Mental turbulance

It's been a long time since I posted. The past couple of weeks have seen a lot of mental turbulence - quite typical for bipolar disorder but nonetheless pretty unpleasant.

I have managed to keep up with the filing and my area of the sitting room has been reorganised. That was partly due to the mess generally, but largely due to synesthesia. This is a condition where senses become conflated. So, when I see this:

I don't just see lime green, I FEEL clean hands.

When I see this:

I don't just see yellow, I hear wood pigeons cooing.

This:

is not just red, it is the sound and smell of the beach, including waves, seagulls and fish and chips!

Turquoise is a tricky one:

Some days, just looking at this would make me physically nauseous as it smells overwhelmingly of play dough to me.

So, in reorganising, I have put my bright acrylics more or less out of direct sight and next to me I have my wool, cotton, alpaca and silk yarns. I always seem to choose muted colours in these, which are nice and soothing.

I am also exploring the physical, mental, spiritual and financial implications of starting a new craft. No details yet, but a few hints:

Lots of Mindfulness practice to try to keep centred, reading 'Spirit of the Home' and 'Quaker Faith and Practice' and my new favourite bog, nestledunderrainbows

Organised? Me? Part 1

There may be MANY parts to this Organisation blog.

Those who have known me for a long time will attest to the fact that until my first major breakdown in 2009 I was super organised. After 2009, things have been going downhill in terms of home organisation,, but until I left teaching last year, I still maintained a very organised classroom, planning and assessing schedule and kept myself up to date with professional issues.

Now, though, things are terrible.

I don't know if it's because Spring is in the air, or because we have hit rock bottom in the house, but I have this compulsion to organise and declutter.

We went to Staples yesterday and bought some resources:

A handy dandy portable filing box and hanging files. We have 2 metal filing cabinets in the hall. One is beautifully organised with files pre 2009. The other is just a jumble of post 2009 papers, not even in files. Hence, this new portable box, in which I intend to keep our most frequently used files. We have decided just to dump the contents of metal file cabinet #2 into a big box and put it under the bed. 

I have been watching dozens of YouTube videos about organising (yes, get a life Piggles)and was taken with all the references to a label 
maker. So the Finster also purchased this:

The photo's a bit dark, but it is a hand held Brother label maker. We have to wait until tonight when the batteries come in our Sainsbury's shop, and then we can play around with it.

I decided today that I could tackle the 'in tray':

Pretty impressive filing, huh?

I needed to gather all the papers up, but that raised the spectre of the *ahem* dining table. To give the full effect of its beauty, I took shots from a number of angles:

So, 'Operation Sweepstake'. I would love to be able to say that I put everything away, but in the interests of honesty, I just dumped them elsewhere in the tip  sitting room.  But I did end up with a table like this:

I gathered the papers up and put them in a real in tray:

One and a half hours later, all the stuff that could be filed was in newly created alphabeticised files, in date order and all logical. All that remained was various questionnaires and forms that we have to fill in - hopefully tonight, sitting at our cleared table:

Just a little glimpse of some of the glory that awaits my attention...and this is only 1 room in the flat. It really is a visual statement of what mental illness looks like:

Keep watching for each day's transformed section!

I need a break

I need to get into a rhythm of not being in employment. I am in the most fortunate position of being able to determine my own schedule and yet I have found myself slipping into old habits. For me, this means obsessing over a project and excessively striving for perfection.

I gave myself a talking to this morning. I sat in my crafting corner and my heart sank. I have sickened myself of critters by doing nothing but them for so long. I have got into the position of having lots of partly finished projects:

This group all need dresses or jumpers and skirts 

This poor girl needs quite a lot of finishing:

I crocheted a sweater for this bear. It fits well but I HATE the way it looks and feels - it's all clunky and thick. So he requires clothes:

I have made the pieces for a pair of dungarees for this bear, but they have to be sewn up and blocked:

I got so bored with this dress, I even left it part way through a row!

So, I dug through some bags to find a project I just embarked on before the Christmas frenzy. It is a lovely, bright, hooky project.

I got the idea from the brilliant Bunny Mummy blog. Basically, it is just 7 round Granny Squares, but in each square you just use colours from 3 of the following colour groups:

1.  Blue/turquoise

2.  Lilac/purple

3.  Pink/red

4.  Green

5.  Orange

6.  Yellow

You can get amazingly different results from using different tones in each colour group. Although it doesn't show too clearly, I have tried to indicate this with photos of the already completed squares:

What is even more surprising, is the vast amount of cat hairs on the squares, bearing in mind they have been wrapped in a plastic bag, inside a project bag. A triumph even for this household!

I shall watch some YouTube podcasts about yarn, craft rooms and organising stashes whilst taking a break and having a bit of crafting fun.

I have had a word of mouth commission for 2 dressed rabbits, but they are not due for a while yet.

Bunny and Bear

I unearthed a bag of various rather creepy looking body parts of animals. I KNOW that when I put them away, I had very clear ideas about how I was going to use them.

Surprise, surprise...all that information has disappeared into the ether!

So, looking at my supplies (which I tidied)), I decided to make these two littlies. The bear has all the PigglesBoo buttons and ribbons, but the bunny is suitable for small children, with no parts that can cause choking.

Here they are.

Miss Kitty

This is Clarrie Rabbit

They have turned out the way I wanted and are now for sale on PigglesBoo on Etsy.

Oh yum!

At New Year, we made a commitment to eating more healthily. Since then, my mental and physical health have both been very poor and for the last couple of weeks we have eaten rubbish, including lots of take outs. For me, now, a take out signals being ill, rather than a treat.

We pulled ourselves together enough last week, to explore Abel and Cole. This is a delivery service that works with organic farmers and food producers. All their stuff is traceable back to the farm and is all ethically sourced.

At 9.30 this morning, our new delivery man came to the door bearing lots of (recycled) cardboard boxes.

I was so excited! Normally the Sainsbury's delivery makes me think 'gird your loins, Piggles, and just get it over with'.

What a difference today. Everything fresh and lovely.

It all smelled and felt wholesome. The bags at the back hold cabbage and sprouting broccoli. I will have to surf the web a bit to look for red cabbage recipes. There was also some celery, but that made its way into the dairy products photo:

Organic cheeses, houmous, salmon, cream ( a Texan needs cream in coffee!), whole milk and Guernsey milk, wild mackerel pate and breads. Oh yum. Lunch will be a dense rye and spelt bread with mackerel pate, houmous and vegetable sticks. *I think I might have dribbled a little there*

Then there is fresh fruit. We tend to eat more fruit than veg, but we are attempting to switch that around. Here is the fruit box:

I can report that my cup of tea with the organic whole milk has been a very tasty accompaniment to writing this.

Planning ahead

I have been absent for a week because I have had 3 changes to my medication for bi-polar disorder. This has left me in an unstable state with little or no motivation to do anything. Things are improving now, though, so I can share some of the things that I have been able to do.

Firstly, a rabbit and a bear have been finished and I love the way they have turned out:

Because she has little snails on her skirt, among the flowers and fruit, I have called her Margot Escargot!

She has been made with some gorgeous new yarn...but more of that later.

This one is Birdie Bear:

                    Isn't this fabric adorable?

I have had a couple of deliveries of the most seductive yarn *sigh*.   
I love it so much, I have arranged it in a wire and wicker tray right by where I sit:

Both yarns are by Drops. The fuzzy, fluffy stuff is Alpaca Silk - 77% alpaca and 33% silk. I am using it doubled with 4mm needles for the head, body, ears and arms of critters.

The coloured yarn is Cotton Merino - 52% wool and 48% cotton. It is very soft and knits up beautifully using 3.25mm needles.

As I said, my knitting mojo life mojo has been almost non existent. What I have done, however, is a lot of daydreaming, putting together different colour combinations in my head. I then had the bright idea of actually photographing different combos so I didn't have to try to remember them. These are for the next few projects I have planned (in no specific order):

I am looking forward to getting back to normal. My bunny and bears are in my Etsy shop...perfect for a Valentine or Easter gift!