Collages as Self-Care

This is an end-of-the-year photo collage I made for my old blog back in 2018; I cobbled together pics of the best of the quilts and quilted objects I made throughout that year. I did this for some time until my arthritis started seriously damaging my hands, and I couldn't quilt as much as I wanted anymore.

I like seeing at a glance what I have been able to do in a year, and it reminds me that all in my life is not negative. For self-care maybe I should revisit this habit in some different ways.

I did a couple of quick mock ups to see if I have enough pics to put together (I would wait until the end of the year and redo this one before making it official, obviously.) I'm crocheting a lot lately, though, so an annual crochet collage would be fun.

I could also do seasonal themed collages of the different projects I make, as well as fun thrifted finds. I tend to only put any value on my quilting, but I do a lot of other things, too, so everything doesn't have to be about quilting.

I don't get any praise (or notice) for anything I make unless I post pics of it online. I don't really need praise, either, because I'm not talented. Still, it's uplifting to share what I'm doing with others. I don't feel as if it's worthless when I can show someone else my accomplishments. I'm also not hiding it like I used to because I was afraid of what others would say because I'm at such a basic level. I could also do collages of a lot of other things, like cooking, the pups, sunsets, road trips and just interesting things I see out there in the big wide world.

In the near future I'll try and make a new accomplishment collage as part of my new self-care regime, and see how it turns out.

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Other Stashes

Along with clearing out the spare bedroom and tidying my office and our guest bedroom, I decided to reorganize some of my stashes. This is all the yarn I have on hand, sorted by color. It looks like a lot, but lately I've been using up a minimum of half a bin every month, so this is approximately a year's supply. All of my solid color cotton perle thread. I go through a lot of this every year, too. I need a container in which I can fit all of it together, but I haven't found the right one yet. I won't show you all of my fabric -- I'm still reorganizing this stash -- but I went through everything and donated two bins of fabric I won't need to the local quilter's guild.

Love Means This

Invested in a couple of hand-dyed bundles from one of my favorite fabric artists. This one said "Make me into something for Valentine's Day." So I went for a quilted and embellished tote. I kept thinking about what love means to me as I worked on it. Here's the finished tote. Although I was tempted to embellish with beads and pins, I got sick and only felt well enough to do a little stitching every night. As I worked I thought about how often love seems disappointing to us, especially when it fails to live up to our expectations. But now that I've experienced love in many forms, I can say that it's made me a better person than I might have been without it. Love is a precious thing, and should be appreciated in all its forms. I am very grateful for the love of my guy, my child and my friends who have stuck with me all these years. That's you two, in case you're wondering. :) Also finally found something to do with a ve...

Store Closing Haul

The mega Books-A-Million store over in Sanford is closing, and offered an extra 20% off on their current stock -- all sales final -- so I went over to do some shopping. Safely but sadly there was no one in the store but me the entire time I was there. The Holly Jackson novel is for Katherine, the Halloween board book is for Oliver, and the copy of Garden Spells is to keep on hand because I give that book to everyone. The rest of the books are for me. I love Anne Cleeves, and the Galbraith novel sounded interesting (the first couple weren't, but I'm willing to take another chance.) The Escape Room is by a new-to-me author, plus it was cheap. The GreenCraft mag is just a guilty pleasure. Hopefully the smaller BAM nearer to me won't close. I don't buy many books from brick-and-mortar stores these days, but that's really the last one within reasonable driving distance.

Valerean

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