTube and I realized that social media affects my desire to do things, but not in the way that I had previously thought. 

I knew that social medias enabled me more in my purchasing and my willingness to start new projects - a slight fear of missing out that was awakened in a way far stronger than I ever got from reading blogs. Perhaps because interactions are not as seemingly instantaneous on a blog, perhaps for some other reason entirely, I'm not sure, but on blogs I seem to be able to admire someones hard work and the piece of art that they are creating without feeling... obliged, I guess... to do something similar or to join in a SAL or whatever. Getting to know people still happens, just slower and more gradual - more natural in a way.

Social medias breed pettyness and social cliques however than I have never come across in the blogging word. And that makes me sad. That there is snobbery and people citing opinions as fact and feeling like you (or at least I feel like) are being force into choosing this side or that side of a ever raging battle between the right way and the wrong way. And the stress of that makes me not want to read or not want to stitch or not want to knit.

Of course maybe I have just been fortunate enough to avoid such things in the blog-o-verse, which would render my point useless I guess, but I can only speak from what I have experienced. Nor am I blaming social media. Petty social cliques are endemic, I have noticed, in any group of people - just look at any high school in the world. 

But when I am at home, I want to be able to be me with out fear of reprimand. 

By day, I essentially run a store. There are other people around - the bakers and the owner doing baking and owner type things, but over the last three years, I have become one of the main faces associated with the store. Its a small city, so consequently, I can rarely go anywhere without bumping into at least one customer that recognizes me. So you see, home really is the only place I can truly be me. Where I don't have to be happy or civil or tippy toe around the politically correct environments. 

At home I can be human.

I'm not saying that I'm going to ditch social media altogether - I do like it. But stepping back from it a little bit has done wonders for my productivity. Which we should probably get onto - I have rambled on for far too long and if you have made it this far without skipping, I applaud and thank you.

I have been a little ADD this last couple of weeks, trying to kick start my stitchy bug - but it worked, so we shall just deal with a lot of photos. We've just dealt with a lot of words so why not right?

First up is my Steam Punk Sea Serpant by Samsarah that I was working on in Kakanui. I have only done maybe another 20 stitches or so since coming home, but I never put any pictures in my last post so here you go - 

He still needs a head, but we will get to that eventually. I am doing the DMC conversion for this one for all bar one colour. Its a Weeks Dye Works and I'm still not entirely convinced on the thread. I know I have said before that I am boring with my fabric choices because I think that hand dyes are too busy and I think my thread preferences may be heading the same way. We'll see.

Next up I put Once Upon a Time back on the frame, but that didn't last long either.

I love how these always look so much better once I take a photo. It's like the action of stepping back and viewing it through a lens forces me to see it as a whole rather than as pixel stitches.

Then, as I said in my last post, I started Joan Elliot's The Reader.

This is about where I started the thinking of the thoughts that have been spewed out above. I got a decent chunk of it done but lost a bit of momentum because work and what not and didn't really feel like picking it up again. So when in doubt, start something knew - I am coming to terms with being a serial starter.

Just looks like random purple at the moment, but it will become Eleni of Troy by Cross Stitching Art. I am just doing her on an antique white 32 count even weave, and while I would have loved to do her all in beads, I am just doing the DMC conversion because that would have been a whole lot of money on a WHOLE lot of beads. And that money I need for house renovations right this minute. And tea. I always need tea.

Side note, this progress on Eleni was fueled by tea - t leaf T banana caramel to be specific. Its my current favourite and if you love tea - you should try this brand. I love them all - even their earl greys which until now I have never been particularly fond of.

Finally I gave my mosaic a bit of love

Not a huge amount, but I definitely think it would be a lot easier if I had a table or desk to work on, but alas, they are in storage at the moment so we make do without. Progress is happening on it though.

Hopefully I can get back on track this week. I still have one work book to finish for my course. I want it in by next Friday and then I am up to date with that. But my man goes over to Australia for a couple of weeks this weekend so at least I will have no distractions stopping me from getting that done and moving back onto getting all the pages on here updates and back only my stitching and reading. And knitting. I am going to have to go shopping (oh no what a shame). After the success of my pompom hats I have had half a dozen people ask me to make them one too. 

Practice makes perfect I guess.

A "Crafty" Weekend

Admittedly, writing this post has been put off all week. Sickness had left me not wanting to do much of anything recently. Just a cold but as has become my pattern since working in the baking industry, the simple cold became a sinus infection and a chest infection. That combination does not really leave much motivation left for anything beyond curling up in bed with a book. Or more accurately, graphic novels. I go through phases - always have - and it would seem that graphic novels are my 'thing' at the moment. Whatever. As a result I have upped my reading goal for the year once more to 75. I can't remember if I mentioned it or not, but I set it quite low, at 50, at the beginning of the year because my reading bug deserted me. 2014 got me to 72 books so the drop was a bit demoralizing, but such as life. The way my mood is going at the moment though, I feel confident bumping that back up. I only hope that my stitching doesn't suffer too much as a result.

I did go to my crafty retreat last weekend though. Retreat makes it sound all fancy, but really it was a borrowed batch and what was supposed to be mum and two of her friends and me and two of mine. Family friends have a holiday home in the little coastal community of Kakanui. It sits right on the beach - we had stayed there before - last year, just the two of us, but this time we thought it would be fine to increase the numbers. Mum has a paper craft circle that she is active in, and I have a good friend that crochets and another that is more of a mixed media crafter. I was really excited about the weekend. Went up on Friday after work.... only to then find out that both of my friends had pulled the pin and were not coming. One for a good reason, the other not. The news resulted in a fair bit of ranting and more than a little sulking around. Don't get me wrong, I love my mum and its good to see her for a weekend now that we live in separate cities. But when her and her scrap booking buddies get going, I may as well be on mars.

Without the motivation of those two, I spent more time on the beach searching for penguins than I did with needle in hand. Didn't find any, but it was fun trying. 

I did make some progress on my WIP's - I'll update the page above when I get some decent light for taking photos. Mainly on Steam Punk Sea Serpent (seemed fitting since we were just out side of Oamaru - the Steam Punk Capital of New Zealand) and on my mosaic thingy. Mum seemed fascinated by the mosaic, so that's a Christmas present sorted. I also started yet another project, just to see it that would kick start my stitchy bug. It didn't, but maybe the weekend will change that. I'll keep Joan Elliot's The Reader on the frame for the next few days and see if motivation returns. I hope it does. 

This year has been killer on my motivation. It's not been a bad year per say. I just seem to be in the wars a lot. I am usually a very healthy person. But this year I seem to be back and forth to the doctor so much. Torn calf muscle, fractured hand, respiratory infections, various cuts and bruises that are more serious that usual... maybe that's not really that much. Maybe I'm just noticing it when I see my productivity drop.

Never mind. No point whining about it I suppose. No body wants to hear me complain and feel sorry for my self - I'll go back to my book instead. I am about half way through it and I think I can feel pretty safe in declaring that it's one of my favorites for the year. The Martian by Andy Wier is going to be released as a movie later this year, so of course, being the true book nerd that I am, I had to read the book first. Man, I am glad that I have. It is truly brilliant.