Done Things

Starting is not most people’s problem, staying, continuing and finishing is. ― Darren Hardy

 I've been struggling the past couple of months with low energy. I discovered a while back that I had very low ferritin levels, which explained why I felt like my coffee needed a coffee almost every day. I've recently been able to improve my situation and I'm feeling more like myself every day.

A lot of the things I have been wanting to do have been sitting unfinished for quite some time, so I'm slowly working my way through my projects and getting them to the finish line. It's a nice feeling, and I'm looking forward to feeling that feeling a lot more often.

While I was traveling in Europe last September, I took a skein of my own hand-dyed yarn with me, determined that it should finally become something. Socks have become my go-to travel project: small enough to pack, and straightforward enough to be worked on in short bursts. And I love a pair of warm socks for the cold evenings. It's like my feet are being hugged.

These are the Penobscot Narrows Bridge Socks. I just liked saying "Penobscot." I'm also sure that was the last name of Margaret Houlihan's husband in M*A*S*H. But I digress:

Ah... comfy socks...

We went to Sooke a few weeks ago for the weekend. I wanted to bring along another project to work on while relaxing in the cabin, but first things first:

And Seymour made sure I was relaxed enough as well:

I had eally been wanting to get this art quilt finished. The front is made from fabric I dyed in a workshop last spring, and I illustrated it using a technique I learned in a class last year. It's been sitting in my spare room all summer, waiting for me to get to it:

I found the perfectly-coloured fabric for the backing and the binding in the form of a second-hand bedsheet at the thrift store. I cut the batting to size and then thread-basted it in place. I rolled it up and brought it to the cabin with me:

I'd like to say I got it done in one weekend, but the beauty of Sooke was quite distracting:

It took me a while to remind myself how to hand-quilt and I spent quite some time deciding exactly what I was going to quilt, but after several evenings of stitching, I think I added just the right amount of texture I was looking for:

It's the first time I made my own bias tape, and now that I've done it, I don't think I'll ever buy it ever again! I learned a lot doing this, and I am very proud that most of it was done by my own hands.

So there's the update. I'm currently working on some knitting some Christmas things, which is very much out of character for me, but hey, I have energy now, so why not?

Hope you are doing well.