September so far

The good news is that thread sales in September were really good so far. I have been doing this for a while, and I should get used to the sales being low during the summer, when everyone is enjoying time outside in the sun rather than inside sewing books and leather goods. But I am always relieved to see sales spike again when in September people begin to think about preparing for the Christmas season. The downside of flourishing thread sales is of course a lack of time for other things than measuring and packing thread. Which is meant to be an excuse for the lack of new work being shown on this blog in recent weeks.

But I have been able to spent some time in the studio and have a little thing to show you: Since a couple of days now I have started a new habit of beginning a studio day with stacking some of my beach finds, and making a quick sketch. It all began with three messages in bottles that had such covers. (If you want to see them, click here, here, and here for the three bottles.). I like this self-imposed small task: Often I am not completely convinced by the outcome, but I can always blame the fact that it is supposed to be a quick sketch and not something time and energy consuming, so I can always tell myself that I could have done better with more time. And overall I very much enjoy this little thing and the look of what comes out of it. Some if its attraction also stems from that is not supposed to really go anywhere, and therefore is not something that needs to get finished.

Other than that I feel a little worn thin at the moment. We have had 2 weeks now with all 4 of us taking turns on being sick. Last Sunday it was my turn. However, I also had thread to ship, so I kept working until I really just couldn’t anymore. That evening I was absolutely drained. Next day I felt better, however, dear husband was badly hit so I was back at the front line. Luckily little boy could go back to nursery. (He had been sick the week before.) But little girl had three things at a time: the virus we were all suffering from, a skin infection at her back which must have been itching like crazy, and she was feeling nauseous and had a loose nappy. And I can tell you, a kid with a nappy flowing over with poo is hard to clean when the kid is squirming madly when on her back because it itches too badly. Things were uggly, I better leave it at that and do not paint you a more detailed picture; probably that was more than you wanted to know anyway…

But, today they are both in nursery, M. in his office. I started work on a new instruction, and the first illustration (to be used in the introduction) is currently being finished on my table. So, everything seems back to normal now.