12th April 2025

21:55 | Mood: good!

Actually had a really good couple days at work, I'm off for two days now but I'm happy at what I accomplished. I completely redid a tracking system we have for logging drawer hires, and got the sales for the last financial year through - so we can see exactly how much we've sold of everything. Or not sold at all!
I finished a sleeve for this cardigan I'm knitting, and I've done the first 7 or so rows of the next sleeve. I'm using Sirdar's Jewelspun with Wool Chunky in the shade "Mother of Pearl", it's not my usual colour choice for cardigans but I think it'd be great to wear with light jeans or perhaps with a solid colour dress. I'm not one for fashion or making lookbooks so take my ideas with a pinch of salt.

10th April 2025

17:41 | Mood: melancholic

Got back from my holiday away yesterday - it was lovely. It was great to spend time walking around a new city, visiting the tourist spots, taking pictures and eating lots of food. The mystery city I went to was Pristina, in Kosovo! It wasn't a place I would usually visit, but I'm glad I went and I gained another stamp in my passport in the process.

I was crazy productive last night and this morning. I emptied the suitcase, did laundry, changed the bedsheets, tidied, folded the dry laundry, did another load of laundry, vacuumed the floors, mopped, cleaned the windows, and spent some time quilting. And then hung up the laundry to dry and did another load. Wheee.

This week off work has been really nice, don't get me wrong, I'm kinda tired (probably from doing so much housework and travelling) but I feel refreshed and ready to go back to work. Sometimes you need to drop the hot potato and let it cool off, or at least wait til your hands have healed a bit.

You know, that ice block analogy I used yesterday really rung true for me. I'm chipping away at things, and the sculptures are starting to appear, but a lot of the ice blocks resolved themselves or weren't as big as I thought they were. Sure, I'm gonna have to pick up the chisel and hammer again tomorrow, but they don't seem as daunting.

Want to get a few more tasks ticked off my list today, including taking a walk to the glass recycling bins, doing some zine work, some odds and ends. I'm kinda tired thoughhhh, so I might have a nap first. peace

28th March 2025

20:11pm | Mood: Stressed

Work has been busy and stressful as expected. I did make that list I mentioned, but it has since grown in size. it feels like I have giant ice blocks infront of me, and every so often someone brings me another giant block of ice, in front of the block of ice I was previously chipping away at. And I have a small chisel and hammer, and I can only chip away in small chunks. Don't get me wrong, I am asking people with bigger chisel and hammers for help, or specialist chisel and hammers, or even just another small size chisel and hammers to help, but damn. It feels like this ice will never be chipped away to reveal the beautiful ice sculptures beneath. Can the ice melt away? Maybe. Some problems could maybe resolve themselves, but it feels a lot of them have been delegated *to* me. I am taking on all administrative duties for my role now. I'm supporting my place of work, providing technical help and maintaining machines, and helping organise and inventory of things for sale. Starting to feel a bit overwhelmed.

It's my performance development review soon, I'll mention all the ice blocks I chip away at and the hats I have to wear. It'll hopefully be a bit more quiet tomorrow, so I'll work on that. Hopefully my next entry will be after stock take & audit and be more positive.

24th March 2025

17:38pm | Mood: Content

I've had a pretty okay day so far today, I finally redid my nails after spilling wood stain on them on Saturday, had to soak them in some acetone based nail polish remover as the stain would not budge. I've painted them a fresh spring green colour, and I applied a subtle gold sparkley top coat - however in typing this I have just smudged my my little finger's nail on my left hand...

I made 3 blocks for the quilt I'm currently making today. I love spending time infront of my sewing machine, especially now my arm is feeling much better. I still haven't figured out how big I want this quilt to be; it's for a friend, so I'd maybe like it to be able to spread over her sofa to snuggle up in when it's cold, or over her bed as a top quilt. I love making quilts (stuff in general) for other people, would you believe I haven't made myself a quilt yet? I have a couple ideas, I want to make a 'pixel art' style quilt as a nod to Habbo Hotel, one of the wall art things you can buy in the catalog looks like a quilt and I think I could make it and hang it up, just like in the game. And a scrap quilt - using scraps from all the quilts I made up to that point to make myself a quilt. Little souveniers and memories of the effort I put into previous quilts, all sewn and quilted into a blanket just for me (and my cat and partner, I guess ).
But as I said in a previous blog, I want to finish all my work-in-progress projects first before beginning something new.

Work tomorrow. It's gonna be a busy one. I might write a list of things to prioritise tomorrow before I go to bed this evening so I'm not thinking about it too much.

23rd March 2025

19:49pm | Mood: Okay

Happy Spring, I hope that this new season brings us all some much needed positivity.
Work is busy, and it looks like it's going to be busy for the next few weeks. I've been organising a huge inventory of 'stuff', properly logging it, recording who made it, and whether or not we need to return it to the owner. About 50% of the stuff needs to be returned to its owners, which is going to be a big ol' task. We are slowly making progress though, and are finally starting to see the scale of our inventory. I have a long weekend away in a couple weeks, so I'm looking forward to having a break. I'm gonna pack a book and some knitting and just spend some time in a new city, in a new country, with a new language, relaxing and taking in the history of the place.

My parents visited me this weekend; I love it when they visit, but I always feel homesick when they leave. I need to start making more effort to take work off to visit them for long weekends every so often. I want to visit them at least every 2 months, but I don't think I can take much more time off work. It was hard to get this long weekend off, it's difficult to find cover as we are currently short staffed and it's hard to convince someone to work a Saturday... I feel jealous of my colleagues whose family live down the road, or a quick bus journey to the next city over. Blahhh

16th March 2025

19:01pm | Mood: Accomplished

Ah, I'm feeling so positive this evening. Today, despite sleeping in a little, I had breakfast, brushed my teeth, did my full skincare routine and got the bus to recycle a bag of electronics. I bought a new electric toothbrush whilst I was there, and some extra strong command strips. Oh and a delicious chocolate and pistashio cookie, yum.
After I got home, I tidied the flat, did the dishes, and jumped straight in to hanging several framed prints we have been collecting over the previous two years. It feels so good to have everything on the walls after having them stacked on the floor of my art studio for so long.

Now, I'm relaxing in bed with some hot water to drink and listening to YouTube. I'm blogging away, and hoping that I can get some quilting done before it gets too late (I'm quite paranoid of how loud my sewing machine is, and if my downstairs/upstairs neighbours can hear it...). But my cat has just curled up on my legs, maybe I'll just reach over to grab my kniting off my bedside table and do a few rows.

Have a wonderful night

10th March 2025

22:08pm | Mood: Happy

hmmm. what to blog abouttt. well I had my first (and hopefully only!) physio appointment today! the doctor/nurse seeing me was incredibly lovely and has sent me away with some exercises to do on both of my wrists. I have very weak extensor (?) muscles in my left wrist, compared to my right wrist which is 'normal'. I have slightly limited mobility but hopefully this will improve with the exercise regime. They seem easy to incorporate into my daily routine, and hey, maybe they'll help me get my butt back into the gym.

I began another quilt today, I feel so relieved. I love making things, I'm glad I'm getting out of that horrible slump. I also started another painting and have been itching to do more. But I must finish the paintings I have already started before starting new ones. eeeep. but anyways, i need to finish doing my skincare routine and make some chamomile tea. good nightttt

8th March 2025

17:09pm | Mood: Tired

I had an early night last night (is 11:30pm early?) yet I'm still feeling so tired. I've been staring at an excel sheet for at least 3 hours today sorting out inventory so my brain is fully fried. Hoping that I can get some stuff done tonight, maybe I'll treat myself to an iced coffee on the way home (but maybe half decaf, I don't want to be up too late).

My birthday went really well! Had a nice relaxing day, went out to eat pancakes with my boyfriend in the morning, did some window shopping, and then went to get my Nexplanon implant replaced again. It's been healing really well! I even changed the dressing all by myself last night. I did soak it in the bath for 20 minutes, which helped with getting the adhesive soft, but I didn't feel too squeemish! Feeling very proud of myself. That iced coffee feels extra deserved now.

Not too sure what else I want to write about. Having a paper journal has been helping my mental health a lot. I think having to miss the gym whilst my arm heals hasn't been helping either. Really hoping I can get back in the gym next week with no pain! Saying that, I have my first physio appointment for my bum wrist on Monday. Maybe the gym will help with that though?

Anyways, here's my list for this evening. Have a great evening!

2nd March 2025

20:58pm | Mood: Pleased

It's my birthday tomorrow! I'm having my contraceptive implant replaced tomorrow too - following from my previous blog, I went in for a check up and it seems it has migrated down my arm and is touching a nerve. That explains the pain going down my arm when I lean on it, or if I move my arm back in a specific way. Hoping that this replacement will work! I'm not sure what other options I have for contraception. I have considered the IUD, but I'm quite squeemish and the idea of having something inside my uterus gives me the heebie jeebies. If anyone has experience with an IUD please let me know, maybe I've just been reading too many horror stories.

I'm slowly feeling better in myself. I still feel immense guilt for not being as active as I could have been with Salvaged.nu and @00sbloglayouts, but I'm hoping to change that. Another thing I want to change is that I want to start journalling. I love this blog, and I think having a physical notebook on my desk at work or in my bag might allow me to express how I've been feeling more frequently. Like if I'm feeling down, I'll find a quiet room at work and just scribble down a few sentences.

I'm hoping that my 32nd time around the sun will bring good things. I want to treat myself kindly, not beat myself up for having bad days, and hoping that in treating myself kindly and with respect that I'll have the confidence and energy to do the things I want to do. Maybe not today, maybe not tomorrow, but at some point.
Have a great night all.

22nd February 2025

15:57pm | Mood: Meh

Sitting like a werido on these odd kneeling chairs has got to be a new hobby of mine. I know you're supposed to keep your back straight when you use them, but I keep slouching after a few minutes.

Starting to feel that there is a way out of this current slump I'm in - which is great! I haven't done much this week, but honestly I need to stop thinking my value is directly linked to my efficency, about how much stuff I'm getting done after work hobbies wise. It's nice to set myself self imposed ddeadlines and goals but I shouldn't feel bad if I don't meet those goals. Sometimes it's okay to have a lazy month. No one can be perfect 100% of the time.

I had my contraceptive implant replaced on the 27th Jan and this past week I've been having a few issues with it. I leant back into bed on Tuesday night and felt this awful pain down my arm, like it was trying to pierce my skin. Needless to say I've got a check up booked on Monday, so I'm hoping that it goes well and doesn't need replacing again. Maybe my implant replacement is a reason why I'm feeling extra glum recently? I do feel like I'm about to start my period any minute now.

Speaking of periods, I've been thinking of learning to sew cloth menstrual pads. I use cloth menstrual pads almost all of the time when I'm on my period and have done for years now, and was hoping to sew my own liners for lighter days - specifically the thong type, as I find using the regular liner types a bit uncomfortable when wearing thong-type underwear. I have a lot of scrap fabric and I love thinking of ways to use it all up. I'm also hoping to sew one of my dresses into a skirt, I just need to watch a couple YouTube tutorials first, but it looks quite easy.

peace x

15th February 2025

15:24pm | Mood: Achey

I've been making a mental note these past couple days to keep track of the things I've been doing (big or small) to help me find little joys whilst I've been feeling glum. Having everything written down seems to make everything seem more real, once it's visualised I suppose? Anyway, here is my 'done' list:



Hoping that the rest of this weekend will be good... this weekend's tasks/events/things I'd like to do include:

12th February 2025

9:38pm | Mood: blahhh

Well, my Bloganuary didn't work out as well as I thought it would. Work is buuuuusy, and all I want to do when I get home from work is nap and doom scroll til I realise it's too late to do anything worthwhile with my evening, so I go to bed, where I ultimately doom scroll for another couple hours.

I've been feeling in a slump for a little while. Just tired of everything, my hobbies both online and offline, going to the gym, anything that requires an attention span longer than 5 minutes. It's hard to break out of this feeling, not to mention I'm feeling under the weather too. I wonder if the two are related?
I know I need to be more forgiving to myself, it's normal to just want to rot in bed for a while (is it?), but when your hobbies are very public (Salvaged.nu, @00sbloglayouts on IG, Nostalgia.forum) I feel like I'm letting people down. I do all of these projects solo, and I don't want to spread myself too thin with these things. 'Blah' is how I can really describe this feeling. blah.

I hope I can feel well enough to do things soon. For now, I'm gonna make a cup of tea and crawl back into my bed.

16th January 2025

9:59pm | Mood: Productive

Had a very productive day today, at work and at home. Did a few routine monthly checks at work, did a lot of cleaning, replied to many emails, sent many emails, and once 5:30pm rolled around I made a hasty exit out the door to make it to my hair cut on time.
Hair wise, I went for a regular layered style, cut my fringe back in, and evened out my shaved sides - after a few years of shaving the sides of my head, they had started to get quite uneven.

Got home, tidied, did a load of laundry, painted for an hour, hung the laundry up to dry, did the dishes, packed lunch & breakfast for tomorrow, and packed my gym bag. Feeling very productive today! So hoping to finish off my evening with a nice hot shower, a cup of tea, and spend some time working on salvaging resources for Salvaged.nu. If I have time, I'd like to darn some socks and do some knitting. Or read for a little bit.

14th January 2025

11:25pm | Mood: content!

Wasn't as tired after work today as I was last week. It was a very excel-spreadsheet heavy day, but a nice day nonthelesss. I have baked some banana bread to bring into the office tomorrow, hopefully that will help us get through the 'mid week slump'. I've also packed myself a hearty lunchbox and breakfast as I'm planning on going straight to the gym after work tomorrow.

I didn't ragequit my quilting today, infact I got the first half of the binding completed! All that is left to do now is pin it into place on the other side, bind it, and wash. And then voila! another completed quilt! One of my goals for this year is to finish all of my work in progress pieces, whether it be knitting, quilting, painting, studying, etc... I'll see how that goes.

Unofficial list of things to do in 2025

12th January 2025

11:49pm | Mood: a bit headachey

Today started off well, I cleaned the house, did a load of laundry, took out the recyling, folded dry clothes. I even spent an hour or so on my quilt, but ended up getting a bit frustrated at the binding and 'rage quit' (calmy turning off my sewing machine and walking away).

My sisters birthday is today and unfortunately I think her parcel was stolen from her front door, or delivered to the wrong address. So I'm gonna see how I can go about getting a redelivery/refund... why is it so hard to get a hold of a contact email or number these days on major websites? The 'help' bot on this website gave me nothing, infact congratulated on my parcel being 'delivered' after I inputted the correct details. Just a bot with a series of messages precoded in. Useless. I did eventually find a form to send an email to, and rated the delivery on both the shop and the delivery courier as low as possible in hopes that this will set something in motion to get it fixed. This is a major online beauty retailer btw, not a local/small business owner.

I have spent the majority of the evening knitting away, doing a lot of decreases and cables, so I'm currently transferring my knitting onto some smaller circular needles, which I think will stop my stitches from being so stretched out. I do need to drink some more water today, I am feeling quite headachey

My self imposed plan to join 100 fanlistings hasn't gone to plan so far. Maybe I'll sit down and join some later this week. Maybe two a day? that would mean in 50 days I will have completed my challenge, hehe.
Also want to work on an about me/credits page tomorrow, probably the latter as I think that is more important. Good night!

11th January 2025

10:25pm

It's a beautiful clear night outside, my belly is full of dumpling soup, and my electric blanket is warming up as we speak.
Thought I'd do a quick blog before I head for bed. This week at work was productive, tiring but productive! Not necessarily busy (at least for me anyway) but tiring. I'm looking forward to my lie in tomorrow morning, gonna spend my day studying MySQL, quilting, and painting. Maybe baking too! I'll see how I feel.
My tea is brewed... my knitting is calling me... my electric blanket has DM'd me....... see you tomorrow!

7th January 2025

8:42pm | Mood: Exhausted

God I am so tired. Didn't sleep until about 4am last night and had to get up for work the following morning, which is exhausting enough after having two weeks off. It was okay at work - wasn't a 'push into the deep end' like I was worried about, but the next month or so is going to be verryyy busy. I think half the battle today was remembering where I left off with certain tasks - and making notes of tasks I need to get completed sooner rather than later. I'm pretty sure I could figure out a way to plan this all on my personal calendar system I use, but would really like to keep work and personal stuff as seperated as possible.

In other news, I sent off the most recent issue of Queen Beat for printing! Which reminds me; I need to tweak the cost of postage that our website offers, so that it will cover international postage. *scribbles down on post it note* WHat else did i do today? Oh yeah, I finally took down our Christmas decorations! After having them up since December 1st, ha.

ho hum, I'm so tired. I think I'll pack my lunch for work tomorrow (and my gym bag for after work), do the dishes, and then mayybee if I have time, read and knit before sleep. I want to be unconcious before 11 tonight...... peace out

5th January 2025

11:10pm | Mood: Content

I'm back at my own place and the weather is cold! We haven't had any snow yet (*sigh* ... I love the snow, I not-so-secretly want it to snow) but pretty much the whole of the UK has a weather warning for snow and ice for the next couple of days so that might change next week.

I cleaned my washing machine today with some dettol washing machine cleaner now the whole kitchen smells like lemons. :) I also spent some time folding the what-seems-to-be-never-ending pile of clean laundry and worked on recovering and repackaging some resources for Salvaged.nu. And (hopefully!) fixed a MySQL error on Nostalgia MB... it hasn't really been a busy day, I did spend most of it in my PJs after all.

I didn't blog yesterday, but I did move my webrings to the sidebar. They were quite cluttered and unorganised on the old links page, so I've turned that into a 'listings' page where fanlistings will be dislpayed. I have over 100 fanlistings that I want to join to fill up the now very empty looking page.
I'm gonna head to bed now, have a great evening/morning wherever you are!

3rd January 2025

11:08pm | Mood: Motivated?

today is my last day visiting my parents before heading off back home to my partner and cat. ♥ I've had a lovely few days here, it's nice to spend a few days hanging out with my parents, birds, and sister. It gives me the opportunity to reflect, unwind, and escape from responsibilites (or at least for a little while!).

had a nice chill day today. spent the afternoon watching The Golden Girls - every new years period i rewatch The Golden Girls. I think it started when I was spending a New Years period alone when my partner was away visiting family, and I began watching it after Betty White died. I kept it on throughout the night to help me sleep as sleeping alone in the house was daunting - and I guess it has become a ritual ever since. :P

I also studied a bit more of my PHP/MySQL book today - I'm enjoying it, which is surprising! Learning how to study again is part of the fun. I'm going to try and finish Chapter 7 before heading to bed. I also finished reading volume 2 of Komi Can't Communicate - I love me a cozy slice of life manga, and this one seems to be my cup of tea! !!!

Not sure if I will get a chance to blog tomorrow, but I sure will try. At least I reached this week's goal of blogging three times a week, woo hooo!

2nd January 2025

7:36pm | Mood: relaxed

today was a good day - woke up late again, but didn't have any sylvanian family dreams... instead i've just been watching collection tours on YouTube

bit of a more laid back day today. did some knitting, went out and bought some shampoo & conditioner, and spent a little time brushing up on my PHP knowledge. i bought a book a couple years ago by Robin Nixon about learning PHP & MySQL - I know there are countless tutorials and courses online, but for now I am enjoying the 'traditional' way. gonna see if i can finish revising chapter 5 before the evening is out! afterwards, if there is time left, i'll spend the rest of the evening with my parents knitting. see you tomorrow!

1st January 2025

7:14pm | Mood: uncomfortable, my back hurts!

Happy New Year! Every year I try to blog on the first of January, every year I have to double check how to spell janruaryJanuary...
As well as being my first post of 2025, this is my first post of Bloganuary - attempting to blog as much as I can for January! My goal is to blog at least 3x a week~

Today was a nice day. Stayed up til about 2am, listened to the fireworks outside the bedroom window, and fixed a few bugs on here.
Woke up late at around 12pm, after having a really vivid dream about sylvanian families... in particular the hedgehog family and the badger family?! I owned both families as a child, maybe it's a sign that now i have Adult Money I can buy and build the perfect dream home for them in a display case, away from dust and sticky fingers. But I don't have the space or patience for that! maybe I'll stick to viewing collectors videos on YouTube instead.

What did I do today?? Hmmm... I did a couple rows of knitting. I'm currently working on a dog sweater (Botanical Yoke Dog Sweater pattern available here!) and I'm excited to be at a point where it looks like a sweater instead of a snood - the sleeves are on and I'm currently working on the cable stitches around the chest/neck area. I'm excited to get it finished!
I've also been working on editing a video for a @00sbloglayouts post. It's a timelapse of me in Photoshop, making a website layout in the iconic 2006/2007 celebrity layout style. I've never done video editing before, but I've been using the VLLO app and it seems to be a good app for beginners. I've never made a video before, nevermind one that would be suitable for Instagram's short video lengths. And don't even get me started on reels and tiktoks...
I think I'll spend the rest of the evening editing more of the video whilst watching/listening to YouTube videos.