Finding Your Cheese

When I was first made redundant last month my husband bought me this card. It made me smile and it made me think. I still have it up in my kitchen to remind myself that anything is possible.

You get that a lot when you get made redundant - people telling you to look on it as a positive thing not a negative thing, which is great. But also makes you feel quite panic stricken with terror and pressure to really make this count. Don't fritter away all your redundancy payment - do something meaningful with it. Go do what you've always wanted to do.

Good advice right? But what do I want to do?

Do I want to go find another job doing what I was doing before? Sure I loved my job, but was it more because of the people I worked with and the fantastic work that the organisation did that I really believed in? Or was it the satisfaction of actually doing the job? Is it what I really really want to do?

I have done quite a lot of soul searching over the past few months and I think that there are certainly other things I would enjoy doing more, but they are not all that practical.

I have a large mortgage, a ridiculously 'characterful' house that is a little like the Money Pit* only on a less grand scale, and two small children whose feet keep growing and whose needs keep changing. This week my daughter wants to take up the flute... gah... have you seen the price of flutes?

So I need to be practical right?

*Oh by the way here is one of my favourite scenes from The Money Pit - for nostalgia! And to remind us that things can ALWAYS be worse:

So... where was I? Oh yes...so I made a long list of ideal careers way back when redundancy was just a concept in December - and I didn't really think it would happen to me. But it was good research. I found that 90% of my dream careers I am too late for.

I'd love to do something really useful, be an expert in something that people really need. Or something creative that is fun. Like interior design, garden design, art restoration or become an optician, a midwife or a sonographer... the list was long... but gradually I whittled it down and realised that without going back to study full time at great expense. None of these ideas were really going anywhere.

So what now...? Keep fingers crossed I would get another job in the shake up and not be made redundant... well that didn't work out so good did it?

So at this point my ever supportive husband gave me a book which really changed my outlook.

It's written by Dr Spencer Johnson and is called: Who Moved My Cheese?

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Who-Moved-My-Cheese-Amazing/dp/0091816971

It's a very short book but if you want the easy option you can watch the video here:

The basic premise is that "change happens - they keep moving the cheese!" The 'cheese' in my case being my lovely comfortable job that I had been doing for the past 12 years. Which I thought would always be there for me, even when the signs were everywhere that it was not really a given that I would have a job after the re-shuffle, I still thought deep down, that it would always be there. 

In the story there are 4 characters, two mice called Sniff and Scurry and two little people called Hem and Haw. 

The mice don't overthink things and when the cheese is gone they go too and look for new cheese in the big scary maze of the unknown. Hem and Haw however react rather differently - with their big human brains they angst and regret and overthink and worry themselves into paralysis. 

I won't spoil the whole thing for you but the basic message is good, the basic message is: What would you do if you weren't afraid? Go enjoy change - savor the adventure!

Now nobody really likes change, so enjoying it is quite a stretch, but I love the idea of asking yourself what you would do if you weren't afraid?

So for the moment, I am venturing forth into the maze to look for my new cheese. I am lucky enough to have a little bit of breathing space financially to think about what I would like to do and to learn some new skills and work on my hobbies and see if they take me anywhere and if not, then I have a broad range of digital skills that I can fall back on. Maybe I can even do both. In the modern world we live in, it is becoming more and more possible to work flexibly and fit in project work around your other commitments, be it children or hobbies or both! 

So I wish good luck to anyone out there in a similar boat to me - let's try not to be scared - get out there into the maze of life and look for some new cheese to make you happy. When you stop being afraid you feel good! So be kind to yourself, try to keep that rising sense of financial panic in check, push it down back into it's jar and screw the lid on tight and go out and enjoy the adventure while you can.

I wonder where it will take us?

Peggy Sue, Peggy Sue...Pretty Pretty Pretty Pretty Peggy Sue...

It's been bugging me for some time now that my peg bucket for hanging out the washing is just all kinds of wrong.

It's a pretty enough oval tin with a hook, which, at the time of buying I thought was pretty and cute. However, over the years I have come to realise it is not really practical for the job in hand.

For starters you can't keep it attached to your person, so you have to keep hanging it on the line and then as you peg more and more clothes up, it gets buried and lost and you have to dive under layers of clothes to retrieve it.

I have dropped it more times than I would like to admit, spilling pegs all over the grass.

It is not big enough for all the pegs I have, so I have to peg some pegs all the way around the edge which both uses up some pegs and makes the bucket taller to house more pegs inside, but it takes longer then when you unpeg your washing to clip them all back on again.

It rusts if you leave it out in the rain.

It hurts when it falls off and lands on your foot.

In short... it is no good.

I started thinking that if I could create some sort of bag that had a shoulder strap then I could put it on and have the pegs with me wherever I went around the washing line and not lose them. They would be close at hand and I could pull them out like a revolver from a holster to peg up the washing, quick and easy. Quick and easy too, to put them away again in the midst of a rain storm when you rush out to get your washing in.

So I started looking at tote bag patterns and thinking about how I could make one with some kind of hook on it too, so that I could hang it on the washing line while the washing was out.

Then I stumbled upon this lovely pattern for peg bags made with a child's coathanger from Just Jude Designs I love the hole for putting pegs in and out and love love loved the applique washing line.

I started wondering if I could adapt this pattern to include a shoulder strap? How hard can it be, I thought to myself...

So I bought the pattern and yesterday spent a very merry couple of hours making up the peg bag. So proud was I at the end when it looked pretty much as it ought, much better and neater even than I had imagined possible.

My husband came home from work and I showed him my bag and said look look, see how beautiful it is... look what I have achieved today!

And he said... "That's very nice dear, where is the shoulder strap?"

Ah... oh yes... that was sort of the whole point wasn't it... I wanted to add a shoulder strap so that I could have it with me as I peg out the washing and pull out pegs revolver style... remember?

Ooops.

So I leave it for a day, and today I have another look, pull it all inside out again and hum and haw about whether or not I can face unpicking my beautiful neat stitching to add in a strap...

I did in the end, and of course it got twisted and some of the seam ended up poking through as well and it is not quite perfect but... I do now have what I set out to do - a lovely new peg bag complete with shoulder strap! 

Now I just need to go do some washing...

Land Ahoy Shipmates!

What's a Pirate's favourite shop to shop at?

Arrrrrrr-gos!

That's my son's favourite joke at the moment, or it's the only one he can remember. But it works well for a pirate mad six year old and he gets a few giggles from it, which is more than can be said for some of his made up jokes...

We recently decided to build him a new bed in his room as he had outgrown his Ikea toddler bed, and as his room was so small, we thought a mid-sleeper might offer him best use of space. So my clever hubbie set to while we went swanning off to visit my parents for a few days over the holidays. When we returned he had a new bed! Ta da! But... he needed some sort of curtain to make the bottom half into a den. This is where I come in...

Now, I thought to myself, what sort of curtain would a pirate crazy little boy like in his room? I know... an applique pirate ship - I'm sure I can do that... how hard can it be? Says me... never having appliqued anything in my life before.

So I toddle down to Hobby Craft and buy a shed load of felt, I google how to make tab tops and I find a old cot sheet that happens to be pretty much the perfect size for the gap we need to cover and then I began.

And I made this little fella...

So proud was I to have made him, I decided to make more, and you know what? I really really enjoyed it. Who knew applique could be such fun? And felt... what a marvel - it doesn't fray so you don't need to worry about sewing some fancy zig zag stitch all the way around. And it is so easy to cut and shape.

I bought some leather looky likey material too for the top edge of the ship - which also does not fray - hurrah!

And some hessian for the ship - which frays like mad... (not so hurrah).

Had great fun buying bits and bobs to make it more textured, like the feather for the parrot's tale and the buttons for the pirates coats, and the polystyrene rings for the portholes.

I learnt a lot making it. And had a lot of fun. And when Louis grows out of Pirates, we can make a new one with a different theme. I hope he wants space or something inspiring, am already thinking up how I could applique spaceships and stars...  might be a little tricky if he gets heavily into tupperware or stamp collecting! 

Here is the finished article... my son is delighted... at last something for him - not just girls dresses for his big sister... ha ha... or should I say....oooo arrr!

I Wish Tamara Was My Mummy...

Although this blog is primarily about the skills I hope to pick up since my redundancy, I think it is only fair to start from the beginning, my first 'how hard can it be' moment.

There I was innocently watching 'The Great British Sewing Bee' last year with my daughter Eloise, when she gave a big sigh and said: "I wish Tamara was my mummy and that man was my daddy, then I would have lots of lovely clothes to wear."

The sound of the gauntlet crashing down was still ringing in my ears as I was madly googling 'sewing classes near Bishop's Stortford' the next day.

Now I think it is only fair to say at this moment that up until that point, my sewing skills only extended as far as sewing on a stray button or a brownie badge, possibly taking up a hem, although I had even discovered wunderweb to avoid the horrors of that particular sewing task.

My mum often reminds me of my first sewing project as a child, when after hurtling down the driveway with my brothers on the back of our 6 wheeler scrambler toy, I tore my pleated woollen skirt - and after much shouting from my mother, I flew upstairs in a rage - determined to prove this was no biggie and fix it myself. Well... the results were not very impressive and my relationship with sewing took a rather sour turn after that.

Aside from making a fried egg bean bag at school, I was never taught to use a sewing machine, and they terrified me. I didn't understand them, how on earth can a single needle going up and down possibly produce a row of neat stitches. And from what I had seen, you spend the far more of your time untangling and unpicking than you do sewing.

So sewing and I had parted company at an early age.

Until now, until my own flesh and blood decided that no matter how many things I did for her, it was a mother that could SEW that was what she wanted. And me, being of quite stubborn stock, thought well fine... in that case... I shall learn to sew.

How hard can it be?

Lucky for me, I stumbled upon Rebecca Woollard's wonderful sewing school:  and it wasn't very far away and I could do a one day course on dress-making on my day off.

Arriving at her shop on that Friday morning with my daughter's £39 John Lewis sewing machine I was surprised to find the whole experience a wonderful retreat of peace and calm and creativity. I made a blouse. Me... a whole blouse! With princess lines and buttonholes and set in sleeves... oh brave new world...

Since then, I have made 4 summer dresses for my daughter, I have altered and added borders to curtains, made an applique pirate curtain for my son's mid-sleeper bed. A picture of a tree and some greetings cards.

Sewing - I love you! All is forgiven. Now, armed with my new best friend - a Janome electronic sewing machine, I am venturing out into the unknown... oh happy days...