What A Long, Strange, Trip It's Been.

Wow it's been a minute! I haven't posted here since last February.

Kids, I'll be honest. 2019 has not been gentle with us. This has not been a particularly kind year. We were financially gutted by our move to Portland which meant that Cap needed to be in Los Angeles and back to work pretty much immediately after our move. I started (and then quit) a very high-stress job across the river in Vancouver. Depression and extreme anxiety were pretty much my constant companions in the first half of the year. We lost my father-in-law to a miserable and prolonged illness in July. My mother died of complications from her many health issues in August, after 3 long, agonizing weeks in hospice. We both basically just had to quit our lives, take time off from our jobs, tend to family, sit by death beds, plan funerals, and be at the Dying Party until it was over. 

I'm still grieving. We both are. And I'm learning that's a thing that doesn't have a time limit. But life does go on and things keep moving, cats have to be fed, work has to be done and eventually you have to jump back into the stream of your life and tend to your own business. But really it's just been one thing after another since the last time I blogged here, and now here we are, a year after our move to Portland, and we're just starting to stick our heads up and look around. There are still unpacked boxes in the closets and in the garage, but we've started to tackle them, one by one. 

My tools and my beads have pretty much been in their boxes and containers, the studio half unpacked and disorganized, since we got here. But I'm starting to get a handle on it. I just dropped off a delivery of pieces to a local store. I started a job at a great little shop in North Portland in early September, and I just love it. I get to walk to work every day and I'm meeting so many people around my neighborhood. I love St. Johns so much.  I feel like I'm getting a jump on my old frenemies, Depression and Anxiety, with some help from my new friends, Happy Light and Vitamin D.  My other new friend, Warm Coat, and my longtime bestie, Hand Knits, are also helping morale. Best of all, we caught up on most of the bills and Cap was finally able to take some time away from Los Angeles and come home. 

If I'm still being honest, I don't think we're all the way out of the woods yet and there's still another 5-6 weeks of 2019 hanging around. There are still a lot of things to do and hurdles to cross. But I'm feeling hopeful and like the light is coming back. And I've got my fingers crossed that everyone else we love is going to stay put for a minute. 

I'm hoping that where-ever you are, you are reaching for the light and that your year is turning gently as it winds to a close.

We're having a little sale in the shop through the end of November. I'm clearing out all the Old to make way for some New. Most of these pieces have been sitting in a box, waiting, for the last year. I so very much want them to find their new homes, to be taken out into the light, worn and adored.