I've moved!

So, I've moved to Burnley :)

Burnley is in Lancashire and I moved up from the Midlands - a good 3 hours drive.  The move itself was relatively painless, with only a few hiccups along the way, although I don't want to be doing it too soon in a hurry.

I had to leave my job.  The thing is, the commute was doing my head in - 45 minutes, but usually an hour, given the traffic.  The diesel was costing me a week's wages every month (well, 4 weekly as that's how often I was paid) and as I was the only one working in our household, money was tight.

My life was so complicated; hence the lack of blog posts.  I'd be out of the house for close to 12 hours a day for 4 days a week (including college) and then for 2 days I'd be pretty much doing half days, although I was good for nothing, especially on the Saturday as I'd have been up since 5:30 (but usually earlier, as if I was on my own, I liked to get in earlier).  Sundays was my only real day to myself, which was filled with cleaning, catching up on college work, laundry and occasionally some knitting.  I was rarely able to cook and although I cooked at work (I worked in a canteen), it's not the same as cooking lovely things for yourself.

The thing about the move is that I'm able to attend Uni up here as well.  I've finished my certificate course in counselling and I'll be able to go on and do my masters degree.  I didn't get in this year, which I have mixed feelings about.  Part of me is relieved as I'll have a year to catch my breath after living such a hectic life for a year or so and part of me is a bit upset.  It's for the best though.

The Mr. has a better opportunity for jobs up here.  In the week that we moved, he had 3 job interviews.  We've not heard anything yet, although I remain hopeful.  It will make things so much easier when we are both working. 

I've got some temporary nights work - for how long, I'm not sure - it's ongoing temporary.  I can't say I'm keen on working nights, but I'm glad that we've got some money coming in.  The money is a little bit better than what I was earning before, plus it's full time, plus it's closer, so less fuel costs, which will help.  We still have some council tax to pay back from when we were living in Nottingham, but we overpaid our gas and electric so we should have some money coming back off them soon (although some of that will get eaten by the Mr's overdraft!), which will help. 

What's cool is that we are paying the same in rent but getting a bigger property.  In Nottingham, we lived in a top floor 1 bedroom flat which was basically 2 rooms.  Now we have a 2 up, 2 down house, with a teeny yard out the back to call our very own!  For the first time, I have my own herb garden.  Well, I call it a herb garden, but they are pots of herbs bought at the supermarket.  It's a little late in the year to be planting them outside, but we will next year.  Along with some chillies and maybe some tomatoes. 

The best thing though is that my sister lives just round the corner from us, which is ace.  She's handy to have around, plus she makes ace cakes!  It's fantastic.

We haven't done any decoration yet, because a) we aren't really sure exactly what we are doing and b) it's probably a better idea to wait until the Mr. has work and I have more secure employment.  Not that we'll be spending a fortune of course!

I have located a few of the local knitting and spinning shops.  There's a shop in Clitheroe that is a distributor for Ashford wheels and also has fibre.  It was great to go in!  I also found out that there's a knitting and spinning event called Yarndale in Skipton, which I'm definitely going to go to!! 

The second best thing that happened as a result of my move?  I now have my cat Hobbes living with me!!! Epic!  When I moved in with the Mr. from Leicester to Nottingham (keep up at the back!!), I had been asked to leave the place I was staying and as neither of us could afford the estate agents fees to move, we ended up in the Mr's place - a teeny, damp, cold, depressing top floor flat.  Not good for us, and unkind on the cat.  Now that we have moved, we've been reunited.  Damn, I've missed that cat!  He's as twp as a sledge though (gotta love Welsh phrases, nobody says it quite like us), but great to have around.

I hope to be posting more regularly from now on too!!  Perhaps with more pictures as well, although I have no idea where my camera is.  Tucked in a box somewhere no doubt!

Ooops

Well, it's been a while. Sorry about that. Ugh, I need to clean my keyboard. Most of my key need a good bash in order to work, so apologies in advance for my spelling

What's new with me? Quite a lot.

I'm in a new relationship. I took a long time chatting to this one compared to my last one. Online dating does work, but it can be soul destroying. There's a whole new blog in that subject, I think. I dipped in and out of online dating for 2 years, talking to different guys along the way. Talked to some nice guys, some not so nice guys and received a lot of weird messages. I think the one thing I've learned is to be clear about what you want from a relationship, be realistic and figure out what's important and what's negotiable. Not an easy task at the best of times.

New guy is a fellow Welsh person, who is also living in the Midlands. Which is cool. We Welsh have a peculiar sense of humour and it's nice to be able to share that with someone. Things are going great.

I also did an intensive course in counselling. I did a course about 18 months ago over 10 weeks and although I got a qualification, it wasn't the right kind to go on with if I wanted to take it up as a career. My ex put me off doing the course, but after we split up, I took some time out to figure out what I really wanted to do (at the same time as I was thinking about what I wanted from a relationship), so decided that I wanted to become a counsellor.

I now have a place (conditional upon a reference from work, but that's a formality) at Uni on counselling course - Certificate in Higher Education in Counselling. It's a part time course over 2 years. If I pass, I can apply for another course, which is a Diploma which is another 2 years. The course starts in January Yay!!

I have designed a sock pattern, but I've yet to finish writing it up. I don't really like writing sock patterns (on the basis of this one pattern!). I think it's because I really enjoy knitting socks and can knock up a pair of stocking stitch / ribbed socks quite easily from memory. It's tricky to have to think about the steps involved when I do them automatically. I will try and get the pattern written up soon, but I can't promise it'll be any good or comprehensive though. I'm crap at following sock patterns as well, because although there are some amazing sock patterns out there, it means I have to deviate from what I like doing. Which is probably quite good for me actually :)

I am somewhat addicted to spinning lately as well. I really want to become a better spinner. For some reason I'm convinced I'm not as good as I could be so I've been trying to practise. There are spinners guilds locally, but they tend to be on far off little nooks of Leicestershire, or meet on a Saturday (and I work on a Saturday). I am spinning somewhere between laceweight and 4ply (the yarn gets thicker and thinner) and my yarn is still slightly slubby. Although it is getting more even as I practise. I notice it's dependent on which fibre I spin with too. BFL comes out lovely and smooth, while the Shetland and silk blend I spun with is more slubby (lumps of silk, usually) and fuzzy (that would be the Shetland then).

Think I need to check out some videos on youtube or something. Not now though as it's 1:30 am and my bed is calling me :)

Retail Therapy

So yesterday after a mammoth 2 hour telephone conversation, me and the boyfriend have decided to have a trial separation. Urgh!

Naturally I'm quite sad, because I can't quite see it working. I'm working on the assumption that it's not going to work out. I think that we both want different things, plus the age difference is a bit of an issue for him (I am 32, he is 44 in 2 weeks). It's been one of the most reasonable break ups I've had, so I'm not in a terribly bad way, I'm functioning but I'm just sad with an added dose of pmt, because my body loves me :)

So, I comforted myself last night with pizza, Crabbies ginger beer and the Eurovision song contest. I loved the Moldovan entry, they were wearing pointy hats a la Harry Nilsson's The Point. This morning, I had to drop my housemate off at work, so decided on a bit of retail therapy and went to the car boot sale in Saddington.

I ended up buying my third copy of Willy Russell's The Wrong Boy, which is one of my favourite books. The other two, I've lent to people and I've never got them back or registered them on bookcrossing and released them in the wild. Cracking book.

I also bought a glass perfume bottle. I don't think it's particularly old (from looking at the stopper), but I love it. It was £10 and I loved the other stuff on her stall, but it wasn't at boot sale prices, as a lot of it was proper retro and vintage stuff.



I also got a couple of bone china teacups for £1. They are beautifully simple and are a little thicker than the one I already have. I do love them though :)



Then I went into Dos Hermanos for brunch, which was tasty, but now I'm sleepy. I think I will have a nap, then onto the job hunting.

Easter...

Easter and Christmas never seem to feel like proper holidays after a few years of working in retail, which sucks. Not that I celebrate them, being agnostic, but it's hard to enjoy your time off when you only have a day to enjoy, rather than the long weekend that everyone else has off. However, I do get a day off during the week and an afternoon off on a Friday, which makes it easier to get doctors / dentists done and out of the way without having to worry about work.

This year, I've got 3 whole days off, which seems like a luxury. Then I'm in for 3 days, then I'm off for 4 days. I am working on the day of the Royal Wedding. Mostly because a) I'm not bothered on watching it and b) I get paid my normal rate for working a Friday (so for 4 hours) and then time and a half on top of it. It seems daft to turn it down. Plus I'll be going out Friday night :)

Soon, I'll have to start working every Saturday, which is going to put a kibosh on going out (all of once a month!), seeing my boyfriend on the weekend (which tends to be the only time I get to see him) and doing knitty things on a Saturday (we often have get togethers). Frustrating, but hopefully I will be able to do something about that soon. It could have been worse. I could have been made to work Tuesday evenings (so no Stitch and Bitch) and Sundays as well.

24 hour society sucks sometimes. I don't see why supermarkets want to open on Christmas Day and Easter Sunday. Mostly they are open 24 hours or until late anyway. I seem to recall that our mothers coped, but then I guess that we have busier lives now. People are also expecting us to open as well, so seem to go mad stocking up with bread and milk, when quite often the shop is only shut for one day. Even if I am visiting relatives over Christmas, I will try and take something edible as a gift to the host and if I will be there a few days, I will take the bread and milk I have on the go, because it seems like such a waste to leave it go off at home when I am not using it. It's easy enough to pick up a fresh loaf and a pint of milk on the way home.

One of the things that I love about knitting is that it's slow. It helps me to disengage my brain from the stress of day to day life. I had been feeling particularly low these last few days and the simple act of sitting out in the park with a few friends and some knitting, helped unwind the tension (which was further unwound with a few beers later on in the evening!). It's the same with camping. I find that when I go camping, I begin to focus on how to cook a nice meal, when I have 1 gas ring and getting the washing up done, which seems weird, but somehow, taking it out of the home makes it more pleasant.

It's been a lovely hot Easter. It's days like this that I miss being in Wales. In particular, I miss the beaches. Even when they are covered in snow.



I used to love going to watch the sun set. I love the vivid colours you get when the sun sets in the summer. Intense hues of yellow, oranges, red, purples set against light blue skies and maybe a little bit of white or grey cloud.



Something I have noticed now that I am a knitter is the quality and hues of colour. I always knew there were particular hues I preferred, like the red of my 1974 VW Beetle, which wasn't cherry red, but more of a yellowy red. Also, I love aubergine purple and royal purples and blues.

It's now more how colours interact with each other and pool together and how we have memories of colour too. Red for me, always means the aforementioned Beetle I had, which was quite a different red from the Triumph Stag and TR6 that my Dad restored many years ago (they were cherry / pillarbox red) and a different red again from the ever so slightly bluish red adorning the wall opposite me.

Something I didn't know before that pure, natural water isn't clear, but ever so slightly blue. I know that we think of (clean!) seawater as blue, but I'm talking of drinking water. I always thought that was clear.

And now I am relaxed. What a difference a day makes. Having spent the day so far browsing a car boot sale (bought a pair of candlesticks for a house that I don't yet own, nor have the salary to own, but, y'know, they were pretty!), applied for 3 jobs and bought some shopping so that I can make goats cheese and red pepper risotto later, along with a reduced Lindt Easter egg and a bottle of half price Cava. Nom!!

I want to test a sock pattern out. I have already sort of designed a pair of socks, but I want to know what they look like with beads on them. Only one way to find out :) Then I will work on writing the pattern out.

But first, I'm going to take a cup of tea in the garden and watch the cats chase each other round.