Crafting 2023

This year I'm not going to give myself a set amount of projects to complete.  Partly because crafting in 2022 almost became something I felt I needed to do and I want it to remain an enjoyable hobby, and partly because I want to have more time to read more and to work towards gaining a secondary income.  So this is my list of things I'd like to do and I'll get through as many as I feel like this year.

Completion and Use Up Projects

I've already written about these in a previous blog and they're mostly little projects to finish off or fix a project I've basically already completed.  A couple are also about using up material I already have.  I've actually already finished a few of these so what I have left is:

• Fixing the jumper arm
• Resizing the hat pompom
• Changing the length of the strap on the dungarees
• Adding attachment to the top and bottom of the dungarees
• Socks for me
• Making a matching tie to my dress
• Leftover fabric top
• Crochet crop top
• Knitted /crochet strappy top

The Hobbit/ Lord of the Rings Cross- stitch - Riverdale

It's time to complete this, hopefully in the first half of the year.

Field of Fucks Cross-stitch

This is a pattern I brought a while ago off Etsy from a shop called Fandom Cross Stitchery.  I think it's hilarious and want to get it completed this year so I can finally have it up to cheer me up when I'm having a bad day.

Icelandic Jumper

At the end of last year my Mum gave me a bag of wool that she had gotten to while ago but never used.  When I saw it the mix of colours made me instantly think of Icelandic jumpers so I went searching for a pattern and found this one called Afmæli by Hélène Magnússon.  Though I vowed I would never do a colour work jumper again here I am preparing to make another one. 

The Maggie and the Coddy Jumpers

Speaking of other colour work jumpers, I would still like to do these sort of matching jumpers by Arne and Carlos from the Rowan magazine, issue 69.  I've worked out that if I buy the wool recommended, and I've decided it might actually be worth doing that at least one, I need to save up around £175 which is seven of my weekly spends so I'll bear that in mind whenever I want to buy something else.

Cut Embroidery Dress

When I was watching the Korean drama 'It's Okay To Not Be Okay' Go Mun Young wears a dress that was made of either a white cotton or linen with cut embroidery on it and it made me wonder if I could maybe make that.  I'll need to find a pattern for the dress and try and find some cut embroidery patterns to go with it, but it would be interesting to give it a go.

The Jabberwocky Embroidery

This was a Christmas present and I thought it would be interesting to try as it's been a while since I've done this type of embroidery and it is a craft I was thinking of getting back into in the future.  This is a kit made by The Fabled Thread and the colours are beautiful.

 

Ankle Trousers

I love my 1940s trousers and I wear them all the time but I do sometimes think it would be nice to have a slightly fitted pair that fall just above the ankles.  I've already found the pattern I want to use, Simplicity S9376, so if I have the time and the spare cash this would be something I'd like to make.

For most of these projects I already have the materials needed and so they shouldn't cost me anything to make.  At least not for the first half of the year.  The other items I will probably need to save up for before I can make them, but that is probably a good habit to get into anyway and should stop me from spending money on other things I don't really need or want.  Regardless, it's a good variety of crafts to keep my brain and hands happy throughout the year and I'm looking forward to it.

Goals 2023

To get straight to the point, the goals I have this year are going to be pretty much the same as the goals for last year so this it's going to be a particularly long post.  However, we are still aiming for the same long term goals and this year should see us carrying on in that same direction.

Financial Fitness

• Four months emergency funds - with the cost of living going up and the added monthly payments for the car we needed to buy our four months emergency fund has now gone up to £7500.  This is going to be a long term goal and, having looked over all our incomings and outgoings over the last year, I know we won't be able to reach this in a year.  I would like us to get a third saved in 2023. That seems more realistic.
• Sinking funds - we need to build up our original sinking funds again.  The Christmas fund has been put up to £800 this year, so we'll need to put aside £75 a month to reach that goal.  Thankfully we only have to put in £50 to get the car repair fund back up to £500 so that'll hopefully be one off the list of things I have to worry about.  I've also added surfing lessons, which we want to do two more of so need to save up £240 for that.  We did however ask for money for Christmas for that so we're almost there on that also.  The last sinking fund is for sailing lessons, which I've worked out for both of us to be around £1400.  This isn't a priority though and we'll only put money in when we can.
• Pension and personal spending - to help with out financial goals I've decided to reduce my pension payments to the recommended 12.5% of your wage.  This does mean that the payments will be about half what they use to be, but at least that means there will still be some money going in.  We've also decided to budget our own personal spending to £25 a week.  That means if we want to buy anything that is more than that we'll need to save up a few weeks before hand.
• Changing my bank account - I didn't get around to doing this last year so I want to do it this year.  I know which bank I want to move to so it's just a case of sitting down and getting it sorted.  It really shouldn't take too long.
• Secondary income - if we're going to reach our financial goals a little quicker it would help if I could get us a secondary income coming in.  Unfortunately it can't just be a case of picking up some extra hours as my responsibilities have remained the same, so it needs to be something I can fit in around the other things I do.  As I'll be spending less time crafting this year I'll hopefully be able to work out what that might be.

Learning New Skills

• Skateboarding - this is still something I want to learn to do.  It's not like I want to be able to do stunts or anything like that, I just want to be able to ride along on one comfortably.  The truth is, I'm getting in my own way here and being lazy about it, so I'm going to put in a goal of skateboarding two times a month and go from there.
• Surfing - we already have some money to take another lesson and are saving up for the second lesson this year.  My brother has also said we can borrow his surf boards whenever we want so we don't have to spend money there (though I do need to work out how we're going to attach them to our car).  After that it would just be a case of getting out and doing it on our own.
• Sailing - unfortunately I don't think we'll get round to this this year as it requires us to save up enough money to get the lessons.  However, it is something we need to do before we take this long term goal any further as we might be terrible at it.  However, if we get the opportunity we'll be there.  I do want to carry on researching boats etc as well, just so we're ready when it comes.

And that's it this year.  It doesn't really feel any different from last year, though for some reason it does feel like I'm trying to fit less in.  Hopefully that'll make them easier to achieve and I am mostly focusing on finances this year.  Wish me luck or maybe just motivation - wish me motivation.

December 2022 Budget

So this is the last blog of 2022 and it's definitely been an 'interesting' year to say the least.  I guess it's sort of fitting that my last blog is a financial one, seeing as everything has been about finances this year.  The December's budget went better than I was expecting seeing as Christmas was involved and having our Christmas sinking fund definitely helped with that.  This fund is something we'll look to build up again next year.

Apart from one week we've actually been pretty good when it came to spending on groceries and eating out.  It shows that we can do it just fine and I plan on carrying that on to next year as well.

In November we did have to do quite a bit of spending on the car which ultimately led to us having to get a new second hand car.  This time we had to get the car on finance, which we'll need to factor into our budgets over the next few years.  This month has been much better when it comes to the car and we did get our car tax for the previous car back again, which I put straight back into our car repairs sinking fund.  This month hasn't really been the best month to determine how much we're going to save on fuel with our hybrid car, so it will be interesting to see that in the future.  Another positive is that I managed to pay a full year of my pension in, the first time I've been able to do that - go me!

Our spending has also been pretty good this month, but probably because we've been so busy sorting out other things as well as presents for other people that we haven't had a chance to spend on ourselves.  Looking back over the year it's pretty obvious that we not particularly good on that front so that's something we'll need to think about budgeting next year as well.

We're also ending the year with no credit card debt and our own emergency funds still in order so I'm very happy about that.  Unfortunately the four months saving didn't exactly go to plan, but at least the money was there when we needed it which is kind of the point of it in the first place.

And that's it.  This year has definitely shown us how important having the sinking funds and savings have been when it comes to helping make things less stressful.  This adds a bit more of an incentive to get them back up and running next year so that we're ready for the next set of problems, or hopefully just reading for Christmas 23.  

Happy New Year everyone.

Crafting Goals 2022 Update #4

First of all, Merry Christmas.  I hope you're having a good day.

This has been quite a year for crafting for me.  It was a very ambitious list that I'd given myself and I even added to it along the way.  Though I haven't actually managed to complete it, I'm still amazed at how much I did actually manage to do.

The Wrap Dress

This was from the pattern Butterick B6554.  I really love how this dress looks and feels on, and I absolutely love the pattern on the fabric even though it wasn't initially what I was looking for.  It's nice to also have a dress that fits me properly and doesn't flash parts of me at unexpected moments.  The only issue is that,despite making the top part already and doing a practise run that went well I still managed to get the bust darts wrong and had to do them again, which means the inside isn't as seamless as I wanted.  If I'd had more fabric I'd probably would have redone that part, but I'm still happy with the outcome and I plan on wearing this quite a lot.

Guernsey / Gansay Jumper

This is a Christmas present for my husband, at his request.  It's a really interesting pattern (from Frangipani), but the size of the needles required are quite small and that meant that, despite doing a lot of knitting, there hasn't been as much progress as there normally would.  That has meant that, despite my best efforts, this isn't completely complete for Christmas and he has had to open it with needles still in the garment.  However, it shouldn't take me much longer to get it completed, hopefully by the end of the year.  Despite that length of time the process has been quite interesting due to the Gansay jumper specific elements such as the false seams, and the gussets under the armpits and around the neck to give that extra space and movement for a jumper that it meant to be quite fitted otherwise.  I would recommend trying this jumper, especially if you're interested in the history of garments.  Just make sure you have plenty of time to make it.

Christmas Cards

(I completely forgot to take photos of the finished cards before I sent them all away.)  Speaking of Christmas, my decision to make the Christmas cards using paper crafts this year definitely saved by quite a lot of time but was still quite enjoyable.  Mostly it gave me the opportunity to use my brain in a different way to create a design.  It's been a while since I've done something like this and I think I might also start making birthday cards in this way in the future.  I do need to make sure this doesn't turn into another money sink though, so possibly a bit of planning first.  Still I think they turned out pretty well.

The Hobbit / Lord of the Rings Cross-stitch - Rivendale

My plan to get everything done before December so that I could concentrate on just doing this cross-stitch went completely out the window when I realised that the Guernsey jumper would take as long as it has.  This has meant that I haven't actually touched this cross-stitch at all this quarter and it has remained the same as before.  I'm not sure I'll get to it at all this year so this will probably carry on to the next where I plan on it being one of the first things that I finish along with some smaller completion projects.

And that's it for crafting in 2022.  Getting all of these crafting projects done did mean that there were some other goals I had for this year that I didn't complete as a result.  The highlight this year for me was making my wedding outfit and even though I had planned on shortening the skirt afterwards to that I could wear it other times I just haven't had the heart to do that yet.  Though I am partly glad on that now as I've now changed my mind on the length I'd like it to be.  Still, every time I open up my wardrobe and see the skirt I get to think 'I did that'.  I have started to think about what I'd like to do next year for crafting, but I haven't completely decided yet.  All I know is that it'll be a lot less than this year and will mostly involve using up products I have rather than buying more.

Goals 2022 Update #4

Well this quarter rushed by quickly, along with the good intentions I had to catch up on all the goals I had planned for this year.  I did have other things on my mind this quarter, such as trying to get everything ready for Christmas and dealing with multiple car issues.  I'm sure if I'd really put my mind to it I could have come along much further, but where's the fun in that.

Financial Fitness

Getting our two sinking funds sorted out early on in the year couldn't have been more of a blessing for this quarter as we were able to do Christmas shopping for all our family without having to stress about money.  The sinking fund for the car also meant we were able to get the tyres fixed without too much bother, deal with a couple of breakdown costs, and have money to help with the deposit for our new car.  It definitely meant that an already stressful situation wasn't made even more stressful, especially around this time of year.  They will need to be saved up again, but it's been worth it.

Unfortunately our attempt to save up our four months emergency savings went out the window.  This was partly due to me working less hours and my husband not having the extra hours available at his work over the winter.  However, it would be true to say that our spending on food and other things we didn't necessarily need also played quite a bit factor in this.  I've definitely spent more money on crafting than I probably should have and whilst it has produced items that I use all the time I could have done without them to reach this goal.  

I also haven't managed to work out an additional income as I had planned to do.  I would have needed to dedicate some of my free time towards it to get it to work, but I was too busy crafting to do that.  I had set myself quite a few crafting goals this year, which I'm not doing next year which might make it a much better time to get that done.  I also haven't gotten around to changing my bank over to a more ethical one, though I have done all the research into it that I wanted to do and have decided that Triodos is going to be the best one to go to.  I still have a little time before 2023 arrives and I'll be off for part of that so that'll probably be the perfect time to make this change as it shouldn't actually take that long.

To end this section on a plus I have managed to pay a full year of pension this year and we've managed to end the year with our credit cards being zero.  In the last week of 2022 I'm going to have a real in depth look at our finances to get an honest idea at how we've been doing and where we've been sending our money.  There will need to be quite a few changes next year even just to ensure that we can pay our bills.

Sailing Around the World

We haven't been able to take any sailing lessons this year, but we knew that was going to be a bit of a long shot anyway.  However, I have been doing more research into electric motors on sailing boats.  Do I completely understand how they work - not really.  Do I at least have a better understanding - definitely.  Maybe sailing lessons could be one of our sinking funds for next year, but we'll see how that goes. 

Long Distance Walking

I've done everything on this that I had planned to do.  Our finances and fitness levels means that this won't be anything we can do anytime soon.  Good to have a distant carrot to work towards though.

Learning New Skills

We haven't managed to get any more surfing in this year, but we have asked people to put money towards surfing lessons for our Christmas present so hopefully we'll be able to get back to that soon.  Possibly another sinking fund.

The skateboarding has gone right out the window.  I am annoyed with myself on this one as I seem to get better at it each time I practice, but I'm just being lazy when it comes to getting up and giving it a go.  I'm not going to let this one go though as I'm still keen to learn.  I just need to make it a habit that we do.  At least my husband is also wanting to get back into it so that's a partner in crime now.

I'm aware that this year I did give myself a lot to do on both the goals and crafting front.  In fact, I probably gave myself a little bit too much to do and, though I'm disappointed I didn't get more done, I know that what I have managed to do is still good.  I am at least a little bit further forward than I was last year and that's the most important thing to me.  

Additional Crafting

I keep remembering, and then forgetting, little crafting things I need to do to finish projects, or make things more wearable, or use up fabric and yarn I have left over from previous projects so I decided to write them down in a list.  It turns out to be a little longer than I was expecting.  My main aim at the moment is to try and get my husband's jumper finished before Christmas, but I might try and fit some of these in now and then as a break from continuous knitting.

The first is some dismantling projects, which includes removing reusable bits from some shorts I made a while ago whilst getting back into using my sewing machine and taking the arms off a t-shirt I don't really wear anymore so I can use it for exercising. 

I also need to fix a couple of finished projects as well.  I noticed a little while ago that one of my jumpers arms is actually on inside out which means that you can see the threads.  I'll need to unpick that and put it back on properly.  I also need to downsize the pompom on my hat I made recently.  I love how massive it is, but it does pull the hat off my head so it unfortunately needs to be downsized by quite a bit.

A project I need to actually finish is my convertible overalls from Simplicity S8447. The trousers are of course finished and I've been wearing them constantly.  I have also finished the top, but I need to change the strap lengths which are actually way too long and I then need to add the hook and eyes that will attach the top and trousers together.  None of these will take particularly long, I've just been lazy about it.

To use up some fabric I have left over from this year's projects I'm going to make a matching tie to my dress for my husband (at his request) and a top using what's left of the dress fabric and the fabric I used for my wedding skirt using the Prima pattern for a fitted peplum top and pencil skirt I'd made my skirt out of before.  I'll need to patch the fabrics together before I cut the pattern, but I think it'll look good.

And finally, to use up the large amounts of wool I've acquired from previous projects I want to crochet or knit a strappy top or two and knit a cover for my hot water bottle so that I don't have to keep wrapping it in a towel every time I use it.  I do also have a ball of wool I brought specifically for making myself some socks and it would be nice to actually get that done.  

It's very unlikely I'll get even half of these done before the end of the year, but I wanted to actually write them down so I wouldn't keep forgetting about them or even think about starting completely new projects.  These will at least give me a break from the neverending knitting in the round that is making a jumper.

November 2022 Budget

November has been a pretty pricey month, mostly because we have done a whole lot of Christmas shopping and have had to get a new car after a few problems with the old car, including a breakdown.  Thankfully we do have sinking funds for these, but it's still unpleasant watching them go down.  Probably because I know we will have to build them back up again.

Of course, if we're being honest, we have also spent more than we should in other areas - like things for the flat from charity shops and IKEA.  I also brought a refill for my perfume, which was pricey but should laste a few years, and we've spent quite a bit on eating out.  Ones of those times is when we went to see family, which also put up our fuel bill a little bit.  We did keep within our budget for groceries though, so I'm going to count that as a win.

On a plus we've managed to keep our own emergency funds where they are and I've caught up with my pension payments so I'll now be able to go back to £50 a week for the rest of the year.  I'm not going to say anything about the four months emergency fund though, which I'm just going to gloss over this month. 😂

In all honesty it's been a bit of a disaster month when it comes to money.  However, the Christmas shopping is now complete and the issues with the car fixed.  We're also not going to be travelling anywhere in December so it should be a much cheaper month then November.  Now we just need to start saving up our sinkings funds and four months savings again - oh joy.