When the rug is pulled from under your feet

My husband and I both come from poor families. Growing up, we didn't have a lot of this world's goods, but we never lacked anything that was essential. Then our parents skimped and scraped to give us those 'extras' that make childhood so happy.

Come marriage, and my hubby and I felt the call of God to spend our lives in Christian ministry and so for 21 years, we served as volunteers in two missions, without pay or superannuation, just trusting the Lord to supply all our needs. We never went without a meal, though we did have some interesting ones! And just as our parents did, God often blessed us with the 'extras' beyond our needs.

Things changed for the last ten years of our working lives, when we moved States, and the Christian organisations we worked with actually employed us, paying a salary and superannuation. This enabled us to purchase a home and pay off a mortgage and buy a reliable car.

So come retirement, we were eligible for a government pension plus a small income from our tiny superannuation. Then God blessed us again with some amazing 'extras'. For 13 years I had the joy of designing bags, wall-hangings, quilts, pincushions etc and being paid a significant amount each year by Craft magazine publishers. To have that income added to our pension meant we had enough money to do a little bit of travel and indulge in some other small luxuries. 

The first rug to be pulled from under my feet was when seven of the magazines that published my work closed down and the one remaining reduced its number of issues. With less income in 2018 and little possibility of publication, there was no need to purchase lots of fabric, sewing aids or any of the amazing gadgets that keep being invented for stitchers. We were still able to live comfortably yet frugally.

I also still had an income from pattern sales on my Craftsy Store where I had nearly 200 patterns available for purchase. My patterns were in front of millions of Craftsy members who hopefully would fall in love with my designs. But ... you guessed it, the rug was pulled from under my feet two days ago. Craftsy's new owners decided to cull their 12,000 designers and 220,000 patterns. They advised me they were keeping my store as I was identified as a "top designer". However they left  just 2 (yes, two) paying patterns and eight free patterns in my store!!! Of the eight free designs, three are Christmas, and four are blocks in a 12 block design! It was obviously a random, computer-generated choice of what patterns were left in stores!

So, what do you do when the rug is pulled from under your feet? Well, the first thing is to pick yourself up off the floor where you've been flung. The next thing is to turn to God who is an expert in picking up the pieces! In this situation, there is a third thing I need to do - fix up my hundreds of links to Craftsy that now do not work!

I am still thinking through how I can best sell my patterns in future. I will eventually have them all available direct from my website, but of course I would like them to be available to a much wider audience. 

So I am back on my feet - just! and have plenty of work to do on my website when my Christmas visitors go home next week!  

May you have many blessings in the new year.

Happy stitching!

Val

Going Green and Gold for Christmas

In the 1980's, green and gold were formally recognised as Australia's national colours. They are the colours also of our National Floral emblem, the golden wattle.

I decided this year that our Christmas Tree would have a green and gold theme - not to be patriotic, but because I like the colour combination and have a few decorations that would fit the brief.

My gold colour is nothing like our brilliant wattle, but, as you can see, is the metal colour, ... all that glitters here is definitely not real gold!

 The colour scheme needed a 'lift' so I included some of my white decorations.

- Bells and snowflakes which I've crocheted over the years.

The holly leaf, one of my four "All is Calm, All is Bright" Decorations which are super quick to make and a bargain at just $US 3.00 for 4 patterns.

This gorgeous tatted snowflake was a precious gift from one of my lovely blog friends.

Whatever colour scheme you have for your Christmas celebrations, I pray you will have a beautiful time with your family and friends, and that you will have time to pause and think about the real reason for the season - the amazing gift of the baby in the manger who was born to be King!

"King of my life I crown you now."

Happy Christmas!

Val

There's no place like home

Hubby and I have been on a two week holiday adventure. Some of the adventures were planned but others weren't! Along with nine of our friends, we hopped on the train for our 1600 kilometer journey to Cairns. It's a long way, but we really enjoy train travel with its spacious leg room, dining car and plenty of room to walk around. And at the princely sum of $25 each way, thanks to the Government gift, it sure is a great way to travel!

We get on so well with the others in the group and it was wonderful to spend a week with caring friends, seeing the wonders of our amazing country - beautiful beaches like the one above at Palm Cove.

Lush rain forests: 

Metallic starlings building their communal nests:

The turquoise water of the Great Barrier Reef:

A Bush Stone-Curlew nesting in a Park right in the centre of town:

On the trip back, we spent a great week with our younger daughter and her family with a few surprise celebrations thrown in. We had an early Christmas with them and included some gifts I had made. Now that plastic bags are a thing of the past in our State, I made some shoe travel bags for them.

They're definitely nicer than plastic bags!

They were colour-coded for family preferences!

I think they are a great way to separate shoes from the rest of the packing.

One of our unplanned adventures was trying to get home again! Travel was severely disrupted because of catastrophic fires throughout Queensland. We eventually arrived home a day late, with the trip taking 7 hours longer than normal. God looked after us amazingly - the train we were originally booked on was held up for 15 hours, so we were thankful to avoid the 29 hours sitting around on that journey. Other services were replaced by Coach so we were also glad we didn't have to endure that with their comparatively small seats and nowhere to walk around. Then of course we were delighted to spend another day with our family ... and even did all the washing so that we came home with clean clothes! The holiday was wonderful, but there sure is no place like home!

The focus for me this week is a stall I am sharing at the Abbey Museum Open Day and Boutique Christmas Markets next Saturday near Caboolture.  Come and say hello if you live nearby! 

Val