Tree Huggery

We've had a relatively quite Christmas, not too much "Brinsleying", plenty of walking and catching up with friends.  I've started making a new range of tote bags and Col has been dismantling the shed in order to move it over to Brinsley.
Col's currently pondering setting up a joinery business, which has always been his long term goal but the reality of doing it seems a bit overwhelming at the moment. We'd set up the name TreeHuggery because we'd always thought that it would work well for both joinery and arts and crafts, and suited a couple of hippy vegetarians who love the outdoors and don't have a television!

Christmas Past and present and future.

Well Christmas past has been different as I was made Redundant on the 22nd of this month,so a bit of a downer to start with. Yesterday the big red fellow had been and emptied his sack. Loved the gifts we got and thank you to all.  We went for a walk locally and then had dinner late.  Today we are off for a walk with friends and then to my folks. 

Hopefully the new year will bring a new adventure and a new job

Merry Christmas to all

Colin

Floorless

Well we now have a toilet, a floor and a damp proof course in "the wreck".  The "embankment" of earth, from where we dug out the earth under the concrete floor, has now been taken away.  Col has spent this weekend taking out the upstairs floors (they lean about 4 inches), and so we're a long way from having a habitable house.  Col keeps scaring me by saying things like "well, we could always boil the kettle for hot water, if it gets to the point where we have to move in"  - but seeing as we dont even have a floor where the bathroom should be, let alone a bath, moving in  any time soon seems a bit impossible.
Jackie

World Aids Day

I did my first craft stall on Saturday at a community event for World Aids Day.  I wasn't quite sure of what I would sell, or how much of anything to take, consequently I had a manic panic for a couple of weekends beforehand  adding lots of Christmas decorations to my collection.  Although it wasn't a hugely busy event, I was really pleased with what I managed to sell and the interest that I got in my work - I'd taken some felt along with me to so that I could use my time wisely, rolling some felt balls for a project that I'm doing for my textiles degree (a rug inspired by rust) and it was really nice to be able to chat to people about felting and explain how its done.  Apparently felting has been discussed by Kirsty Allsop on TV (we dont have a tv so didn't know).  Kirsty has been showing how to do felt with felt needles which are really barbed, another way is to agigitate the wool with water and soap, despite some advice suggesting it needs to be really hot, cold water works just as well and is a more gentle way to treat the wool - its really relaxing too.
Thankfully I'm only making a sample of the rug, rather than the whole thing, so I havent got a lot more balls to roll, but it got me thinking about making a bobbly scarf or a corset - watch this space.....
Jackie