Happy New Year

First things first, I hope everyone had a happy and relaxing new year. We took it easy here and saw the New Year in with a movie and a glass of champers which has been in the fridge for donkey's years. I was a bit worried it might have turned into vinegar it's been in there so long but it was very lovely:)

I've seen countless posts about New Years Resolutions in the last few days and to be honest I wasn't going to bother myself because I never wholeheartedly make them so I've never gone a year and kept any resolution I've made, but ... I did manage to keep one of last years so I may just have another go this year.

I said back at the start of last year that I would try and appear in a magazine and then in true Leanne Woods form I did nothing, zip, nada, bupkis. Then in October I received an email from Alice Blackledge of Sew Hip asking if I'd like to write a tutorial for them.

Let me think about that one for a second ... aye go on then!




Issue 25, with my tutorial for the Evergreen Wallet went on sale on 31 December 2010, so I just made it by the skin of my teeth and what's better is that I even have a copy to prove it.

That was the important part of the resolution because a few months ago my brother's girlfriend was getting off the bus when she say a girl reading a magazine that she had folded in half and could have sworn she saw this bag in the shopping page but without knowing what magazine it was, it may have even been an old copy of something I could never confirm it.

And back at Halloween in 2009 I might have had a cushion in a special edition of Chat but I forgot to buy it and couldn't get a back issue either. A friend of my mum's thinks she remembering seeing the cushion in there but didn't have her copy any more so I'm still none the wiser if it was in there or not.

But I know this one's real, got a paper cut rifling through the pages and everything:)

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So now for this years resolution. Sleep, that's it, I'm going to make a real effort to sort out my sleep patterns this year because my brain still thinks it's a night owl, but my body thinks it's an early bird which leads to a lovely combination of my brain keeping my body awake til stupid o'clock and my body dragging my half bedraggled brain out of bed at half past a freckle and I end up losing about 3 hours a day to laziness and a good dose of knackereditis.

I think I'm going to embrace the early bird and start shifting my bedtime forward a bit at a time until I'm at least going to sleep the right side of midnight, hopefully then the 5am wake up won't be so hard to deal with and I'll make better use of my time.

More time of course means I should get more done in a day, like keeping accounts up to date every week, making more stock so I can approach more outlets, hopefully write another tutorial or two for Sew Hip, work up a few new patterns when my brain isn't addled and with a bit of luck I'll have more energy too for things like exercise and the most important one of all ... spending time with my family, time of the non knackered "can we just sit here on the sofa and watch TV variety".

So what are your plans for 2011, any resolutions made or are you going to be clever and keep those to yourself for the time being?

2010

That's twenty ten by the way not two thousand and ten. You have to say it the first way, it's the law! But here we are again, the dawn of not only a new year but also a new decade. I'm very happy to say that this Christmas was by far better than last, but more about that later.

This year has been very strange for me and a lot of it has come with a pretty steep learning curve.

I started 2009 freshly unemployed with a four year old who, lets be completely honest here, I didn't know an awful lot about. I know that sounds rather odd, because I'm her mum and all but still up until January 2009 she spent ten hours a day, five days a week in childcare and she spent time at my mum's house most Saturdays and Sundays. Apart from when she was sick, a little tiny baby before I went back to work or over holidays we'd never spent more than a few awake hours together. We had our good days and we had our bad days. Though I'm happy to say, mostly good.

In March I finally decided that I'd give my own business a whirl and opened a shop on Folksy. I'm really rather pleased with how my first year has gone and I'm looking forward to next year.

My little girl started school this year too.

My little experiment (that you may or may not remember) failed miserably after some horrible weather. Well it was horrible for Northern Ireland anyway!

And then before we could say Bob's your uncle, along came Christmas and here we are at the New Year again.

As years go I'm very happy and overall I'll be popping 2009 into the good year pile.

All I wish for you this year is that you find and are able to hold onto whatever it is that makes you smile.

Happy New Year everybody.