Bristol harbour on a Sunday and some thoughts.

I love this image of balance and touch.

Portishead Harbour

boat traffic signals

I wonder what it would be like to live on the harbourside?

Nice to have a yellow front door

I like watching the lifeboat go through their manoeuvers.

A hopeful February stand, outside the RNLI shop

An interesting beach here on the estuary when the tide goes out. Lots of pottery and glass.

All the old buildings have been converted into houses.

They do like their pastels here.

I took these a few weeks ago. It seemed a shame not to share. I do love a day out. Takes me out of my normal way of thinking. I must do more. I love exploring. I'm enjoying my camera again. I haven't taken a single shot on my phone hardly this year.

I think I'm re-connecting with myself again. I'm blogging, taking photos, making things. Listing on etsy. I'm really enjoying flickr. It's so nice to see pictures again in landscape and portrait, I find so much inspiration there. My ideas of what I want to to do are beginning to crystalize.

I'd like to say it's because I'm not going on instagram. But I think that would be giving it too much credit. I've been cutting out a lot of other distractions as well. I'm trying to maintain a focus, which I didn't have before, or if I did it was constantly diluted by everything else. Sometimes I think I am just being solitary, but deep down I know I need this to touch on something in myself.

There is still so much inspiration out there. It doesn't go away, because your not scrolling daily through feeds. It reaches you anyway, and in other ways. I think it strengthens your intention. Now I scroll through a little list in my head of things which I have decided I want to make/do/learn and decide what needs to happen next to move me towards that.

I feel like I'm starting to follow my own path. And I have to weigh that up as more important than knowing what's happening else where. The important stuff finds you anyway. That's what I think. Sometimes I just get a prompt to go somewhere and there is something I was glad I didn't miss.

So I think I need to trust that what I need and what inspires me is going to cross my path anyway, and there has been so much inspiration over the last few years, I feel like it's time to assimulate some of it.

Some life stuff happened here over the last week or so, which threatened to tip me off down a slippery slope. Just some sad things which happen in our lives now and again. Without my new found structure of daily stretching and clearer thinking, I think I would have toppled into a kind of crisis. But I'm happy to say that I was able to see the warning signs and adjust my thinking accordingly, and make some decisions to hold steady in what's right for me, and what I can do. We don't have to be heroes. We don't need to feel guilty about what we can't do. We just need to find that place where we can be okay in our selves and all that radiates out from that point. I read a good quote this week: 'draw in to be able to beam out your light more further', by Lindsay Mack on Alana Hellbig's Podcast, Untangled. I like that. 

So here we are at the weekend. I hope you do some nice things. I will be out another teenage 'airsoft' mission this Sunday. In a new place, yay! Well a new old place, nearer to the outskirts of London, where I am from. So I'll see what that brings. I've got some lovely new wool too, so it could be lots of crochet somewhere. I'm kind of hoping :-) Enjoy.

♥

sunday coffee stop

Sunday: teenager playing airsoft in Bristol. I'm the driver. He needs the stress busting exercise. I need the self-imposed free time. To wander with the dog. Drink coffee here and there. Follow my thoughts and fall asleep in the car if I so fancy.

I found this place made of huge old containers from shipping, next to the harbourside. It was full of dogs and their peoples...I was happy I had followed my gut and walked the way I did. Who wants to leave their dog outside in the cold, when they could be lolling around on a rug in here...

There was a red suitcase on display....I'll remember to look inside it next time, maybe give it a little dust on top ;-)

I said no the gluten free cake because it had sugar in it and then I ate the fudge that came with the coffee, so I could have had the cake. I got toppled. I wished I'd eaten the date and cashew nut bar in my bag instead, but you know I am not perfect. My not perfect habits have changed a lot though.

Wishing you a happy Wednesday folks.

♥ 

coffee and crochet and a loopy lou!

I think February is looking like being a coffee and crochet month! Since I started last months 30 day craftathon, finished items are just flying off my hook. My shop is starting to fill up again. I am wading through what needs to be finished and just looking out for some brighter days to photograph things. There is one thing that has been waiting so patiently for me to show you.

It actually all began in here, all the way back in May last year, on a day out in Bristol. I had travelled up on the train with my son and he had gone to meet friends for the day. I was wondering around the quite new to me city, looking for a pit stop and somewhere to sit and cast on my new project. This sign in the city center called me in,  I liked the sound of the 'lush coffee' the 'banging salads' and the comfy sofas!

The vintage decoration inside ticked all the right boxes, it was vibey, full of students, vintage clothes were for sale. I was served by a guy wearing baggy jeans, a jumper from the eighties and the kind of curly hair do which left me thinking he might have been my boyfriend from 1986!.... I love the way vintage now includes the 1980's as well.

 

I sunk down into one of the eighties black leather sofas and tried to look inconspicuous amongst the students. With the Blackcurrent Frangipani cake and the 'lush coffee' for company I cast on for my Loopy Lou. I figured crochet was kind of vintage looking anyway.....!  This was the first time I had ever followed a longer pattern. Initially I cast on with the wrong colour, and then had to begin again. I tried to rush through without reading it properly, lessons were learned! I used a too small cochet hook as well, and then had crochet really loosely from that point on. Also if the pattern is a repeat you need to make sure you have read it correctly otherwise you will have to keep repeating the mistake you have made! So yes slow down, take your time and you can make this,

I choose the dark green because I had quite a large amount of green merino wool to use up, and then I added in the softer colours. I decided to make the poncho longer so I kept on going, and going.

It's just right with jeans and boots, which is just as well because that's all I wear! I decided to finish with a simple edge rather than the 'loops', which makes it rather less loopy.

It was a hugely satisfying longer project, which spanned over about 6 months. The merino wool is soft and warm, and I think hung in such a way that it doesn't need blocking.

I also added a little label in the back so I know which is the reverse. So thank you Sandra@Cherryheart for your pattern!

And this was a little dog I saw that day, as I peeped in the doorway of At-Bristol.

beacause I had to leave mine at home!

♥