The Simple Things

I started out this week purging my sewing/craft room. Monday was spent emptying out the closet. In the mumbo jumbo therein, I went through journals, writing from college, awards, photographs, letters, etc. of my past life. It's so hard to know what to throw away and what to keep and if I keep it, what good is it going to do me or my posterity? (apologies for poor sentence structure) I made the stack smaller and gave it space on one shelf. As with most things, I gave my subconscious the task to deal with this at a later date but for now, it had been thinned down and tucked away neatly.

The next item on my agenda were my embroidery projects. I have been hand sewing for over 20 years and in that time I have accumulated more than a lifetime of projects. They had already had a home of their own in three neat boxes and some project cases yet, were just jumbled altogether. So I dumped them all out, sorted through the "started on's" "yet to be started" and "started but am I really going to finish them?" piles. I had to use a little tough love with myself. I was pretty harsh. It was a reality check into the reality of, "If I am to finish any of these, I need to figure out what to work on, when, how much time to give them and then to come up with a goal." It's pretty amazing the peace that comes when you face a problem head on like this and work out a solution. One of the things I will be doing is working on a huge petite point sampler and have given myself the goal of 30 minutes a day at least five days a week. This will be spent as I listen to inspirational subject matter. Goal one set!

Happy Birthday sampler before

Winter sampler before finishing

The second thing I accomplished this week, was I finished two small cross stitches! How silly I am for buying such things and then working on them about 40% and tossing them aside?

In about 2-3 hours of labor, I finished both AND then prepared one of them to be framed. 

Framing is indeed the most expensive side of hand sewing. I can see having many projects completed but then just await a frame. (sadly, I already know this to be the case having quite a few finished and mounted pieces but no way to display them) This is another problem I am hoping to work out and for the most part have. If I can, I will be mounting them to fit standard frame sizes and then just using ones I purchased at any store. They may not be as beautiful as custom framing and I have had the idea of learning how to build frames by myself but for now, I've only entertained the idea.

I had a $2 frame leftover from my remodel of Danielle's room that I thought might work and do you know what? It does! It may not be anything fancy nor fit precisely but it's cute! I usually sign all my work but this piece was really small and felt like the signature would just be too much for it.

I thought this would be a really cute thing to display the day any of my family have a Birthday. It's done! Check one off my list of completed projects! It is true, the simple things in life do give so much pleasure and I feel a great satisfaction in having done this.

My sewing room might be an utter disaster still but I have made a big dent in prioritizing what I will be working on and what I'll finish. I have one portfolio filled with two projects that will be the worked on until completion this year. Stay tuned to see how their journey turns out and what else fits into the line-up.

Metal Constipation

Is it any wonder that "procrastination" and "constipation" have a similar sound to them? I've been pondering this to myself as of late.

2012 heralds my year of "Past Projects and Good Intentions." I have done very little to work on this. So it is with the "year of's". I had already learned this in the past with the only other themed year I participated in. Yet, as the year progressed, the thought burrowed deep into my subconscious where it worked itself out and in the end, it was better the following year than it ever was in the year it was proclaimed.

Let's get back to the metal constipation, shall we? Like with any problem that gets backed up, one searches for ways to unclog and I became painfully aware that what I needed was a good mental enema. I have so many projects started with the good intentions of finishing them but with no time constraint or goal set, it is easy to put aside what I needed to do.

One of the thoughts in the forefront led me to where I am today;

My sewing craft room in unorganized.

How can I organize myself when clearly the outside world shows my state of mind? I will never accomplish what I need when I have no clear foundation for starting. With that statement, I go to my craft room to start the purging. Carpe Diem!

Introduction

Hi! If you've stumbled upon my little blog, welcome!

My name is Kim and I am a 38 year old mother of four with many talents. I sew, I cook, I write, I play music, and I am handy with power tools. Without tooting my horn, I can pick up most things that require skill and am able to do them. I don't know why that is. Hence my problem… I haven't quite honed into what it is that is my forté or what I want to be when I grow up. Perhaps it is that I don't mind having the ability to do what I want. I just want to do something well. I mean, brilliantly well. So it begins. A blog to record what it is that I do.