After a long break, I’m looking forward to getting back to my sewing and blogging again. Since my last post in January I ended up having quite a bad post-covid reaction which set off my arthritis badly. It took almost six months to resolve it and get a new medication regime working and a lot of that time was spent resting on the lounge and also not able to sew or walk much due to such painful joints. I was also diagnosed with Type II diabetes and hypertension, both are improving now that I can go for walks again. So while the covid itself was only like a having a cold, it certainly set off a chain of health issues for me. I’m glad to be coming out the other side of it.

We did get a few more things done around the house. We put down new carpet in the lounge room, got rid of a lot of clutter and an old sideboard that took up a lot of room. I replaced it with open shelves and baskets from Ikea where we keep hats, keys, handbags, wallets etc, all the stuff that used to get dumped on the kitchen counter now has a new home.  I now have a nice spot for some decorations near the front door & a space for a wallhanging above.

The other room that got a makeover was the laundry. It still had the original laundry from when we built the house over 35 years ago, just some shelves on one wall. I just love my new laundry which has timber bench tops, lots of cupboards and a pull out bin. The washer & drier are up on stand now which is so much easier. I smile every morning when I go in there! DH still has a few little jobs to finish it completely but as you can see its a big improvement. We used  Bunnings kitchen cupboards and saved a LOT of money installing it ourselves.

Once my health improved we were able to fulfil one of our retirement dreams and we have just returned from almost 2 months visiting the UK, Spain, France, Denmark and Norway, part cruise and part land based. It was just wonderful!. I loved visiting so many historic places, grand churches and also some of my family history sites.

I’ve had lots of time to reflect on retirement and how I want to spend it. I just want to read, potter about the house and get back to my sewing. Of course I have lots of UFO’s to work on and some new projects on the go. I’ve started making DS a tumbling blocks quilt  using  a tumbling blocks pattern without Y seams.

I’ve got a colourwash quilt growing on my design wall, lots of 2.5″ Kaffe squares. In the years I was blogging about my debt & mortgage payoff I used to buy a packet of these as a ‘reward’ when I reached a financial goal. Now I finally get to play around with them.

And of course Bonnies Mystery Quilt is coming up soon and I’m looking forward to that.`

“Enjoy the little things in life because one day you’ll look back and realise they were the big things.”

Kurt Vonnegut