All Fingers and Thumbs

Studio. Soon. Still stuttering along in the cleaning and tidying stages . Some days that makes me despair it will ever be usable. Some days I know this preparation is just part of the cycle. That's where I am today and where I'm going to try and stay. I'm preparing the ground, committing the space, making a firm foundation for what I feel will be a big new wave of creativity. I've been fallow for a long time now. Little dabbles here and there: I have a cardigan all but done I'm itching to show off and I've made forays into many new areas with classes this year. They have been so important for me in helping me hold on to the identity of crafter and yet... Classes are like a wander off to a well tended park and sometimes I come back refreshed and sometimes they have made me cast ever more harsh eyes at the mess and chaos in my living space and specifically amongst my supplies. Happily that is not how I feel after needle felting and I have the perfect baske...

Another class as part of the 2013 schedule to try ALL the craft s. This time taught by the totally wonderful Gretel Parker at my local yarn shop, The Fibreworks Oxford . Class buddy Mama at my side, we studiously (and not so studiously) applied needles to roving (and happily rarely to fingers) to sculpt something Christmassy. Or if you were me (egged on by Gretel I feel) started out with a dinky, dainty Christmas cottage in mind and ended up with a substantial mushroom house. It must be my new freewheeling attitude, I just let the roving do what it wanted. Scuse the grainy photos, we work with iphones and limited light the best we can. I think the totally adorable nature of the creations shines through. The row of the worlds cutest wee cottages are Gretel's perfection, the last photo is mine. Still a WIP. Roving on its way from the very efficient Adelaide Walker to add a few last touches. And to begin creating the entire woodland village currently living in my hea...