Signing on.

If you've read some of my previous blog posts you'll know that I've not been working for a while. Finding a job has been slightly harder than I thought, so eventually I had to turn to the government for a bit of help. And oh my, what a demoralising experience that was.

Having worked all my life I've never even contemplated attending a job centre before, until my dad told me I had to to get my national insurance 'stamp'. I had no idea at all what to expect. And I've been twice now. I'm glad I only have to go back once more.

My first time I sat for a good 15 minutes after my appointment time listening to the staff chatting about their weekends. They weren't even good stories. A bit of gossip or scandal I might have forgiven them!

The lady I eventually saw was nice enough, but not awfully helpful - to start with, the system didn't have any marketing roles on it, let alone digital marketing. It did however have 'cheese maker' listed. Which, lets face it, sounds awesome. I was then handed a piece of paper with my sign-on details - I was to go in, every other Thursday, 11.15. The most surprising part of the whole meeting was the 'commitment' I had to make to do 3 things a week to find a job. And these 3 things could include looking online or talking to a recruitment consultant. 3 Things. What the? No wonder people are unemployed!

My second meeting was slightly better than the first. We went through my working history. He read my CV. I made the same commitment to do 3 things a week to find work. I also had to sign to say that in a month if I didn't have a job, I'd look for other lines of work. I was told I'd be expected to take a job within a 90 minute commute and I had to attend a CV writing class, which he acknowledged I'd probably be qualified to teach. I was told my claim hadn't been processed yet. I was given a date in December to go back and visit them. That's it. But my experience was slightly better than the unfortunate man who sat on the desk next to me, he didn't speak much English, but from what I could tell, actually wanted a job. His worker however dismissed every role he gave her to apply for, even the ones he thought he could do.

I go back again Thursday to sign on, and hopefully, finally, to get a little financial help and to tell them I have a job and I wont be going back. As a friend put it, I'll just be another good number for their statistics.

Pretty Packages

I am just a massive sucker for a pretty package. I'm the sort of person who will buy from anthro over somewhere else because the post always arrives just like a little gift! Who doesn't lovegifts?

Right now I am just finalising a little Etsy shop and of course the packaging is uber important - if not impossible to decide upon, so here are a few of my favourite's from a Pinterest trawl;

1, 2, 3, 4, 5,6, 7

What would be your dream packaging?

Puppy Pumpkin

Did you see my guest post yesterday over on the wonderful Rosalilium? She's running a trick or treat week on her blog and has has some fantastic DIY's and recipes so far this week!

So head on over and you too can learn how to turn your puppy into a pumpkin. Look at that face - can't you just tell he LOVES it.

Travelling Notebooks Update

If you've been following the Travelling Notebooks - there is an update post over on http://thetravellingnotebookproject.blogspot.co.uk/

Our Snap Notebook hit Scotland and I couldn't be happier with hos the notebook has started off......You can see what Mairi wrote and the story behind the picture above.

A rose by any other name.

**UPDATE: Thank you to everyone who has read this post recently. I am sorry to all of you that it has offended. I didn't set out to cause such upset with the post, I was just being honest about my feelings.

I want it to be clear that these are my feelings and not the views or thoughts of anyone else. If you want to be annoyed with anyone please let that be with me and not anyone else at Hallam Roses WI. This post was written by me and does not reflect the feelings of any other members. 

Saying that, I've actually been a little hurt by the reaction to it on social media and also by the anonymous comment I was left {luckily my spam filter picks up swearing}. I guess being honest about my feelings isn't the best policy. That or I need some thicker skin!**

You might have heard me talking about the fact I'm a member of a new generation WI for the last year or so - I've been a member of a* WI for the last 12 months at least - but for a while I've been wondering if it was the right place for me. I joined the WI to meet people and craft a bit, but it hasn't happened so I started questioning my choice of group and when a couple of my book clubbers, Amanda and Sarah, mentioned they were starting a smaller group, I jumped at the chance of joining. 

And last week I attended the first meeting of the new* WI. We're a small but perfectly formed band of women who it seems all love a bit of cake, crafting and want to meet new people. Sounds perfect to me - I can't wait to see what I can learn from everyone and how we grow! I've even managed to get myself a committee role as the social media/digi secretary and have 2 amazing other members Gemma and Laura working with me to get a fancy pants website live. 

Pop by and say hi - we're a beautiful bunch don't you think?

*name removed for various reasons, as now has been the logo and all links. Might as well have just deleted the whole thing. 

An upcycled puppy sweater

There are some advantages to not working and not having any cash - it makes you a little more crafty. I've done quite a few of fun projects over the last few weeks, and one of my favourites is Flash's new sweater. He's just a little pup - there's not a lot of fat or hair on him and he gets all shivery in the new cold weather he's discovering, so I figured he needed a little clothing*.

After a bit of searching on Pinterest I found this tutorial on how to turn an old sweater into a puppy jumper - and I had just the perfect number to use. After mishap with a beautiful cashmere sweater and the washing machine a few months ago, I used this lovely Jack Wills number. {I popped the scissors in there for scale - it was super shrunken!}

I didn't take photo's at every stage - I always forget to take photo's of my crafting. {Maybe it'll be a new years resolution.} So it might be worth checking out the tutorial too!

I started by measuring Flash's neck and belly, halving the numbers and creating a template that looked a bit like this.

It took a couple of goes to get the arm holes in the right place - I kept putting them too close together.

After cutting out the template shape from the jumper using the ribbed bit of the jumper as the bottom of his jumper, I sewed both sides of the jumper together - right sides together, {these bits I didn't take pics of.}

And tried it on Flash. Look how rigid he is - bless him!

At this point I realised that he couldn't wee unless I cut out a little bit round his belly.

And it looked a little bit unfinished round the neck. I knew that Flash wouldn't like the roll neck in the tutorial, so I chopped some of the collar from the original jumper and sewed it on this jumper.

To do this I turned it back inside out, pinned the collar to the neck - I'm not quite sure how to describe it in sewing terms but basically, the collar is placed face down on the outside of the jumper and sewn from the inside. It looks like this;

Does that make sense?

I looked at adding sleeves too, as in the tutorial, but it was a bit of a struggle getting him into it at first so I didn't want to make it any more difficult to put on and i think it's much less restrictive like this. And now I have the template - there's no stopping me. I'm thinking a Halloween outfit next!

And here he is in the finished number looking all dapper and handsome;

*The boy totally doesn't agree - but what happens whilst he's away, he can't say no to!

Not falling apart.

It's been 4 weeks since I finished work and 2 weeks since the boy went back to India and I'm getting pretty good at lying now.Especially to the 'How are you?' question - Not working and being here alone is pretty depressing, so I have found that the real answer isn't what people want to hear so I've got good at avoiding eye contact and telling everyone I am ok.

But there are small things keeping me sane, mostly the fact I'm not totally alone and I have the puppy here - just the fact I have to get up and get dressed in the mornings so our other puppy club friends don't think I'm crazy helps. As do the puppy cuddles and the the craziness he brings.

There are trips to see friends & my best mates hen-do's.

And we have skype. The boy and I skype almost every day. Flash hasn't quite got it yet and can't figure out where the voice is coming from, but maybe he will in the next 3 weeks.

There are new friends met online that have spilt into my real life.

There are poptarts.

And there has been a lot of random crafting. Crafting for me and for friends and just because. Crafting that I'm going to get my ass in gear and share with you. Soon. I have a little handbag post lined up in my head that I'll hopefully share with you later this week.

It's not all bad. I just have to dig a little deeper to get past the feeling that I'm not awfully worthwhile and find the things that make me smile.