Reboot

Wow, a year and a half since my last post, since I lost Indra. I'm now married, have a ginger kitten who's a ball of chaos and fur, I'm obsessed with Ravelry and pretty much live there.

I'm going to leave all the old posts up, but I am beginning anew. I want to write about the songs, poems and quotes that have kept me going through some very dark times, and that have made my times of joy more precious. My mother gave me a love of words - always entreating me to listen to the lyrics of songs and not just the music. We still share new music and poetry that we find that has touched our souls, and I want to keep a record of how these words have changed me.

It's mostly for me, obviously - but I hope that someone may stumble on my blog and find something that will give them healing, or laughter, or understanding.

So I'll start when I've had a bit more sleep :-)

Loss

Indra, the heart of my heart, died on Thursday evening. She went into kidney failure quite suddenly, and in the evening had a massive seizure that they couldn't get her back from. I wasn't there.

I seem to lose her again at least 100 times a day. Every time I stand up and wait for her to come get under my feet as she follows me from room to room, every time I turn to look for her to see how she's doing, every time I cry and she' not there insistently trying to hug me like she always did when I cried. Coming home is the worst part - I always loved coming home, I'd walk in and she'd be in the hallway, or at least blinking sleepily when I turned the corner into the living room. She'd miaow at me and I'd miaow back, and then she'd pad over to me and insist on a hug and some scratches before I did anything else. Now she's not there when I come in, and I say hello to an empty room. When I look down to her sleeping spot, she's not there, and never will be again.

Bellatrix the Bat

Eep! I just put my first pattern up on Etsy for all to see (and hopefully buy!). She is Bellatrix the Bat - a pattern I created around Halloween but forgot to write notes for, so when Jo tried to steal my one I had to make another one and wrote the pattern as I went along!

The pattern is 10 pages long (?!) with lots of how-to photos, and can be bought from my etsy store at : Etsy

Here are some pics for your perusal - if you'd like the pattern and it's disappeared from the shop, please do email me and we'll sort something out :-)

For Sheena

Sheena (Antoinette)and I are both fishy Pisceans - and we share a lot of artistic swimminess. She gave me a beautiful turquoise glass and hematite star bracelet that she had made, and I gave her these seahorses. As soon as I saw them on Craft Magazine's blog, I knew they had to be made for her, and I'm going to have to make some for me now too... It was hard finding felt without wool in it that I could use, but finally found some great colours. The pattern is at Futuregirl, and she has some fantastic things in her store - I also bought the octopus pattern for future makings.... I was going to make these into a wee mobile for her, but decided she'd probably end up using them as necklaces or something so I left them for her to decide :-)

For Geraldine

Geraldine saw the hair falls I'd made for myself one night - I was wearing them for a poker night for some reason (I think all the boys were wearing cowboy hats and I felt left out) - and she loved them. Mine are turquoise and silver, but I asked her bloke what colours she'd like and made a pair for her for Christmas. They're shades of purple and dark red, and she loved them (I hope!). Here's them on their own and me wearing them...

For Andrew

My brother is a DJ - old style vinyl and turntables and everything. He recently moved into his girlfriend's house, and although he'd slimmed down his record collection by about 9/10ths, they still moved a Defender's worth of records in. He collects records like I collect yarn, but yarn is lighter....

So I made this - it's a little rough around the edges because I was making it in secret on Christmas Eve and rushing! It's a stress record - for him when his music isn't working out right, and for his girlfriend, when he drives her mental. She liked the idea, but said it didn't have a brick in it, so wouldn't work quite as well as she'd like ;-)

For Elana

Elana is wonderful and I'm very lucky to have her alongside me on our knitting journey. We both learn different things about all kinds of crafts, and then teach each other our newfound skills. We both like to experiment and see what we can do with yarn and material and clay and glass and card and paper and silver and wire and anything else that inspires us. For her pure silk, I chose leafy greens and some dashes of turquoise, and the resulting yarn is called Forest Witch, for that is what Elana is at heart, and it's as beautiful as she is :-)