Yesterday at work proved to me why having three team leads available on Saturdays is very important. There were no major disasters, however constant small problems add up to a very stressful day at work. I was technically the team lead in charge so I had ‘final say’ on what was going on, fortunately I work and communicate with the other two leads very well so I felt supported. This did not stop the stress from happening so I decided that I was going to do a complete emotional reset Saturday night to rid myself of the day. I started by going to Burger King, I had a 4 free. nuggets with $1 purchased so I bought an ice cream cone and the 4 nuggets for under $2. I ate the cone in the parking lot while watching the Snake Discovery Halloween special because the lizard dressed as a taco gives me such a belly laugh every time. I then bought 1/2 dozen Tim Hortons Donuts for $4.5 to take home. Once I got home I completely changed out of everything I was wearing and put it immediately in the washer. Finally I roasted the turkey I had thawing in my fridge, and made my final bag of chicken soup from the roasted carcass. This gave me a chance to freeze the last batch into .7 liter bags.
While things were boiling and roasting I continued to clear off and organize the bookshelves I currently have to make room for my new shelves. This has been great for me, I am working hard on consolidating my supplies according to their usage, weaving with weaving, spinning, etc. An unexpected benefit is that I am also getting everything off of the floor, and those are getting swept up as well. At present I have book cases at a right angle against the corner, however I firmly believe I am going to have to drastically change that. I dislike the idea of ‘losing’ space by having a bookcase at a 45 degree angle in the corner, however I am finding out that I absolutely cannot have stuff stuck in the corner. I forget that the items exist, tend to put items in front of the cases since I cannot easily access them anyway making them even harder to access. One of my main goals of purchasing these last bookcases is to ensure that everything is off of the floor. Another main goal is to make some of the items that I do not want to get rid of, but that are taking up considerable space. Admittedly some of this is procrastination crafting.
Last week I had decided I wanted to make a Celtic themed lap blanket for one of my dad’s cousins that was in the hospital for a form of Brain cancer. The hospital happened to be in the same city that my Sister lives in, so I had her reach out to see if we could take their daughter, our cousin after a fashion, out to lunch with whomever she wished. We did not hear back, and I found out yesterday that we did not hear back because dad’s cousin was taking a turn for the worse. Instead of making a lap blanket I am going to embroider a memorial hanging. She did not want a funeral or viewing so later we will find out when the celebration of life will be.
This is another reminder to see family when you can, that no day is promised, and that reaching out is never wasted effort.
At the most recent Weaver’s Guild meeting I attended we had an amazing instructor that showed us (and provided kits) how to create Huck Embroidery or Swedish Weaving. The techniques are very simple and I sort of fell in love with another craft, oops. Spruce Crafts has a great explanation of what this craft entails and how to get started.
I have been working on some other projects as well, a friend of mine is going to have their second mastectomy, their brother had one last year, and they asked me to provide knitted knockers. I crochet better than I knit so I am doing those, however I was able to quickly create some heart shaped pillows to relieve pressure on the stitches…though they are also being used as neck pillows.
I am still working on the invisible tacking of my aunts embroidery on the quilt top she asked me to quilt. I feel like I am on the home stretch for that, though once I have the last of the embroidery done I still need to hand bind it…what fun! Another aunt, my dad’s cousin technically, is not doing too great so I am trying to get a quick quilt made for her as well.
I finished the skirt for my Victorian psychic costume….I like how it looks for the most part. It is made from Linen, however I was treated to a glimpse of my colleagues costumes and I realized I need to just buy one. If I wear my amazing linen I’ll look like the country cousin…not the look I was going for. I get paid soon so I will order a costume that fits the bill and will arrive on time. I did figure out that I can make a beautiful skirt on my own, and if I rip off the Tulle that I hate I can add the linen ruffle and have a beautiful finished skirt out of linen.
I did have a gigantic positive come out of everything! I had been saving up to purchase some Billy BookCases from Ikea. I finally had enough to get their corner unit that consists of three of their narrower units connected at the top for about $160. The weekend I planned to go to Pittsburgh to see my sister, and try to take our cousin (dad’s cousins daughter) out to lunch to give her a break, Ikea decided to have a sale on their Billy Bookcases. Instead of the smaller corner units I was able to get 3 of their full sized units for less than the corner unit would have been. They are currently living in my trunk until I A. Make room for them, B. Finish up some of my projects so I can clear the room up, or C. A&B Plus I need to make sure I have the space to assemble them.
With the weather starting to change, and a lot of things sucking right now, I need to find the joy and blessings so that I can remember to Live Life a Little More Abstract!
I took the bottom off of my sewing machine since I was having trouble with the bobbin thread catching and the top thread shredding. This took me quite a bit to clean out using an eyelash brush, it worked amazingly well. My machine is sewing like new. I also did a clean of my embroidery machine which has decided that it will not work about 50% of the time unless the hoop is slightly elevated on the side it is not anchored to, so it probably needs to go to the shop to be fixed. Since we are over half way through the library being closed to the public I brought my embroidery machine in for my colleagues to personalize whatever they would like, a few people have taken advantage of my offer which makes me feel good about bringing it in.
It is so hard for me to believe that we will be reopening to the public in two weeks. I have not completed many of the projects I intended to get done. My area is clean which is one of my main goals, I have a rhythm to my weeding and inventory project so I am pretty happy about my progress there, now that I have my ADHD medications I’m better able to concentrate and will make significant progress this week if I do not finish it.
I am trying to destash products that I do not use and have had some success in that endeavor, this will leave me with just the items that I actually use for storage and surfaces. There have been some projects that I have been meaning to get to so I am working on getting some of those completed and out the door. There is a decent amount of fleece I purchased on clearance that I planned to use for blankets. Then when I asked many of my family members stated that they preferred real backing rather than fleece on a quilt. Because of this I have cut it into a size that can be used for sensory mats and I will donate the fleece to my library for future use on the new ‘kindness cart’.
It has been my plan to create my own dress for our ‘Haunted Library’ murder mystery thing that we have going on in November when we are fully reopened. I have the pieces cut out for an initial sample so I hope to get that sewn in the next two weeks so when I go to a clearance sale with my cousin in October I know what kind of fabric might work and whether I can stand the pattern or not.
I have been working on getting some spinning done, though the fiber I first started with is a bit stickier than I thought it would be, I’m considering pitching it to spin something I enjoy. I also warped up my table loom with a fun pattern that I am doing in reds and greens for my Weaving Guild’s holiday cards, no one else is volunteering so I think I will end up doing it. I am also trying to get my Saori Loom re-warped with the cotton warp in a way that the threads may actually stay on and not slip or snap.
All of this in addition to being about a month later than when I told my aunt I would have her Quilt done, oops.
I also decided that I wanted to try to make a fall cloak with felt leaves, so I cut them out and laid them on another piece of felt. This led me to discover that I do not have enough leaves, and that unless I have some veins sewn into the leaves they look really stupid. I did manage to sew in the center vein in these leaves though I still do not have enough, and I think I want to use something other than felt for the base.
I think that’s enough for right now, I hope to get back to you in less than a Month! LOL. Until next, remember to Live Life a Little More Abstract!
My library, where I work, is closing our doors for a month while new doors are being installed. This will really only effect the presence of the public in our building, we will still be working however patrons will not be allowed in. This is going to be a great time for me to get my personal space organized, and a lot of work done on projects that tend to fall by the wayside while focusing on patrons and other things. I just came off of a vacation where I mostly spent my time trying to rest and recharge my social batteries. This worked out really well. Prepping for the closure is going to take a ton of time, energy, and social battery next week. Next Saturday I will also be holding a spinning class, this again is going to take a ton of my social battery.
The second to last day of my vacation was spent with the Weaver’s Guild I belong to making cord wraps with handwoven fabric, these will be given out during a fiber conference in October. I found out that the type of buttons I have been buying, with the little teeth, is not going to work with any of my presses (despite the fact that some came with one of my presses.)
I also found out that I needed to add some extra width to my shirt pieces, I cut out a triangle of fabric to add to the seams on the sides. I have them pinned together and hope to finish sewing them soon.
These small crafting projects have been great for me to dip my toe back in. I have also been doing a lot of cleaning, organizing, and getting rid of items that I do not need/use.
I hope that the weather continues to be good, and that you remember to Live Life a Little More Abstract!
I am still very much on my cleaning kick. Thanks to some help from my family. I was able to get my kitchen completely scrubbed clean so that has set me off to wanting my entire first floor where I mostly live to be as clean and tidy as I can get it. Because of this, I have not done a lot of crafting however, I have started utilizing some tips and tricks to make my house a little bit more tidy.
The top photo shows my first trick which is using scraps of furniture cushion, purchased from the store to elevate the second layer of paperbacks. This can be used with any sort of shorter book to ensure that you have plenty of space that you can also see all of your books.
My second and final tip and trick for right now is to add L brackets to any wooden furniture that you assemble as some kind of bookcase. This is an IKEA shelf and relatively stable on its own however, with the addition of the brackets, it becomes a lot more stable.
OK, so I did get a little crafting done. While sorting and organizing, I found a linen shirt that I had cut out, but never sewn together. Here you can see the back with the center seam that I plan on hand French seaming I believe it’s called, to hide the same as well as the front with the collar turned under twice which I also plan to hand fell.
Until next time, I hope that everything that you do goes wonderfully and that you remember to live life a little more abstract
At present I am trying to build my ‘side hustle’ into an actual business that brings me some income, joy, and purpose. To that end I have started batching some of what I have decided I want to create as well as signing up for some amazing opportunities. One of the major challenges, and ultimately advantages, that I have is my ADHD. Due to my body’s inability to produce the proper chemicals that induce focus it is either very hard for me to focus on a particular task, or it is too easy for me to go down a ‘rabbit hole’ and lose complete track of time. The latter has not really happened for me since I got out of Grad School, which unfortunately means that I have not been able to do any of what is referred to as ‘deep work’ since that time. After my diagnosis, at age 40, I was put on medication. The first was too strong, and had adverse side effects. My current medication allows me to focus on tasks, remember side thoughts, and come back to those side thoughts without having to write them down or keep repeating them with a single minded focus lest I completely blank on what I was supposed to be doing. It is a singularly unsettling feeling realizing that people can go around knowing what they have to do without blanking when they reach their destination then having to retrace your steps and thought process so you remember what you thought you should do two minutes ago.
Recently, I have learned how to utilize my ADHD, medicated state, and newfound purpose to create systems where I can batch my projects. I have two running at the same time currently. With JoAnn Fabrics closing they are having some serious sales. This is allowing me an opportunity to purchase craft felt at a very discounted price. I am using that felt to create pencil/pen/paintbrush rolls. With the scraps I am creating corner bookmarks that I am hand embellishing with a variety of techniques, embroidery, beading, etc.
To effectively batch my tasks I find that thinking about what the next step is going to be at night before I go to sleep gets me interested and motivated the next morning. That is not going to work for everyone, however it is the method that is working for me. I will walk through my creating pencil rolls as an example, each * indicates a day/morning so you get an idea of how long this is taking me:
*I had some leftover fabric and a lot of pens/pencils/markers. I wanted a way to take them with me in case I decide that I want to try my hand at being ‘artistic’ while taking walks on the beach. I did a quick sample and liked how it looked. Then Joann fabrics had a lot of craft felt remnants for sale for literally pennies on the dollar. This felt is both sturdy enough to hold pens and light enough to roll well. An idea was born, also I plan on going to a conference in the near future and would like something that I can ‘give away’ to promote my business.
*I started batching, the first step was to cut the felt to what I thought would be the correct dimensions. I took a few hours to cut all of the pieces that I would be using to very similar sizes.
*The next day I pressed all of the felt out since many pieces were wrinkled and I had over 30.
*I decided how tall I would like the pockets to be, out of fleece fabric I had in my stash and picked up on clearance, then cut them to the same length of the craft felt. After that, and on the same day, I folded over the top about 1/2″ and did a quick straight stitch hem to have the top looking nice.
* I took the tallest pen that I had to make sure that the felt would be tall enough, I discovered that the back and pockets were both too tall.
* After some frustration, I chose to cut down the felt and resize the pockets. Thus began my second batch project. I took a day to cut these down, while realizing that it was not realistic for me to plan on making dozens of these rolls in time for the event. That is alright, I already have an etsy store and I can bring some to gauge interest. The felt will be great for corner bookmarks.
* I cut down the felt to the correct size for the corner bookmarks and then cut some of them diagonally to create the flap for the page to sit in (thus making it a bookmark).
*During the evenings or when I have a few free moments and feel creative I use various threads to embellish the corner flap of my bookmarks and do the stitching that holds the two pieces together. Beads, buttons, thread, whatever I can get my hands on and whatever stitches I think of are being used to embellish these.
*I did a sample of the slots for my pencil wraps, using a seam ruler I placed it inside the pocket and that became a hard guide for my presser foot. This sort of worked, however I hated how it looked since there was a ridge in the middle of the slot where the ruler stretched the felt a little.
*After some thought I realized that I could use tailors chalk to mark the ruler spacing on the back of the felt and sew along those lines. I have completed one and like how that turned out.
*I had some faux leather and cut that out the same size as the felt so I could create a waterproof backing for the pouch. Placing the faux leather face down on the pocket side of my piece, I sewed along three sides leaving one open to turn and place the cord.
*I pressed the piece once it had been turned right side out. I hate how the leather looks since it just about refuses to lie flat. This could be in part because my iron is set to synthetics, however, perhaps not. I used sewing clips to flatten out the edges some as well as holding the open side so that I can use a top stitch to close that up, as well as inserting the cord.
This is as far as I have gotten, I just put the clips on the faux leather sample yesterday evening. I plan on sewing the sample closed as a demonstration piece. Fortunately I have quilting cotton and thin fleece fabric that I can machine embroider on, this should create a cleaner finish for my pencil rolls while having an embellishment to draw attention.
I am not working quickly, I am trying to be both efficient and produce lovely products with minimal waste. This is a great chance for me to explore different stitches with the bookmarks, play around with my embroidery machine, use up thread and cords I had lying around, and (hopefully) create beautiful projects that people will purchase to help fund my exploration.
I hope that this helps some of you who might be stuck trying to figure out how to get bulk products out the door. While I certainly took my time by taking each step one day at a time, there are ways that you can batch these tasks and do them within one day, for example cutting the felt and fleece to the correct sizes could have happened on the same day, even cutting whatever you would like to use as your ‘pretty’ fabric for the outside of your pencil roll.
I hope that this is informative and possibly helpful. Until next time remember to Live Life a Little More Abstract!
I am working on auditioning patterns to quilt my Aunts quilt with. A cousin suggested a couple of styles that hold sentimental significance for our family so I am going with those. I’m going to let the patterns ruminate for a little bit while I decide if I like them there or not.
This is not the only project I have going on at this time. I’m also still working on getting my craft room organized. It does not look like I have made a lot of progress, however I am considering every step a small win.
I have many of my fabrics, threads, and other crafts on the shelves, labeled, and mostly organized. In attempting to use up some of the smaller fabrics and pieces I am trying to make small projects. This should free up some of the space and help my organization as I see how I am using materials. This type of organizing is already helping me feel more motivated and willing to do some crafting.
I have been experimenting with making mug rugs using some basic quilting patterns on my embroidery machine, this also doubled as a good way to see how the pink thread was going to show up on white fabric. I have also been using some of my scrap fabric to play around with fusible applique on squares to see how I like them and what kind of applique I can do/enjoy.
Of course I cannot be happy with just one type of project, though I guess this could also be considered sewing.
There is some, very slow, progress being made on creating a beaded cord necklace. This craft takes a lot of beads, a lot of time, and patience to ensure that the white cord is completely covered and that the beads a laying where I would like them to be. I am enjoying this as my slow craft.
Other things are going on in the background, my local library had a book sale so I need to weed out some of the books I am no longer using to make room for the ones I just bought. I am attempting to coordinate programming for one of the guilds I belong to. There is some minor medical stuff going on in the background. Work has some exciting things going on as some construction is going to get started and we are ramping up for summer reading, which can add some stress.
All in all it looks like this year is going to be fascinating. I’m hoping to continue adding fun stuff, and hopefully add some items to my storefront again in the near future.
Until next time, remember to Live Life a Little More Abstract!
Every Day bring a slightly new challenge to the forefront. I’m still chipping away at my 100 day challenge, I did have one slip when I found some Fat Quarters for $.50 at Walmart. I plan on making a simple children’s quilt from them for the Holiday Season.
I have managed to work on several projects over the past week and a half. Much of my ‘good’ yarn has been put in plastic bags for easier storage. I have started spinning again and gotten a few ‘puffs’ of wool spun. My singles yarns that I purchased or were gifted years ago are now being made into a large granny square that might be sold or gifted as a decorative throw. I made a sale in my Etsy Shop (total of 2 now, lol). This makes me want to finish the skull earrings I have embroidered, they need their jump rings and earring hooks. My Tie-On Pockets have also made some progress.
I am doing my best to look on the bright side and get through this last hurdle. There is a Quarter left in the year, this Sunday is the Autumnal Equinox so I will use these next three months to close out this chapter of my life and welcome the New!
I hope that you have a great day and remember to Live Life a Little More Abstract!
I was lucky enough this past week to have encountered a rare productivity burst. Throughout this burst I was able to get one of my rooms organized, start several projects, and make progress on other projects.
Not all of my projects turned out great, but most of them did what I wanted. The first paragraph is going to be about outside projects I was able to complete during a warm day, and the rest is going to be about crafts I have started, some are a little more artistic than crafty, but everything I do comes back around to crafts eventually. Even my garden, which is what the next paragraph is going to be about, is going to have plants that are good natural dye producers. Speaking of, onto the outdoor projects.
During a windstorm my downspout decided to blow off of my house. This seemed like a sign to add a rain barrel to my gardening. I bought a rain barrel, and the device to connect it to my downspout. To see if I was able to get away with a cheap solution I purchased a connector that was a little too big, sealant, and some screws intended for a downpipes, under $10, and decided to try to connect it from the ground… It didn’t work, but I really didn’t think it would I was just really hopeful.
This means that I am going to have to wait a little longer since I will need to purchase a 7′ ladder, new downspout, and probably an elbow for the top. I also noticed that there is no downspout on the gutter that surrounds my porch so I’m probably going to add one on just to be sure. The downspout was not my only outside project, I also managed to put up my mini pop-up greenhouse. It is weighed down with some stones from my front yard and it currently houses my mower, clippers, and a few other gardening things. This prompted me to finally put together my two workbench sawhorses, one of which is currently in the greenhouse. I’m hoping to start some plants in March or April. Okay, let’s get into crafts now!
In getting my home back in order I have discovered several projects that I have been meaning to work on for quite some time. One of which is my Unicorn in the Library fiber from Hipstrings. I finally managed to finish spinning it up, I did split the last puff into 4 pieces so that I could spin some other fibers in between that I will use as ply experiments. I also rediscovered my love for spinning silk, this caused me to spin up some lengths that I will allow my library craft patrons to use in their slow stitching project. That reminds me I need to make up a sample for that sometime this week.
I have been exploring some crochet techniques, mosaic crochet was not as much of a success as I would like, I found a Tunisian Crochet pattern video that I am working through and transcribing into a written pattern, and I will be seeking out resources for two sided mosaic crochet to eliminate the weird stair-stepping I am getting on the inside of my mosaic crochet.
Now we are getting to the part where I can never be content, I have to try everything. I don’t know if I mentioned that I bought a Rock Tumbler? If not, well yes, I bought a rock tumbler, some sample rocks, ceramic media, and enough grit to last me a while. I have been watching YouTube Videos by Michigan Rocks for some time, and my Aunt mentioned not getting around to using her rock tumbler, plus a way to force myself to go outside to find rocks all combined to have me starting this new hobby. I have had a ton of fun so far, I have owned it for a month, and I managed to get my ceramic media tumbled through the first 3 stages ( I didn’t bother to polish it), as well as some of the bag of tiny chips that I only half regret purchasing. They aren’t going to turn into anything great, but I’ll run them through the cleaning and two polishing stages to see if I can get them to have a shine. I did put about three pounds of the bigger rocks into each of my two tumblers to get them started on the stage 1, I’ll pull them off on Saturday to see what they look like. I’ll put out a post of how to get started Rock Tumbling, as well as linking to some great resources later.
Of course I cannot start just one hobby at a time, you think I have any self control? I haven’t started this one but it is going to go hand-in-hand with the rock tumbling, I plan on wrapping the rocks in wire when they are tumbled. To be able to sell these for something like a decent price I plan on purchasing some Sterling Silver wire. I’m not selling necklaces, just the wrapped stones for now. This brings me to my last two projects that I’m working on, skipping over the fishing poles I purchased today because I found out that there are ‘no license fishing days’ in New York State. I will need to find pictures of the types of fish it is legal for me to keep, and I have to remember to invite my friend out since I bought her a (cheap like mine) fishing pole.
Okay, so I did manage to have a sale on my Etsy site (thank you to whomever bought the Dino Plushie) and that caused me to realize that I hate having to pay Etsy out of what I had calculated as earnings. I know that people look for inexpensive items, deals, and sales. This means that I’m going to be paying about .20 per item, every quarter (I think that is how often), create listings, and pay for shipping, to make very little if any money. I do plan on creating some spreadsheet and other printable items to put up on Etsy once I have them perfected, to create something like a passive income stream. I have some great ideas I just need to slow down and find enough time to start working on them, I think I might start staying a couple extra hours on the days I’m supposed to leave early, or go to Panera Bread for a couple of hours before I’m supposed to be at work to get these things done.
Due to the slow nature of my Etsy Sales I have decided instead of dripping my products onto Etsy as I get them done, and sort of rushing to get them done, I will take a little more time and sign up for a couple of craft shows this Fall. There is one in September and another in October I would like to sign up for. There are registration fees, I’ll need another table, and I need to take photos of my setup, but all of that should be doable by September. I’m really sort of excited about this, though I am not sure what type of craft I should bring. There is an apple festival that mentions having old-fashioned crafts, so I’m thinking about seeing if spinning and weaving would work for them.
I think that this is long enough of a rambling post to be getting on with for now. Until next time remember to Live Life A Little More Abstract!
Okay, so I have not gotten any real crafting done even though it is over half-way through January. I went to visit family, I was supposed to stay for 4-5 days, then they planned a reunion type event so the stay was extended to 10 days…then two flights were cancelled and I wound up staying closer to 13 days. Fortunately with the holiday I wound up missing only a single day of work and I discovered that I can easily make the drive by myself, since I had to rent a car to get back to my car at the airport.
I had a ton of fun visiting with my Aunts, Uncles, cousins, and cousin’s children while I was there. For a long time I was working 3-4 jobs and taking care of mom so I was unable to go to any family events, plus mom didn’t really want to, so I have a huge gap of time where I lost touch. It is great that I am able to get to know my relatives as adults.
All of that being said, I did not get much crafting done. I brought and completed a small portion of my Tula Nova EPP, however I do not have a photo of it. What I did gain however is a better understanding of what kind of organization might work well for me. One of my cousins has 2 very busy children, however they manage to keep their items in, relative, check with the use of storage furniture. Not just bookcases but storage with drawers that can be labelled. I know, this is not revolutionary information, however I’ve been trying to get away with the cheapest form of storage possible and it just isn’t working. The bookcases always look sloppy and the plastic drawers can rarely hold anything well. I tried ordering Ikea furniture however there were some shipping problems so instead I have some dressers arriving from Home Depot.
Hopefully these can help me to get my materials under control and my home looking like a home instead of a wreck….which honestly right now it looks like a wreck.
Since I am going to focus on getting things in check, then using the supplies I own before purchasing more, my shop is going to take a brief hiatus. I am thinking about switching to a quarterly model where I plan on having a new set of items available every 3 months or so.
I think this is probably enough of an update for now. I’ll hopefully have some crafting content next time, however it might also be some organizing content.
Until next time remember to Live Life a Little More Abstract!
