First off, many of you know that I work a lot - A LOT a lot - of hours between the dyeing I do for the shop and my clubs and shows and wholesale clients, and my design work, and this past year I've been doing photography and styling duties as half of the Stitch Definition team. I also have continued to put in 28 hours a week at a day job - but I'm really happy to say that's coming to an end as of October 8th. I put in my notice there and will work out my 2 weeks' worth of hours (which I've already made a dent in - today's the end of week 1). I am sincerely hoping this will give me back some better balance of home/work/life in a way that doesn't have me tired and hoping for a nap pretty much all day long. So a big thank-you to all of you who have, over the last several years, supported my yarn and fiber and design endeavors for finally helping me get to this place!
I'm hoping that will mean some more frequent shop updates and some more designs coming off the needles and to that end, while I will still certainly be posting things about knitting and designing here, I'm going to also plan on posting to the blog content section of the shop website with new releases and other business-related things. I hope, if you enjoy reading about things here, you will also consider bookmarking that feed as well to keep on top of shop going-ons.
One of the things I would like to add back into my life is some sewing and in light of that, I've dug out a project I started under the radar a while back and haven't really made any progress on (see above - home/work/life) but I'm hoping that will change. I cleaned off my sewing table, organized and put things into separate plastic bins so I can keep pieces straight, and decided I'd like to work a bit on the first month of Bertie's Year. You can see all of the month's blocks here on Pinterest.
While I think I'd say this type of quilt isn't necessarily me, there's something about this little bird and his seasonal adventures that grabbed me - maybe it's because I can hear my Gram saying things about "little birds" in my head? (She loved birds. Loved having them outside her window and in her flower garden, and just adored their personalities. Maybe that's the hook for me.) At any rate, all the blocks are done with cotton flannel using a fusible web applique technique, which I hadn't done in this fashion before, but find I really like.
I've had the January block started and this week I fused on the little red hat and snowman's nose, which I'll get whip-stitched into place. After that, there are a set of green leaves to add, and then the decorations of some embroidery and red buttons in place of holly berries. I also plan to finish cutting the squares that form the triangular border if I have time.
I've been a bit on the fence about whether I wanted to do each block separately or put them all together as a larger wall-type square quilt, but I think I've settled on separate blocks, which I can then hang in 3 tiers together. This will mean that I actually have something finished to show for my time and effort and I think having the smaller projects to finish will help me stay motivated to work on all the months.
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