This week's work.

There is so much to say and so little time. In any case, having a custom stamp means it's real.

Insomnia, prototypes, unravelling, decisions, decisions, decisions & one 180 degree turn. Phew, what a week-end!

It turns out that launching a mini-business is quite a lot like camping. You need a load of stuff whether it's for one night or for three months. In this case, I need it all in about three weeks.

This week-end was all about my upcoming market stall. When I wasn't busy making or unravelling pot hangers, I was thinking about displays, pots, plants, stamps, paper bags, business cards, social media, prices etc... throughout the day, and at 4am!

The insomnia had to do with the fact that since I hadn't yet received my rope, I was busy designing things in my head that I couldn't test. In the morning, Chris convinced me to go get some small amounts for the local crafts shop so I could start working on my ideas.

Suffice to say, the perfect designs in my head didn't quite come to life as I imagined them. Not to worry, the good thing about having no time is that one makes decisions on the go.

I had imagined that I would combine some elements of knitting with the standard macrame stuff but I soon realised that whilst the idea is good, I would need a lot more time to bring it together. After some unravelling, I delved back into classic macrame and started yielding some good results and a couple successful prototypes.

Since I am making pot hangers, the question of pots was also getting fairly urgent to resolve. The first question was whether the hangers would be sold with or without pots. In any case, I would need some for the display so might as well sell them at the same time. So the next question was, what pots?

I could go cheap as chips but it wouldn't look any good or follow Bec's suggestions to get some really nice pots one shop sells in town and sell them for a small profit. The pots are beautiful but pricey and if I'm honest, I actually felt that people would be buying the pot with a macrame hanger chucked in for free, rather than the opposite. Also, I wasn't thrilled with the financial risk of it all.

So, after a Bunnings to the local garden centre, we decided on two sizes of simple terracotta pots. Neutral and classic, you can't really dislike them. They just are 'The Pot" par excellence. They are cheap but much nicer than plastic ones. And since the market will have a spring theme to it, we decided that we would plant herbs into the pots and create little hanging kitchen gardens. The whole thing would look nice, smell nice and create a lovely package.

The biggest turnaround that happened though was pretty major and quite a leap of faith. All week-end, I was working with cord that was much smoother and prettier than the bulk order I was awaiting. This made me feel increasingly worried and down. I just felt that I would put a huge amount of effort into something that just wouldn't look that great because the cord was just kind of ... blah.

I had been nursing an idea in my head about using my beloved T-shirt yarn by Wool and the Gang. It is soft and easy to use and comes in great colours. Suddenly, I realised that I could make a test with a few scraps from a project I had made last year. I knotted it up in a couple of minutes, and breathlessly asked Chris to confirm what I already knew, it looked way better!

After a quick calculation, we realised that not only did it look better, it turned out to also be cheaper. Even though time isn't exactly on my side, I still made the decision (very quickly) to order a few different colours and return the initially ordered rope when it arrives.

With the colors I have picked (a red-ish pink, a peacock blue/green, a bright yellow and white), my display should look bright, springy and festive. Now, I just have to wait a few more days for all the yarn to arrive before I can get stuck into it.

I still have loads to do. When I finish writing this, I am going to open up photoshop and start working on a logo. Today, Bec came over and I was able to ask questions and get her opinion on a lot of the decisions we had made over the week-end. She also told me that before her first market for House of Bec, she had exactly 5 days to set herself up from scratch.

With that in mind, I try not to worry and keep enjoying the ride.

Oh, and I have a name for it all... 'Oh Josephine', in honour of the beautiful Josephine knot that started it all.

Eloise, 5 months.

If you have been following this blog, you'll know that every 19th of the month, I take a few photos of Eloise to mark another month in her company. I usually put her down on my big knitted throw and shoot away from a few different angles.

Yesterday, our little photoshoot didn't go down the usual route. Instead, Eloise started rolling around all over the floor as soon as I put her down. For the first time, she was able to roll from front to back and vice versa. She mastered this new skill almost instantly and was off the rug in seconds.

Luckily for her, her loving big brother came to her rescue... well, sort of...

As for the photos, most of them are blurry and/or overexposed. I'm going to need a little more practice with this new action-packed style of photography.

Prepare to have a giggle.

Creating Cities - by Marcus Westbury.

To creatively minded Novocastrians, Marcus Westbury is something of a demi-god. He rose to this status as the founder of Renew Newcastle, an initiative that has been acknowledged as one of the driving forces behind the revitalisation of the Newcastle decaying city centre.

'Renew' as the locals call it, solves two major problems with one beautiful, simple, genius solution, and the result is more than the sum of its parts.

In a nutshell, the scheme makes it possible for creative folk to occupy vacant commercial space in a temporary tenant agreement on a month to month basis, until and if the space enters a proper commercial agreement.

There have been over 70 projects started this way in Newcastle alone and have included everything from Art Galleries, to studio spaces & office spaces. The only condition is that the projects must fall in the creative category and people must make what they sell. The definition of the latter has evolved over time but the former stays true six years later.

Some Renew schemes have been in the same space from the start, while others had to move out after the first month. Some have 'graduated' to becoming proper commercial tenants, others have moved on to other pastures.

Over the years, the blossoming activity in the city centre has encouraged a myriad other businesses to take up residence on Hunter Street, literally bringing a once nearly abandoned artery of the city, back to life.

These days, one hears of a new bar/restaurant/cafe/shop/deli opening almost every week. At a time when retail is dropping around the Western world, small businesses in Newcastle are blossoming. Far from having to exist in the shadows of the big shopping centres, these days, Hunter Street brings its own sunshine.

Creating Cities is Marcus Westbury's just published book and is a great read. For anyone who has met the man himself or seen him speak - I have done both - his sharp wit, quick mind and ability to see things from inside and outside the square are all translated perfectly into his writing.

Marcus tells the story of how Renew came to life. A walk down Hunter Street counting empty shopfront, a few fateful meetings, a lot of questions, a few failures along the way and ultimately, finding something while looking for something else.

And while serendipity might have had something to do with it, the dots took someone pretty switched on to get connected. Let's just say that if I had been the one taking that walk, I don't think that what followed would have made history.

At the core of the journey is Marcus' realised attempt to make it possible, even easy, for people with tiny budgets and big dreams to have a go, to do stuff in their city, to try things that haven't been done before.

Somehow, he managed to get around the apathy of a system that was asleep, the legalities of getting people into spaces they don't own or actually really rent, and even of setting up a wifi network that wouldn't require a year long plan.

Renew makes it easy to fail (without much consequence) but more importantly, possible to succeed.

How many artists have access to a free studio? How many curators are handed the keys to a street fronting gallery space? How many fledging graphic designers and clay animators can move out of their sun room into a proper office space? Renew does all of that for free and with no strings attached. You just have to rock up with a can of paint and a good dose of determination and can-do-ism.

In Newcastle, this has been the experience of a couple hundred people. That even included me for a short time.

Apart from the bricks and mortar, Renew has also brought together a solid, growing and supportive community of creatively minded people. They go to each other's events and openings, they recommend each other, they collaborate, they show each other the ropes, they contribute some elbow grease, time and the few resources they have. It's a family of people all doing different things together, simply because it matters to them and because they can.

Renew didn't create the artists. They were already there, they just didn't have anywhere visible to go. Renew built a framework that completely redefined the place of the artist in our cities. Rather than struggling alone in a kitchen/sunroom/garage, they can now bring it all in the open. Some will still struggle, that's what artists do, but some will thrive, and that should be what cities aspire to.

The fact that Renew is an amazing community above all else was never truer than when Marcus decided to actually write a book about it. The day it appeared on the crowdsourcing website Pozible, it smashed its target of $10,000 and within 24 hours, the project had pledges for almost $50,000. It became one of the biggest and fastest Pozible campaigns of all time.

If that's not family, I don't know what is.

And maybe Marcus isn't quite a demi-god. Maybe he's just a really clever guy who wanted to shake things up a little. And he just kept shaking and pushing and knocking. For that, the combination of determination and blind optimism, we're very thankful.

Long live Renew.

The same pleasure.

Eloise has started rolling over. She is a couple days shy of being 5 months so that definitely makes her the youngest child I've ever had to do the flip. She hasn't quite mastered it yet. She gets about 90% of the way but then, her arm gets stuck under her body and she can't pull it out yet. Since she can't push herself back, she is then pretty well stuck.

Still, this morning, Chris and I were watching her as she struggled back and forth on our bed. We both had grins going from ear to ear as we shouted encouragements and praise at her. We were so proud and smitten, you would think we'd never been there before.

But we have and I realised, it didn't matter at all. It was with the exact same pleasure, and awe, and amazement, that we watched her reach her own milestone.

Somehow, when Hugo was doing all of these things, I hadn't completely detached myself from it. In some ways, everything he was doing was happening to me as well. And that's why I wrongly thought that maybe, if it had all happened before, it wouldn't be quite as exciting the second time around.

It totally is though. It's amazing to see your child push and pull and stretch and twist to try and make this brand new little body do something it has never done before. I remember how proud of himself Hugo was when he started standing and then walking. They know it's a big deal because it's their first time and that counts.

It doesn't matter how many times we have watched it happen before, a first time is a first time and it's incredible. 

I'm possible.

This is a play on words my friend Bec made while promoting her market project, The Impossible Market. As Bec sees it, her market celebrates the makers and doers who have done what they once thought was impossible, as she has with her blooming business, House of Bec.

These are also the words I will need to repeat to myself this month as I take the challenge to be one of the vendors in the second edition of the market, next month, on the 11th.

Her concept is to exhibit about 20 stalls each time with about half of these being experienced market sellers, and the other half, you guessed it, a selection of newbies, either launching a new business or simply having a one-off experience.

For now, I see myself as the latter but depending how things go, who knows? It might turn into the former.

The plan is to sell some of the macrame pot hangers I have been making. These are simple, on trend and quick to make whilst still being decorative and functional. Unlike knitting, it's not impossible to imagine making a sustainable small business model out of it.

We're not quite there yet though. First, I have to survive the next few weeks leading up to the 11th. I now have a pretty good idea of what I will be making and my supplies, 750 meters of cotton rope, are in the mail on their way to me.

Once the rope arrives, I'll just need to figure out when I'll make everything. Probably during naps and in the evenings.

There is so much to think about. What I will make, how much to sell it for, how to present it, what to buy for the display, how to make do with what we have, how much I will need to sell to break even... let alone make a profit, what my business (or at least stall) will be called!

My brain has been buzzing with ideas. Some for this month, some for later. It's keeping me awake with a mixture of excitement, anticipation, questions and some fear. What if I make is terrible? what if I don't sell anything? What if I don't pull it off?

Since I have now committed to it, the question of pulling it off is off the table. It just needs to happen. As for selling, well, we'll see.

The fantasy of making and selling things as a source of income has been one that I have entertained so many times in so many forms, from knitting to making felt toys, to jewellery and so on... It's an itch that I finally have an opportunity to scratch. I don't know what the outcome will be. I might hate it and curse myself at night when I am making some macrame pot hanger when I should be sleeping or I might love it and wait for next month with anticipation and new ideas.

I don't know, which is why I need to try. I need to get the fantasy out of my system and test it, see how it feels, have a laugh about it or get serious.

Either way, it will be challenging but not impossible. I'm possible.

Same chair, different babies.

A (incomplete) family portrait.

The miscarriage.

One of the sadder and more difficult experiences I have gone through was having a miscarriage that ended my first pregnancy at a short 9 weeks into it. It was physically and emotionally devastating and it took me a few months to recover. In the end, the only thing that really made the sadness recede was falling pregnant again.

I have come a long way since that unfortunate episode and many things have happened, most of them much more joyful but it left me changed forever, in ways that would take too long to write about today.

In any case, it wasn't my own miscarriage I was referring to in the title but sadly, one of my friends'.

For a little over 1 1/2 years, I have been going to a playgroup almost religiously every week. In that time, I have made a few connections with other parents but none stronger than with my friend Aqua. Despite being very different people, we have found in one another a strong connection. We talk easily, share secrets and make plans. I am always happy to see her and she, me.

Together, we have watched our sons grow from wobbly babies into confident toddlers, all the while talking about it from the sidelines. We talked of our plans to fall pregnant, and when I fell pregnant with Eloise, I shared the news with Aqua early.

Then, a couple months ago, it was her turn to share her happy news. Her baby would be born in March, close to Hugo's birthday. As all expectant mothers, she was both excited and terrified.

Sadly, a couple of weeks ago, I received a text message quite early in the morning letting me know that she thought she was having a miscarriage. There was blood and it wasn't stopping.

She knew I had experienced something similar so she texted me in the hope I could shed some light on what would happen. Through a couple conversations and text exchanges, I did my best to reassure her but also explain clearly what I had been through. Naive to it myself at the time, the process the body undertakes was very shocking and unexpected. I wanted to spare her that if I could.

Over the next couple of weeks, we texted every so often. I asked for some news, sent some positive words, let her know my plans to attend playgroup and so on.

I saw her last Thursday at playgroup and she was looking well. She had just come back from a little family getaway to clear her head and she was feeling positive and refreshed. Her body was recovering well and, contrary to her first impulse to want to get pregnant straight away again, she now felt like waiting a little, to let the dust settle.

At the end of the session, she handed me a lucky bamboo plant to keep at home. It was to thank me for my support. I was so touched by the gesture even if I wasn't the one needing it.

The thing about terrible things happening is that they are quite often very random, making it hard to move on and get closure. Miscarriages happen. That's it. There is no reason and there is no way to stop it. With time, of course, we come to accept it and move on. So many much worse things can happen.

Helping a friend go through the same experience was sort of healing to me too. It gave it some purpose. it felt that something good could come out of something bad. If I hadn't gone through this, my words and thoughts wouldn't have had the same weight. I probably wouldn't even have received that early morning text at all in fact. It seems strange to say, but in some ways, I was almost glad it happened because it helped me be there for someone who needed it.

Friendships evolve slowly, as you move through levels hinged on specific events, from the superficial to something with more depth and intimacy. It was an honour to be told the great news of her pregnancy, but it was an even greater one to be allowed to help in more difficult times.

My own miscarriage has taken on a blurry softness. It doesn't sting to think about it like it used to. Today, I can honestly say I have come full circle with it and my beautiful exotic bamboo is there to remind me of that.

Two and a half.

My baby boy is two and a half years old today. Although it's not actually a birthday, it still feels like a big deal. I can't believe six months have gone by since his birthday party (that I didn't really enjoy) and in another six months, little Hugo will be off to pre-school. Life has certainly changed a bit in the last six months as well. Back then, I was pregnant and our house was a construction zone. It's actually strange to think back to a time, not so long ago, when Hugo was our only baby. Luckily, as we suspected, he has turned into a wonderfully gentle and caring big brother to Eloise.

Inspired by Rose, who herself was inspired by another blog she reads, I'll list a few things that I love about Hugo, followed by a few things I don't enjoy as much, since it is such an effective way to mark a fleeting moment in time. What is true today might be a distant memory in another six months.

Things I love:

• Your smile. It floods the room with light.

• Your hair. It still has that magical red tinge, darker than the usual anglo ginger colour. You absolutely hate having your hair washed or cut so we don't do either that often. I'm glad your hair is a little longer at the moment because we get to enjoy its stunning brightness.

• The way you try to pronounce certain words. Speech is still coming slow to you and when words come out, they seem to get all tangled up in your mouth. It's hard to understand you most of the time but I can see that you try so hard. At the moment, you are trying to say 'broken', which you pronounce 'Bwok-n'. It's adorable. 

• The way you show your love for Eloise. Until recently, she was still 'Baby' and now, 'Eloviiise' is coming out more often. You want to hold her on your lap, kiss her in the mornings and at night, you greet her in the morning by saying, 'Hellooo Baby' looking her right in the eyes, you pat her when she cries and smile at her when she is in the bath. She is lucky to have you.

• Your jokes. Your favourite joke at the moment comes from one of your all-time favourite books, called Moo-Baa-Lalala. It goes like this, "A cow says... Mooooo", "A sheep says... Baaaa", "Three singing pigs say, La la laaa" and so on. We all know it by heart but to spice it up, you now like to say 'Mooo' for the singing pigs and it completely cracks you up! So when we are having a laugh during the day, you look at us and say, "Moooo" because this is your big joke. It makes you laugh and it never gets old (it actually doesn't).

• Your run. You are so agile, like a little acrobat and unlike some of your friends who seem to stomp on the ground like miniature elephants, you run like a little deer, hopping from side and side on your light little feet. Since you run more than you walk, we can enjoy it all the time. 

• When you explore. When we go to the park or the beach, you spend a lot of time wandering around, picking up sticks or rocks or flowers. You like to climb the roots of the fig trees or dig in the sand. I enjoy this new autonomy where although I always keep an eye on you, you can explore while keeping yourself mostly safe... until you run towards the water.

• Your manners. I don't even know how you know these things (I suspect it's from Peppa Pig) because we don't purposely try to enforce it but when you ask for something, you often say please, or rather, "cheeeese", as in "more l'eau cheeeeese". Recently, you've also started saying something that sounds a lot like "thank you". You also love saying "bye bye" and "hellooo". It all seems so simple but it's cute and important for later so we're glad it's coming to you naturally. 

• Your beauty. In another era, you would have inspired painters.

• You love books. We read to you everyday, several times a day and books have become one of your favourite toys. Every night, you carefully choose the two or three books we will read to you and then, once you are in bed, you listen carefully, always commenting in the same spots, while you twirl your hair. A love for books will be a lifelong gift that I hope you keep.

Things that are more challenging:

• At home, you don't play much on your own. You need me by your side all the time and don't give me much breathing space. It would be tolerable if you were in a good mood but you are often grumpy as well, saying no to everything and speaking in a whinny, pretend-cry voice. 

• Your agility can be scary. I try to stay quite relaxed about letting you explore things physically but when you start jumping from the fourth step of a set of stairs, my heart does skip a beat. It's all good when you then proudly exclaim, "biiig Jump!" but it's hard not to feel worried for your lovely teeth, your pretty head and all those cute limbs you have.

• You are starting to imitate the bad behaviour of some of your friends: pushing, hitting, snatching and so on... Thankfully, you aren't doing it too much yet but it does worry me for the future of play dates. 

• You can be pretty shy. You don't easily let other people take care of you and I hope this doesn't cause problems when you start pre-school next year. Hopefully, you'll adapt easily. 

• You don't love solving problems. When things get stuck, you get mad. When things don't fit, you get mad. When things don't stick, you get mad... You don't have a lot of patience for things that require some thought. I'm hoping pre-school helps with that too.

I'm sure I could go on in both columns. I don't want to dwell on the challenging parts since I know that they are fleeting and are often challenging simply because of the situation we're in at the time. Patience will come, agility will continue to evolve, the hitting and whinging will dissipate. They are all temporary and important stages too. We'll look back on them and laugh, and think how far away it seems. For now, the problems we have are pretty harmless, not much to write a blog about. The good bits though, I hope I can hold on to for a while longer before it all moves on to the next phase.

Doing the figures.

At the start of each month, I have a little ritual called "doing the figures" which consists of going over my bank statement and transferring each expense in a table on my computer into the appropriate categories.

I have been doing it for about a year and over that time, I have actually come to enjoy the process. I started doing it at a time when I wasn't working much and we had a lot of expenses. Not knowing where we sat each month and if we were living within our means was a source of stress.

Doing the figures doesn't quite act like a budget since it happens after the fact but it has brought a lot of clarity to our spending habits and helped maintain a good balance, even when our capacity to spend is limited. Since I can not imagine running a credit card bill that I can't pay back, to me, this is absolutely crucial if we are to maintain our current lifestyle.

It helps that neither of us are big spenders but tallying everything has highlighted where some money was trickling out and could be saved. Not every month sees us in the comfortable green but at least, I know that the expensive months, which are unavoidable, are balanced out by the leaner ones. It also gives me a rough feel for what is wise to spend, like a coffee here and there won't hurt, and what isn't, rather than spending blindly and hoping for the best... only to then live with the guilt of the purchase.

I also like to remember each purchase which acts a little like a diary. Some months have been more interesting than others with trips to Sydney or a fun dinner out. Some months are all about the house with several trips to Bunnings, our local hardware store.

At a time when I am not earning anything, it restores peace of mind to simply know and be ok with what has happened. Of course, we could always spend less. We could always skip that coffee or that pastry but that wouldn't be living, it would take all the fun away. So until I start adding coins to the coffers, my job is to make what we do have stretch as far as it can. And I'm actually pretty good at it.