Half Term

For the third day in a row, I’ve actually woken up feeling refreshed and without the thumping headache that was becoming so characteristic of my early mornings. It’s not that I’m missing it, quite the opposite, it’s just that after the way the last couple of weeks have gone I’m slightly wary of relaxing and hoping that I’m finally finished with this horrible flu.

Saturday was Valentine’s Day, and as Mike and I were booked into the local pub for dinner, I was really worried about having to dose myself up with painkillers all morning before venturing to have my first alcoholic drink in a fortnight. I was already worried enough about eating a three course dinner with an appetite that seems to have deserted, me so it was lovely to wake up and find my head wasn’t aching for once. After a relaxing day of doing not very much, we spent a very pleasant evening at our lovely local and I even managed to eat half of each course, much to Mike’s delight!

After church yesterday we were off to visit Mike’s mum and dad. Again, I’d been worried- sitting through and hour’s service, followed by an hour long drive across the moors would be hard work if my head was once again pounding, so it was a relief to find I’d had a second good night’s sleep in a row. It was a lovely day, with great food, and although I felt very guilty for not helping more with the food and clearing up, my dear in-laws seemed more bothered with how I was feeling now, than with my lack of manners!

This morning once again I was delighted to find I’d had a really good sleep, with no headache as a memento. I’ve obviously been feeling like I was ignoring my business all weekend though, as I was aware that I was thinking a lot about what I need to sort out on the site overnight! First things first though, having been out for a very long day yesterday, no washing up was done so no one can have breakfast until that’s all cleared up!

It’s the beginning of the half term holiday, Mike’s working from home today, and our eldest daughter has a scheduled day off work so with the washing up in to soak, and the washing machine loaded and on the go, I take our morning cuppas upstairs for a leisurely start to the day. This week has come at just the right time for me- with the chance to have slower starts, I should be able to get back into proper routines and build my strength up better, so that I’m raring to go when they’re all back at school next week. I hope!

I don’t have a great many aims for today, just some basic admin work. Having not looked at the website at all over the weekend, I want to take a fresh look at it today, and just double check that I’m happy with how it all looks and that there’s nothing obvious that needs tweaking. It still looks good to me, the design is supposed to translate well on mobiles and other devices too so I take a quick look at it on my phone too. I’m actually really surprised by how good it looks on there, so I’m pleased with my final decision on the design. Hopefully this one won’t be ditched at all in the near future!

During the afternoon my four girls all go into town to watch the Shaun the Sheep film that is currently showing at the local theatre-come-cinema. I take the chance to do some cutting for the new dresses that I added to the shop last week, but that I now desperately need a demo of so that I can photograph them, thereby giving them a half decent chance to sell! One of these dresses is my Comic Relief charity dress, and so I also take the chance to put a link through to it on the homepage of the website.

The other job for this afternoon is to re-do my pattern pieces. All my patterns are hand drawn and cut out, and have been re-made several times over the years. Pin holes are the main problem here, as there are only so many times you can put pins through the same piece of paper before the paper becomes just one big hole! Although drawing around a shape, and then cutting it out sounds simple, it does have to be done very carefully. I’m aware that every time I trace around a shape it has the potential to get larger, so I have to watch my cutting out skills, or else the whole outfit could change over time. And, of course, adjoining edges have to still come out the same length.

Having been waiting to do this job since my big rush at Christmas, it’s nice to get the chance to finally refresh my patterns, which will make my cutting out easier and quicker next time. It may be only small steps towards getting back to working as normal, but I feel good about my business tonight- the website has a fresh new look, my patterns are crisp and waiting for more orders to come in, and I feel well enough at last to start sewing again. My job for tomorrow…