New Year, New Beginnings

The start of a new year is very welcome to me, this last year has been a complete blur. At the beginning of the year I had just come back from university after just 3 months and the decision that it really wasn’t for me. I was working part time in a chocolate shop and living back home. Not much happened for a while, until April when I started working in a clothes shop with a good friend who had suggested me for the job, so now I was working two jobs. I desperately wanted a full time job, with enough money to move out of home and get my own place. On a whim I applied on-line for a job at the flagship Topshop store on Oxford Street in London, I went for an interview and to my great surprise I actually got the job, this meant moving back to London somewhere I had been sure I wouldn’t return.

The job was okay for a month, but I soon realised I was working far more than I had expected and some of my shifts didn’t finish till 10pm. I was pretty unhappy, homesick and still barely making enough money so I decided to call it a day. I stayed in London till August and looked around for other jobs, but no luck, so back home I went. I signed up to do a craft fair and worked hard making my little soft toys and knitted scarves. The show was on the 27th of August, bank holiday weekend and it was a bright sunny day.

I had twittered the night before that I was going to a craft fair and one of my contacts Aral asked me where it was, and what I was selling. I told him that I had made soft toys and he wanted to meet to see if it would be possible to make this little guy into a softie. The day after the fair we meet for dinner, and that night he asked me to go to Boston with him where he was speaking at a conference. I agreed and the rest is history, we’ve been together mostly everyday since and I moved in early November.

There was another fair in December, and I was planning to launch a pet project this spring, but I think that is going to have to wait, for now at least. Christmas was another blur, I was working up until Christmas Eve, and Aral was ill also, but we had a nice day with lots of lovely presents (felting wool, wooden knitting needles) and a delicious lunch Everyone loved my handmade gifts which included an apron, necklace, needle case, crocheted glasses case, and hand decorated cups.

But now it’s time for a new start, I will be helping Aral this year with Singularity, I am planning a very early spring clean for next week, and I have several projects on the go as usual. Aral’s re-worked scarf is nearly done, I am knitting myself a very short muffler scarf with the thrifted vintage Jaeger Baroque, and I have started work on a crocheted blanket in Patons washed haze with four colours of crocheted squares, this is my first blanket so it’s very simple and I’ll see how I go.

I hope you had a great holiday season , and a happy new year to all!