Tough one

This is a tough one to write. It is like when you mean to catch up with someone, you promise to do it, and time keeps slipping away. Then you hit that awkward point where it is almost too late to get back in touch because it looks like you've not really been too bothered all along, so it can all sound insincere and not just a little sheepish. But this is where I am with my blog. Not wanting to abandon it, but feeling like letting go!

A few things have caused some deep thought on what it means to me and how I want it to be. It began as a report on life in the UK, then started morphing into a record plus a sort of  attempt at being more expressive through crochet/making. In behind the scenes, like most of us, if we are honest, life in all its messy big fat hairy way was going on non too smoothly. Big J and I have been having a very rough time, we have reached some spectacular lows. But what to do? Abandon us or keep at it? It is clear as I write that it is worth the effort, only for all of us, it takes up so much energy.

In the meantime, blogging and crafting sort of lost their breath and lagged along the way. Now I think that it is not going work for me to blog as if things are fine, but the blog is not a space to dump either, some things are not for world to see. It just needs to be my blog, about my life really and just a bit more honest.

I think I wanted a blog that had loads of followers, but now, love the ones I have, don't get me wrong, it is not about recognition and comments.

So friendly folk, it is gonna get duller around here. Thanks for popping in. x

Eyore syndrome

It is getting so that I am not even looking at the blog, let alone writing it. Despite some of the lovely things that have gone on that normally would be shared.

Currently, my mind is so distracted with issues that are not suitable for open discussion, that just getting my day job (read that as life) done is tough enough.

Not helped by the fact that there is a foreign body lodged in my right ear and I am deaf there.....completely. It is true, nothing bigger than one's elbow should go in an ear, but a cotton wool bud tip is in there...due to be removed tomorrow at the swanky new Pembury Hospital.

Issues and deafness aside, it is good to report that the sewing machine has been out and my friend's bag revamp is nearly done.

A Japanese doll has been commissioned - yay!

Bro in Hong Kong's baby on the way is a boy and the blanket for him has formed perfectly in my mind.

On a roll here peeps, flooding out now....

A cousin and I met up after THIRTY EIGHT years (we were practically babes in arms last time we met LOL), and had a great time. It is like meeting a new friend.

Phew, feel better already.

Apologies for the lack of photos. That requires a bit more effort and I am not there just yet.

April already

Here are the little kokeshi made for a raffle for a fund raising friend. They stand up but in order to get them in any decent sort of light, they had to loll drunkenly on the window ledge! The little pale blue is the one that was bought by a friend whose daughter was expecting.

Remiss I have been at posting, but it is not easy to do so if one is not in good spirits. Australia was awesome, but this weekend brought a rare bout of homesickness. (Bearing in mind I have not LIVED there since my twenties - it is rare that it gets bad, but it did this week). It was probably to do with distance and lack of seeing my family and of course the wonderful sun. It is true that the sun makes one feel better.

But, Big J and I ventured out in the icy cold to Hastings one day over the holiday and went to the Jerwood Gallery. We loved it, small and beautifully laid out, it has some pretty impressive works in it. We pottered onto the beach where the snow came blowing in, so the remedy was a plate of hot fish and chips.....

I have not touched my crochet hook since getting back and feel a bit stalled. The project I started when I was at home, all from my head has taken shape nicely, but the motivation to go on has gone, for now.

Mojos return and mine will. No point in pushing it. Em and I are off to Belgium on Friday and the crochet will come too. Some quiet evenings in the country might help focus my mind a bit....






 

Back from the Outback

Friendly people, I am home in wet and snowy England after two special weeks with loved ones on the other side of the globe.
In 14 days I flew in and out of Hong Kong with an 18 hour stop over to spend time with bro, sis-in-law and the lovely Ava Eloise, then on to Sydney for a weekend with Artist Sister and her partner.
A whole week in the Sunshine State with my parents, back to Sydney for two nights and one day and then the long trek home.
It was just lovely seeing everyone and being in Australia. How I love the place. How hard it is to come away.
It is good to have learned that that long trip is totally do-able in two weeks. So the plan is to do it again - one day.

I took loads of photos and did a lot, including some pretty nifty crochet, so will put a few pics up to share with you all the beauty of the places I saw.


 

Still here

Despite the lack of posts, I am still here. Occasionally reading up on all the news and latest creations. Truth is - the job requires loads of learning. I take it seriously. Lots of people now come to me with their issues and it is important they get the help/support they need. By the end of the day I am fairly wiped out.

The kokeshi dolls are all done and have been handed over to be raffled. I was so very proud when someone said they could not wait until the raffle and bought one outright for £10.00!! I don't think my work has been paid for before. That money also went to the Ethiopia fund, what a feeling.

J and I have been swanking it up in London with an overnight stay in a friend's flat in BELGRAVIA....Such fun! We went to the London Eye, the cinema and walked our toes off. The girls joined us the next day, when we parted with J to go shopping. Em got a dress for the Boat Party, discounted and cashed back.....and we picked up some items at Uniqlo for my artist sister.

In TWO DAYS I will be flying home via Hong Kong where I get to see my brother, sister in law and the lovely Ava Eloise.  Dad has had his op and is doing well and I will in Cooran on Monday next week after a couple of days with my sister in Sydney.

So, things are busy. Very busy and there is lots to do.

I imagine my next post will be from Australia.

Have a good week you lovely people. x

Lurching

I seem to be lurching through the days at present. The new job is busy and quite a challenge. I have been having the horrible old crocodile dreams, always a sign that my head is full of stuff and some of it is not easy to process.

My laptop is in the repair shop getting a new keyboard as someone left it open on the kitchen table - just after the cookie theiving incident, and 17 keys were chewed off it.

In two weeks I fly to Australia to see my parents, sister and en route my brother and his family. I think I am a little nervous as well as being excited. Seeing them all is lovely. Leaving them all is very hard, especially as my parents are getting older. They all seem too far away.

Today is a domestic goddess day. Ironing well underway. Gym at lunch time and my little charity crochet project to work on.  Photos of this will be up soon.

It will be good to get my laptop back. Nothing seems quite right without instant access to the world and other people's keyboards don't feel like mine!!



 

Munched Up Hearts and Puppy Farts

Hannah spent hours in the kitchen yesterday making heart shaped cookies, little fluted biscuits and initials, all lovingly and painstakingly piped. In Japan, girls make biscuits and chocs to give away for Valentine's Day and she has done this most years since we got to England. 

Biscuits need to cool and they were duly left to do so in a kitchen empty of PEOPLE. Tragically the kitchen had in it, one OLD CAT and one GREEDY PUPPY. Some time later, Hannah went to box up her biscuits to discover that 16 of them had GONE.

Meanwhile, back on the sofa, the above mentioned puppy was lying motionless, comatose really between her unknowing parents - sad really, I am Mum to the dog... with some rather strange gurgling sounds coming from her very round belly.

Hannah flew into the living room to point her finger and the dog sat bolt upright, a look of absolute innocence on her face.  The movement stimulated something and she produced the most unladylike, very long, whoopie cushion like sound, which actually worried HER. She kept trying to look for the source of the noise. Too much for the rest of the family though. The noise was the least of our problems!! What a smell.

What a blow for Hannah though. And we have all learnt that our little girl really can jump quite high. Time to reconfigure some of the kitchen areas.