Saturday 15 December 2012

New beginnings

Wow its been cold here. I'm not built for winter...I was a summer baby born on one of the hottest days of that year apparently! I don't mind winter in general but I think the point at which I stop enjoying it is around 4 or 5 degrees...less than this and I prefer not to leave the house. Snow just isn't funny. The only reason I like winter is that there are far more reasons to knit and I can wear lots of layers of clothing and add scarves, gloves, hats or snuggle up under home made blankets. Spring, Summer and Autumn, however, are just far nicer...I like to be able to feel my ears, nose and feet when I go out for a walk!

Of course, the only reason I like winter at all is because it contains Christmas. I can't believe its only a week or so away. I am nearly done with the gift buying now, just a couple more to get. Then I just need to finish the wrapping, post some gifts to Kent, hand some out next week at work and then I am done. I am impressed at my eldest this year. For the first time she has planned ahead, earn't pocket money and told me not to give it to her so she won't spend it, and is today off to Chester to buy some presents. She's so thoughtful and selfless sometimes. 

Child #1 is also 'favourite child of the week' (I don't really do this but I like to say it and wind them up a little) because she bought home a school progress report yesterday that proved she has really turned things around at school since year 8. In year 8 she didn't really understand that school was there to help her and consequently ended up in most teachers bad books. Year 9 was then tough...she did see that she was in the wrong but had to build up her reputation again. This year most teachers love her...she's clever, she pays attention, she's mature and she's kind. Child #2...well...she's in year 8 and anything her sister can do...she can do better...enough said!! Hopefully she too will soon realise that this isn't the best way to get through school!

So what else have we been up to then recently? I collected these last weekend...



I do like the girl's efforts quite a lot, especially the trainer that child #2 worked so hard on. That mug that I did is now at work and proving to be the best coffee mug in the world...ever! I love it. 

Last weekend I also sewed together a little Owl cushion kit that I bought at the knitting and stitching show. I need to buy some stuffing to finish it off...child #2 has already claimed it for her room. That's ok...I like the pattern but the not the fabric so I shall make another, slightly larger, for downstairs, from other fabric. I will show you later.

The thing that has been taking up most of my time at home, for some weeks now, is very very very nearly ready. It's a little business venture called 'Felicity Stitches'. It was an idea that I played for a couple of months back in the spring when I came home from Wonder Wool Wales. I decided that I wanted to sell kits of some sort after watching people, myself included, spending the day buying other peoples kits and thinking 'I could do that better'. I was going to go with knitting kits to begin with, and then maybe crochet kits. At the same time I was busy completing my Emily Peacock cushion kits too. Now I don't think I can do better kits than Emily Peacock, but they could be as good. So this is the path that Felicity Stitches is currently on...tapestry kits.

I have produced 1 kit. It has taken months. What I didn't appreciate was how complicated and time consuming starting a business was. I didn't expect to be spending a few hours of my life looking at samples of different clear plastic bags and trying to decide if bag A was better than bag B, or bag C,D etc etc. Its the little things like that that have taken up weeks of my life. The actual production of the first cushion only took about a month...everything else has taken far longer!  So, anyway, in some ways it has been really fun and really rewarding. I am now only a couple of steps away from launching the first kit online.  There is still lots of other things to do, like finish the website, produce a few more kits etc etc but once the rest of my stock arrives and I have had a few more pictures taken I can finally launch the first kit, via Etsy! How exciting.

I'll show you the kit shortly - it deserves a post all of it's own. Partly because of the effort put it but it's also special for sentimental reasons too. 

For now I have to go and restore organisation within Vivod. Starting a business has taken its toll on the house to say the least!!  Back soon.

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