Category: Life

If you don’t ask…

Raining again...

…you don’t get. Sometimes you can ask and you still don’t get, but if you don’t do the asking in the first place, you’ll never know.

I’ve always had a hard time asking for things. Always expected other people to somehow magically know what I wanted, which of course led to disappointment when they inevitably didn’t. I thought asking for things was bad. Greedy. Selfish. Needy. Rude. And so I rarely got what I wanted (sometimes, needed), and so I was sad a lot. My husband likes to remind me that he does not in fact have psychic powers, and that if I want him to do something, I actually need to remember to tell him. Sometimes I remember, sometimes I forget. But it’s always better to ask and be told no, than is it not to ask and to never know.

January is always the time of year for Resolutions. I used to be a great resolution-maker, very serious, and then always very cross with myself when things didn’t work out exactly as I’d Resolved. This year, I’m making a change. I’m doing two things: 1) choosing a word that I want to embody this new year, and 2) making a great big list of WANTS instead of Resolutions.

The word part was easy for me this year, and the word is action! 

I spent so much of last year waiting, hibernating, feeling ill, that I just allowed my life to happen around me, for the most part. Clearly that can’t continue – I’ve done far more than my fair share of sitting around feeling sorry for myself, and it’s time to move on. I decided to treat myself to Honey & Ollie’s One Word bracelet, which Rain will be making for me with the word action! stamped right across the middle. Any time I feel inclined to moan and feel sorry for myself about things not going the way I want, I can look at the bracelet and be reminded that there’s always something, no matter how small; there will always be an action I can take that will change things.

(Sometimes, yes, the action will be go to the shop and buy a giant bar of chocolate and sit in a nice hot bubble bath whilst eating it, because fibromyalgia sucks and I need a tiny bit of luxury right now. But an action’s an action, no matter how small.)

The other part, the I WANT part, still feels a bit weird, a bit selfish. But the important thing to remember is that just because I WANT something, there is nothing and nobody out there in the universe that is obliged to leap up and simply give that thing to me. If I WANT something, I have to WORK for it. And there will always, always be an action! I can take that will move me one tiny step closer.

So, these are a few of the things that I WANT for 2014.

1) I WANT a lovely garden
I have the bones of a lovely garden, but it will take a lot of work to turn it into the garden that’s in my head, and I’m going to need help. Fortunately my Mum loves gardening, and she’s offered to come over with books to help us identify what some of the giant overgrown shrubs are supposed to be. We have one friend who can help us to design and landscape the space, and another who can help me to keep on top of looking after it all. (We’ll pay them for that, of course, as that’s how they earn a living.) For now I’m reading Gardeners World magazine, and doing a bit of pruning when I feel up to it. I can do more when it’s not raining all the time!

2) I WANT to be more healthy
Well, my doctor’s pretty much given up on me with this one (long story, very dull), and acupuncture’s beyond my budget at the moment, even though I know it would help. So, it’s up to me to try and keep the fibromyalgia a little more under control. I’ve started by giving up coffee and caffeinated fizzy drinks. I kind of want to give up caffeine altogether, but I don’t think I could survive without tea! So I’m taking things a step at a time. I’m giving up dairy, because I already know it doesn’t agree with me, which I need to keep reminding myself means NO MILK CHOCOLATE.  I also need to do more exercise. This can be a tricky one with fibromyalgia, because the increased blood flow through the body can make the pain much, much worse, which then makes the fatigue much, much worse, which isn’t terribly helpful! But, I’m walking a mile home from the bus stop most days, and when the weather stops being quite so revolting I want to start catching the bus a little further away from work, so these little bits will all start to add up.

3) I WANT a pair of silver shoes
Yes, that went from very serious to rather frivolous quite quickly, I know! I’ve spent the past couple of years building up my shoe collection, and the only gap left in it is for a pair of silver shoes that I can wear in summer. I have a moneybox which collects all my spare change as I save up for the pair I want… but that rather depends on whether Ren at Fairysteps decides to make any silver shoes this year! If not, then I’ll order a pair from Conker instead. I figure that the weather won’t be nice enough for summer shoes until at least May, so I’ve got a while to save up!

4) I WANT an instant camera
I recently acquired two boxes of Instax Wide film to go with a Fuji 200 or 210 instant camera. I have a friend who thinks she has the right model of camera and is willing to lend it to me, I just need to wait until our paths next cross at work. If my two boxes of film come out well, and I actually do something with the pictures, then I’ll decide whether to buy an instant camera of my own.

5) I WANT to run my own business again 
Well, that part’s easy. On April 6th, the beginning of the new tax year, I’ll set myself up as a Sole Trader again, and start running Mr & Mrs Magpie’s Inexplicable Emporium as a formal business arrangement. The difficult part will be deciding what I want to make, and how to sell it! As I’ve said before, the past year has been spent doing a lot of research, and I’ll be carrying over most things that are currently in the Etsy store. There will also be new things, once my hat blocks arrive, so I’ll just have to wait and see how they’re received.

There’s more, of course, but I think that’s plenty for now!

I have made one Resolution, which is to do something towards the business every single day, no matter how small. As it turns out I’ve been ill for the past few days (since I went back to work!), so the actions have been very small indeed. I’ve sewn some experimental bootlaces, sent out a parcel, re-listed some items on Etsy, and not much else! Once I’m feeling better (stupid tonsils) I can get back to doing more again.

2013 round-up

I am 40!

Well, 2013 has certainly been a very interesting year!

My formal diagnosis with fibromyalgia came right at the tail end of 2012, but it’s coloured the whole of 2013. My health this year has been dreadful – not being able to sleep, not being able to walk, not being able to manage the pain – but I’ve just had to keep going regardless. What else is there to do? Of course I’ve done my fair share of complaining about it, but at the end of the day all I can do is carry on and do my best.

Farming cycle

Things at work have also been interesting… my role changed quite dramatically in March, when I stopped working every weekend and increased my hours to work a job-share rota as Visitor Services Assistant. This year will be even more interesting, as a lot of physical changes are happening to the museum itself (thanks to Heritage Lottery funding), but I have no idea yet how this will impact my role.

First Frost

Our home life has seen perhaps the most interesting change of all, in that we now live in a new house! This was not something that we had been planning, but once the decision was made to look for somewhere new, we’d put in an offer on a bungalow in a matter of days! We then had to wait several months for the sale to go through, and getting to know the new place has not been without its trials (nicotine stains, dog hair, malfunctioning drains, a door that keeps falling off its hinges…), but we’re gradually making it into our own place.

The overall feeling of 2013 has been one of resting, nesting and hibernation. So much of the year was spent waiting for the house move to happen that I feel as though I’ve done hardly anything creative with my time. Looking through my photos reveals that’s not actually true, so here are a few highlights of what I’ve been up to.

Mrs Magpie

The beginning of the year was mostly taken up with building Mr & Mrs Magpie’s Inexplicable Emporium! Our first event in May was at a Steampunk festival in Frome, which was really a test to see how our offerings would be received. We learned a lot from watching people’s reactions to the stall, and it was successful enough that I decided to carry it on as an Etsy store when we came home. This year has been all about the market research, and I’ve learned a lot about how I both do and don’t want to run a business in future!

Airship Fresheners - tealight sample pack

The key to the Emporium has been two things: Diversity and Branding. They might seem mutually exclusive, but (finally) putting my typography degree to good use to create a coherent brand has meant that we can include all sorts of seemingly unrelated things into the Emporium, and they all look as though they belong together. We also discovered that the faux-Victorian theme can work outside the Steampunk community, being well-received at a local charity stall just before Christmas.

Some individual products have worked better than others in terms of popularity and sales, and some have worked better than others for me in terms of what’s required to make them. I’ve learned that I enjoy working in small batches, but don’t like making custom orders. I’ve really enjoyed writing the little blurbs to go on the labels for each piece, but really hated making the Harris Tweed Cufflinks. (They’re beautiful, but I cut my fingers to ribbons as I made them!)

Having taken the time to do this preparation and research, I’m pleased to say that I’ll be formally setting up as a Sole Trader again in April, and running the Emporium as a proper business from then on!

Felted Hat

I’ve done a little bit of more ambitious felting this year, making a hat, a pair of slippers, and a number of small experimental pieces to try and get the hang of felting in three dimensions. There’s something really satisfying about the nothing-into-something aspect of felt making, even more so than with sewing. You’re starting a process completely from scratch, with nothing but a bit of fluff from a sheep’s back, and ending up with a (hopefully) beautiful piece of fabric or a three-dimensional object. I have a huge bag of wool sitting in a cupboard, waiting for me to find a good space in the new house for making a mess with fluff and water and soap. I’ve also ordered a set of hat blocks from Guy Morse-Brown, so watch out for hand-felted cloche hats coming this way!

Tea dyeing

My natural dyeing experiments have been a bit hit and miss, to be honest. Reluctant to experiment with chemical mordants, I restricted myself to working only with substantive dyes to begin with… which basically means tea!  Not having a great deal of use for miles of beige fabric (although I am currently making a smocked dress from the silk shown above), my future dyeing plans are now more long-term. I want to do lots of research into dye plants that will grow in my new garden, and then begin the process of planting and harvesting and dyeing. Realistically it could be two years before I have my first crop of dye plants ready to use, so this will be a continual background project for a while.

My first handspun!

This little ball of goodness is my very first handspun yarn, made on a borrowed drop spindle. I’ve since bought my own spindle, and borrowed the spinning wheel from work, although I haven’t made a great deal of progress with either yet. Spinning brings with it the same sense of satisfaction that I get from felting – of being involved with every step of the process. I had fluff, now I have yarn, soon I can weave or knit or braid and make a whole new thing!

Going back to basics, unburdened by the demands of making things for other people, or without even considering the finished product at all, has been really important for me this year. Being able to immerse myself in a process, learn different techniques, and see where they take me, has been really liberating.

Mostly, I seem to have started a lot of things that I want to carry on with and learn to a much deeper level over the coming months. I’m planning to divide my time away from work between developing the Emporium to keep the sales coming in, and carrying on learning and testing and making things with wool and felt and fabric. I hate to use the word “whimsical”, it having been mocked so soundly by Regretsy, but that’s the direction I want to follow. Felting, spinning, dyeing, embroidery, beading, knitting, sewing… the theme for this year is to take my crafty skills, and turn myself into a Textile Artist.

Quite how this is going to happen I have absolutely no idea at the moment, but I’m guessing that sitting on the sofa, wrapped in a fluffy blanket and scoffing the last of the Christmas chocolates as I poke the computer isn’t going to make me a great deal of Art. Time to get up, and get on with it!

Insomnia and Inspiration

Robin

It’s that time of year again. Too much food, not enough exercise, late nights, late mornings, never shifting from the sofa. I’ve officially done too much relaxing now, eaten too much chocolate, and I need to get moving again. Yesterday I started sewing, and now that the Christmas knitting is finished I’ve picked up a couple of long-abandoned projects that I’m enjoying working on again.

Last night I couldn’t sleep, and was nestled into the sofa again at half past three in the morning. I managed to find a spot of David Attenborough on the telly, and when he’d finished I found a programme with Maya Angelou. I also watched a five minute preview of “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo”, and that’s five minutes of my life I’m never getting back. Sometimes I despair of humanity, I really do, and I don’t know what kind of mess we’ll be in when people like David Attenborough and Maya Angelou are gone.  I was very glad to have the opportunity to watch them, and even though I’m very tired, I’m also inspired by their excellence and experience.

Frosty Garden

When the sun came up, I opened the blinds and curtains and was met with this. I’m sure I’ll show you many pictures of this view, and this picture doesn’t do any kind of justice to the beautiful light that fills this space. Now the ice is melting as the sun comes up, and every leaf in the garden is twinkling as the heavy frost melts and falls. The houses at the back are nearing completion, and I’m thinking about what kinds of trees we can plant to disguise the vast expanse of that big brown roof. We were lucky enough to suffer very little damage in the storms, just the loosening of a few already-wobbly fence panels, but we know we have a lot of work do do out there.

Crafty Corner

Inside the house, I had a little flash of inspiration right when I should have been going to bed. This led to the late night shifting of furniture, and the creation of a little crafty corner. It’s not the most elegant arrangement, but it fits in the space and fulfils its function, which makes it ideal! The table and chair are from the 1950s, and used to belong to my Great Uncle Frank. They’re the closest thing I have to a family heirloom in furniture terms, and I’m really happy that they’ve found a little space in the new house. (Plus they match the curtains, which is a bonus!) The bookshelf on top used to belong in Paul’s teenage bedroom, and we have several of them scattered around the house. I might paint it, if Paul doesn’t mind. It’s the perfect size to hold my knitting books and magazines, and the big box at the bottom is my “emergency craft box” that I have to confess I haven’t touched since the move.

As always, when the New Year approaches, I’m full of good intentions and thoughts of diaries and journals and plans. Every year I buy a new planner or start a creative project that always falls flat after a few weeks. This year I’ve downloaded Susannah Conway’s Unravelling 2014 workbook (free) and Leonie Dawson’s Life and Business Workbooks (not free). I’ve also joined a Facebook Group called The Documented Life Project, which is about keeping a planner and art journal combined – something I’ve tried before, but never quite succeeded at. I’m hoping that now I have a little place where I can sit down, with arty and crafty materials at hand, I’ll have no excuse not to follow the weekly prompts and see what happens. We’ll see…

First Frost

First Frost

Just a quick morning note to say how much I love my new garden.

I know it will need years of work to get it looking how I can see it inside my head. But it’s going to be worth it.

The light is so beautiful, no matter what time of day it is. Right now I can see steam riding from next door’s compost bins, there are small birds flitting between all the different shrubs, and yesterday I saw a cormorant fly overhead – a change from all the red kites!

I have visions of chickens and bees, although I’m not convinced that either Paul or my neighbours will be best pleased with those plans. The lawn will gradually give way to a proper path and a rockery/alpine patch, and the borders around the shrubs will expand so that I’ll have room for dye plants.

The only thing spoiling the perfect peace and quiet is the team of builders, who are currently building five huge houses just one metre away from my shed. I can hear them all day, and see them through the gaps between the fir trees. I’m hoping that the resulting houses won’t be too much taller than the trees, as one of my favourite things is being able to look out of the window and see nothing but garden and sky.

If I could live in the middle of nowhere, I’d be happy as anything. But as that’s not possible, my beautiful garden is definitely the next best thing.

Remembering my Grandad

GEC logo on the lamp post by the bus stop

This is the lamp post that marks the bus stop where I catch the bus to work in the morning. Every time I see it, I’m reminded of my Grandad, Leslie Clarke.

The initials stand for General Electric Company, now GEC Alstom. GEC had a large site in Stafford, and my Grandad worked for them for many years as a driver of large vehicles.

As far as I know, he was also a driver when he was drafted into the war, but apart from that, I don’t know anything about his involvement. He never spoke about it, and specifically asked me not to wear a poppy, as he didn’t want to be forcibly reminded about the war by people who had never been there. He does have medals, and we know he was in Africa, but that’s about it.

Mostly, when I think of my Grandad, I think of glass bottles of lemonade on the cellar steps, running down his very long garden, and bonfires and fireworks on the edge of the orchard. I miss him very sharply at this time of year, and I wish I could have shown my new garden to him. I think he would have liked it.

The house has been warmed, and visited

House warming and birthday gifts

This was our first non-work weekend in the new house (and I’m back at work again next weekend) so we wanted to take the opportunity to invite a few people round for a little party. The button heart wreath above was one of the many lovely gifts that people brought for us, and the ceramic heart inside it was a birthday present from one of my oldest friends.

Please excuse the graininess – every light bulb in the house seems to be the lowest strength available, but it seems wasteful to change them before they’ve blown. Though we might take them all out and save them to use up in a bedside lamp, which doesn’t need to be as bright as a dining room!

It was lovely to be able to show people round, and have enough space for more than two people to come and visit us at the same time! Nobody had to sit on the floor if they didn’t want to, there was space to mingle, and it was lovely to have everyone just popping in and out over the course of the afternoon. I might even brave my hermit-like tendencies, and invite people round again.

Robin

This afternoon we found ourselves with a rather more unexpected visitor. We’d just eaten lunch (in a dining room! at a dining table!) with my parents, and retired to the living room for a coffee. Paul went back into the kitchen to put the kettle on, and then started waving madly at us through the glass door because he’d discovered that there was a robin in the kitchen!

We didn’t take a photo, because the poor thing was desperate to get out of the house and had started flying into the kitchen window. So we opened the back door and gently herded him out. He must have come in through the open bedroom window, and flown all the way through the house into the kitchen!

Originally we’d planned to trim back the shrubs outside the bedroom window, because they’re bigger than they need to be for privacy, and they block out a lot of light. However, we’d already discovered that a lot of birds live in one of the bushes in particular, having been woken up several times by a blackbird and a wren at startling volume very early in the morning. So we don’t really want to destroy anybody’s habitat… but we’re obviously going to have to be a lot more careful about the windows in future!

First Fruit

First Fruit

We’re finally in to the new house, starting to get settled. Things have been a little more difficult than we expected. The previous owner was a smoker, and also had a great big dog. This has meant that we’ve had an awful lot more cleaning to do than we anticipated. We’ve already cleaned the place once, and had the carpets shampooed, but the entire house is still covered in a layer of nicotine and dog hair. Quite disgusting, and I’m beginning to despair of ever getting rid of the smell that’s still coming from the living room carpet.

But!

One of the reasons I wanted to buy this house in particular is because it has the most lovely garden. (Well, it will be. Once we’ve got rid of all the dog mess and cigarette butts. And pruned all the abandoned shrubs.) It’s much bigger than our old garden, about thirty metres (100 feet) long, and it already has a vegetable patch and some fruit trees. The pear tree is very young, and hasn’t grown any pears at all this year. The apple tree is also young, but has managed to produce about a dozen little Braeburns! Most of them are still hanging on very tightly, but we’ve picked these three which look lovely. Yes, a little nibbled in places, but we’re thrilled to have lots of wildlife in our new garden too.

We also managed to grab a couple of handfuls of sloes from the well-established blackthorn tree at the bottom of the garden. Although the tree didn’t seem to be excessively full of thorns, which makes me wonder whether they might in fact be damsons. More investigation necessary, I think!

It’s going to take a couple of years to get the vegetable patch sorted, I think, though there’s a greenhouse and a shed and a nice big rhubarb plant to get me started. It’s going to be a lot of work, but I’m really looking forward to it.

Emergency Book Pile

Emergency Book Pile

Paul is optimistic that the removal men will be able to waltz in on Friday, finish off the packing, whisk everything into the back of a truck, and have all our belongings spirited away in no time at all.

I, as usual, am less optimistic.

I keep looking around the house (and especially in the Shed) and seeing the mountains of things still not in boxes. And the mountains of boxes without lids, or labels, and insecurely taped.

These books are deliberately not in boxes, as they’re the ones I think I’l most need while all the others are packed away.

(Yes, the coloured pencils will be going into the same bag!)

Time to rest

19/06/2012

Today I am mostly feeling sorry for myself. Anyone who reads my personal Facebook page would be forgiven for thinking this is nothing unusual – my status is quite often me whingeing about some aspect or other of my health that’s gone a bit wrong. Today’s is quite a spectacular one though – I’ve managed to put my back out. OUCH. I did it yesterday – a particularly annoying finale to what had been a really good weekend!

On Saturday we popped into town with some friends for Reading Town Meal. An annual event, with lots of stalls about wildlife, sustainability and local food – and a free meal, cooked by catering students from the local college, from food donated by local allotment holders and home growers. We sat on a hill in the Forbury Gardens to eat our vegetable curry, beetroot and bean salad, and fruit crumble. Yum!

(Paul didn’t go for the vegetable curry – he bought a massive pork pie from one of the stalls. I have to say it looked good!)

In the afternoon I went to a BIG SING organised by the Witt Studio Chorus. We spent three hours rehearsing a medley of songs from The Sound of Music, and then gave a small performance for friends and family. I used to be a regular member of the chorus, but had to give it up earlier in the year, mainly because I could no longer stay out late on a Wednesday and then be awake and functional in time to go to work on a Thursday. I enjoyed it very much, but I was reminded just how strenuous singing can be – I was exhausted when I got home, and in bed by 9pm!

Twelve hours’ sleep later, on Sunday we made an impromptu trip to Hughendon Manor, where they were having a 1940s WW2 weekend. Again, we had a really good time, enjoying the re-enactment displays, and particularly the talks given by Stephen Wisdom. We’d seen him at one of the big multi-period re-enactment events a few years ago, and Paul couldn’t resist the opportunity to see his “Mr Punch vs Mr Hitler” puppet show again! The weather was so glorious that we sat on the lawn in full sunshine, wondering why on earth we’d come out with scarves and gloves.

When we got home, I wanted to pop round to the corner shop. Unfortunately, as I bent over to pick up my bag, something right across my lower back went PING and caused me to do rather a lot of squealing and hopping and yelling. Oops.

I went to the corner shop on crutches, and spent this morning on crutches too, hissing and ow-ing every time I tried to move. Thankfully a heat pad, a short walk, and some stretching later, and the pain has downgraded to quite severe sciatica, which I can cope with a lot more easily. (As someone with long-term hip problems, I get sciatica a lot.) Hopefully by tomorrow I’ll be well enough to go to work – and I have been very glad that today was my day off!

So, to everyone who thought I was bonkers for doing so much on my previous day off, you’ll be pleased to know that I have actually spent this one resting. I’ve only done a few rows of knitting, I haven’t made anything, I haven’t packed anything for the house move – I’ve just rested. Shame it took a serious complaint from my spine to force me into it, but there you go.

Mrs Magpie’s Mug

Mrs Magpie's Mug

Just enjoying a nice cup of tea from Mrs Magpie’s Mug…

Mrs Magpie's Mug

… a very thoughtful birthday present from Paul’s Aunt!