Wednesday, 3 May 2023

Workshops & Lectures

I joined the North California Quilt Council today aka NCQC. They have a regular teachers parade where new and longtime teachers get to show off their offerings to guilds and groups looking to book people for lectures and workshops. I've started building lixiemakesit.com and so my offerings are on there. Which is where this blog needs to go too! I'll be sad to leave blogger but I'm going to slurp a load of this content over there so it won't be lost. 

This will be the blog link in future: https://lixiemakesit.com/blogs/news 


Monday, 1 May 2023

A Time to Tear and a Time to Mend

I am not a religious person but I do find some of their texts highly quotable. For instance, the Bible's Ecclesiastes 3:

I have not had the best few years. In my last post I'd just ended my marriage and at some point I'll talk about my divorce quilt aka "Fifty Five Thousand Dollars". Then I was diagnosed with breast cancer out of the blue during lockdown. Then I got burnt out at work, had a disastrous breakup and started dealing with a childhood trauma, while navigating mass layoffs and reorganizations at work. That was a tough month. Then things got really bad. November to March were dark days, punctuated by suicidal thoughts, lakes of tears, complete loss of direction and a lot of alone time. March saw me start Ketamine assisted therapy (KAT, and all perfectly legal here in California) and that, on top of the years of therapy and hard work I've put in, seems to have helped. I've realized a few things. 

1. Fuck those men who used and abused me at various points in my life. 

2. Time for a fresh start. 

3. This is going to be challenging. 

I'm currently researching different business ideas but after years of telling myself 

"You can't make a living from being creative" 

(despite the zillions of people I see doing just that), and the last year of hearing a little voice say 

"Please don't decide to try and make it as a creative because that is going to be SO hard" ...

I've made the decision. I'm going to try and make it as a creative person. It is going to be hard. Really, really hard. But then I've always loved this quote. 

Image shows the quotation "We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things. Not because they are easy, but because they are hard. - John F. Kennedy

He went on to add "...because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win...". I've challenged myself to make a go of it between now and the end of July. Watch this space for details!