a space with my name on it

I am so pleased to have my own space now. What you see here are my two thirds of a brand new room, one added when we built the extension. The other third is where we have the family computer. I resent the latter a bit but two thirds of a room is way better than what I had before, which was for most part of our life in this house the dining room table. I call it my sewing room although I have to admit, very little sewing has happened in there so far.

The sewing room was an integral part of our extension plans. Richard wanted a utility room (ever so practical), I wanted a sewing room (ever so whimsical). The kitchen/dining/whiling-time-away-whilst-contemplating-the-garden-space was just an afterthought. Honesty, it was.

Despite this brief the sewing room is of course a non-essential part of the extension in terms of family benefits, unless you count the keep-mummy's-temper-under-control factor. It took a while to get it where it is now. I assembled the cheapest possible Ikea tables all by myself, even the drawer unit. I only got two of the drawer bottoms upside down. I briefly considered to fix that but then it didn't feel urgent enough and now it is history. Richard mounted shelves for me. There was a lot of swearing coming out of the room but I didn't investigate. Some things are best left to the expert in the house. All my boxes of fabric, yarn and soap making essentials are now neatly tidied away. We lost quite some wall space when the extension was built and internal walls pulled down. As a result, there is not enough wall space to hang all our pictures and they were sitting in a corner, unloved and neglected. I chose some of the smaller ones to hang on my walls. Most have just sentimental value, for example, there is a framed picture that Annie made in a life drawing class when she was only little. I bought two metal rails to attach  magnetic tubs on and to tidy my cutting tools collection away. The tubs are a good size for sewing machine needles, curved quilting safety pins and things like that. And yes, you guessed right, these are all from Ikea. I am considering shares. I have been going into this little room frequently, gazing at the sheer practical beauty of it. Every time I go in, I am glared at by a random child 'working' at the family computer (they always call it work!). I feel totally unwelcome. I wonder if there might be elsewhere where this blasted piece of plastic could go.

Very little sewing has happened so far. I did some mending and I have been slowly cutting triangles for Annie's quilt. Cutting triangles is a tad more involved than cutting squares, the angles are important and mustn't be messed up. The cat however has made a shelf her new home. She is a cute one, isn't she? It is a strategic choice for she can see which animal is coming or going through the small dog flap in the wall.

Looking out through the window,  you'll notice that the garden is still disturbed from the building work. It needs some serious attention but not mine. Me, I'll focus on the little patch just outside the window. An order of spring bulbs is waiting patiently for a dry spell. The mud just outside the window is earmarked for spring planting Lily of the Valley rhizomes. They do well there, we had quite a few in that part of the garden before. I have also ordered some dahlia tubers and freesia bulbs (ever so optimistic, I know). I think I'll plant these in pots and bury them where I would like them to flower. Neither are suitable for a Scottish winter, not even a mild West of Scotland winter and being able to lift the pots and pop them somewhere sheltered is a good plan.

So there you are, a sewing room and some gardening. This should keep me busy for a while. x

P.S. I was delighted to see so many comments on my last post, thank you, I love to read about your views. There haven't been many comments lately, not as many as maybe a year ago, although page views went up. I suspect it is a common trend, I am often too busy to comment myself or sometimes I read on my phone and then can't get a proper sentence typed with my sausage fingers. It is good to see you all out there, still reading, still enjoying my blether.