Post Phyber Philosophy Book Launch

And what a perfectly marvellous day for a ebook launch it was.  Even though I charged Currawong and Lilly with taking photos........as I suspected, Currawong was too busy chasing round 4 little boys, and Lilly was just too busy having fun.  So most of the photos were taken by me, at the one point in the day when I had a minute to take them.

Over the years I've really come to terms with my particular form of fame, and it's not big and flashy by any extent of any imagination, but it's quirky, unique, and full of quality instead of quantity.  I get deep and meaningful connections with people more than a broad fan base, and lots of extraordinary yarns.  So over the whole weekend there was a steady stream of gorgeous people sitting with me in my space, telling me stories or letting me tell some, and mentioning at some point how colourful and beautiful my stall was.  An audience makes me purrrr.

And being as my prime directive is to 'make it' in my own way, on my own terms, I reckon an ebook launch at Sustainability Alley at the Nimbin Show, with a self published ebook printed out on recycled paper, and in a loose leaf folder as a display, and a branch full of little pouches/finger puppets/necklaces with usb sticks in them, with two copies of Post Phyber Philosophy - one a pretty version and one a printable one.........is about as good as it gets!  For me anyway.  This was such a close shave, to get it all together in time for Nimbin Show, that I only printed out a full copy of PPP the night before, and finished taking photos for it early friday morning. I did the final check as I printed it out, and Currawong saved all the info to the usb sticks we'd bought, and made sure they all worked.

And then we were up at sparrows fart as we usually are, and surprised ourselves with how easily we organised everything, and the kids, and the animals......  Dreamer who was about to have kittens any day, was being cute in the morning, as she snuck in the rabbits cage to hang out with Fleur and her babies.  

So when we go anywhere for a while, we usually have to take half the house with us.  Food, water, swags, blankets, pillows, toys, changes of clothes, favourite silkies, prams, shade, rugs, and then all my other market stuff as well.  But I love the little autonomous zone that we create wherever we are, and there's something quite special about how at the end of the day, we pack it all up and away and you'd never know that we were there.  Currawong is at the back right of the stall in this photo, wearing his Tinkerbell t-shirt, and his gorgeous floral pants made for him at the Maccy Market.  And underneath my stall you can see the swag that I made for travelling, that I unroll under the table so the boys have somewhere to sleep and hide in the shade.  

And here's the branch I whittled and oiled to use for my display, resplendent in my little pouches full of memory sticks and the Pentapusses :)  With skeins behind them.  That I actually sold two of!  Shock horror.  And don't tell all the people who've been asking to buy them, and told that they were display only.  Like I tell everyone who asks, if you want a skein out of me you've got to work for it, and twist my arm a bit.  Cause it's my palette!  With which to create! But I'm always a bit happy to sell one to someone who really appreciates it, or has a passionate idea that they want to create with it.

And in this photo above, I noticed the mirror, and how I inadvertently took a photo of myself taking a photo.  So of course I had to play with that a little bit....

So does this qualify as a 'selfie'?  Cause if it does, then it's my first :)  I love this photo.  And then a bit later, when my hair had fallen out of its bun, I tried just one more....  And in this photo is the loose leaf folder displaying my ebook.  The page you can see in this one, is a photo description page.  I was showing PPP to a mate just a week before the launch, and as I was telling her a brief yarn of all the photos, she said I should write descriptions in, so people knew what stuff was.  So I did!  Thanks Yollana :)  It's almost an ebook in an of itself :)   And the descriptions of photos built the ebook up to 85 grand pages.

I'm just so thrilled that I've finally done it!  I've been writing this ebook for over 10 years now, and it's full of photos and stories that I've been telling people for years, and there's something so alchemical and magical about actually putting it all down in transcript with visual expressions of us.  

And here's a photo of an unknown man in my mirror, that I didn't know I'd captured till I looked at the photos later.  And a rather gorgeous pic of my Moth Wing Cape, for which there's a pattern in my ebook.  

And here's the Moth Wing Cape from the other side, showing off the spiderwebs rather well, looking into my stall, and giving a bit of an idea of the colourful little island I was on for the weekend.

And I brought the needle felted and crocheted family along for this one too.  As everything was really one big display to launch an ebook, I thought I should bring the gang - especially Ursula, as she's in a few of the photos in my ebook.

And here's PROOF that it was an ebook launch.  EVERYBODY knows that you can't have a book launch without goon and cheese on crackers.  Jatz preferably.  And Nimbin cheese hopefully.  And I had to explain to a few people what goon was.  As in, goon is cask wine of the cheap and nasty sort, and for this special occasion I bought a cask of Sovereign Point, soft and fruity red :)  And every cup and jam jar left in the house.  Being as they are at a premium with so many cheeky little hands that like to fling cups and glasses round.  I washed them and brought them along as a last minute decision on sunday morning, cause there was just no way that I was going to be able to justify to anyone bringing plastic cups.  Being as I was plonked on Sustainable Alley and all.  

I also bought two punnets of strawberries on friday.  Because I knew that the chances of actually keeping them in the fridge for sunday were very slim, but thought that the large number of them may assure some success.  On sunday morning while I was washing every cup and jam jar in the house, Currawong nicely managed to save one of the last punnets from the jaws of rampaging boys, and I discovered another one that had been saved earlier, and was high on a shelf.  So I managed to bring TWO WHOLE punnets to the launch!  Though they didn't make it to the photos :)  And on the table to the left is the Nonapuss!  A hat/puppet with nine tentacles with bells on.  That doubles up as a magpie scarer. 

And here's me enjoying my rather large jam jar of soft fruity red, or as I like to call it......goon.  With Zarra asleep underneath the table no less.  

But what ISN'T in the photos......is all the other people at the launch :)  And like I said in the beginning, there weren't heaps, but the ones that came were very special people to me, and made it huge just by being there.  There was a lot of love and thoughts expressed to me during the weekend, that made me feel truly honoured, by who spared a thought for me and my little ebook :)

I had not one but TWO first buyers.  One of intention, and one of reality.  See, I was rushing along the street of Nimbin one day, and got reminded about how life's not meant to be a rush, so I sat for a hug and a chat, and ended up burbling bout what I was doing, and got earnestly asked if I could sell him my first ebook in a pouch.  Now if I'd been ready earlier than the night before, then I would have been able to work this out just so, but it wasn't quite ready, so my friend made an effort to come to Nimbin Show instead.  BUT.  As I was setting up, a charming man with his partner and mother in law came by to chat, and have a look, and a yarn or two, and he was the first to actually see the printed out ebook, and he loved it, and also the first in person to buy a little pouch.  And I liked him so much, and appreciated the appreciation and time that we all had, that I even sold him a skein of hand spun, and as he was just starting and wanted to crochet, I even balled it up for him, so he wouldn't get it tangled.  So two first customers and both of them MEN!!!  I love it :)  And there was also an elegant and gentle couple that showed up on both days to give moral support and lively conversation.  Been rather thrilled that quite a few gorgeous men have been walking into my life lately..... 

And then when we got home.......I reckon Dreamer waited all of 5 minutes till she jumped in with the baby rabbits and Fleur again.  We thought it was cute, but when it was time to go to bed, Fleur was getting a bit miffed to have Dreamer in her den, so we went to move her........and discovered a kitten underneath her.  There were some beautiful oxytocic moments between her and her kittens and the baby bunnies, but then we had to rehouse the kits so that Dreamer could finish birthing.

And she birthed 4 beautiful little kittens!  All of them tabbies.  One a black tabby, one a grey, and two black and brown.  I love tabbies :)  We're all a bit thrilled that Dreamer and the babies are all okay, and she did a marvellous job for a first time mamma :)  And the next day, when all the baby bunnies were out again, one of them snuck in for a cuddle.  Gotta love love.......

And like a beautiful friend said, 'how appropriate to have two kinds of birth in one day!'

So.  A big day was had all round.  And my eBook, Post Phyber Philosophy, is finally ready for sale.  

If you'd like to purchase a pdf of my eBook, Post Phyber Philosophy, you can do so on my Etsy site  

here.

 

I hope you like it :)

Post Phyber Philosophy

Okay.  So life and extremities have been intense lately, as it always is, and I've got to confess that the mindworm of haters, has made it hard for my desire to yearn towards blogging of late.  And I had a big experience that I'd like to express on here, but am a bit loathe to all at the same time.  So I'm dragging my heels.  And the result is that I haven't even told you that I've very nearly finished writing the book that I've been writing and living for the last 13 years.  Post Phyber Philosophy.  

I was asked to launch it as an Ebook at Sustainability Alley at the Nimbin Show this coming saturday and sunday, so I am.  I've been working on it for months, but kinda stalled at the last minute, a bit of fear of success taking me for a spin for a while.  But with a deadline I'm grooving it, and it's all coming together beautifully.  

I've been a bit stunned and elated, that the passionate crafting, that sees me tempting Currawong into watching in depth media for the night, so I can avidly hook with a head torch, to see what happens next, has come back.  After a very long hiatus, which I realise now, was the lack of an audience.  I don't know about other artists, but for me, an audience is a very important aspect of what I do.  To have people that 'get' it, and love what I do, who are curious and interested, and waiting with bated breath to see what I do next, and appreciative, and lovely, and the main reason why I do this, cause I'm a show off.  And honest :)  

So knowing that there's a bunch of people I know, who I really like, and who really like me, and that they're going to be at the Nimbin Market at least once a month, and I'm going to be there too, and they're going to ask what I've been up to this month, and cause I'm a show off, I've been slipping making into every spare second, and feeling the fire and spirit of the visiting genie, and turning mistakes into features, and alive with it all!

Whereas blogging has turned into watching lots of haters traipse silently through my blog, and a few brilliant comments that make up for so much, but the audience isn't very visible or vocal you know?  I've been really missing the direct interactions with live people who laugh, and giggle, and share oxytocin and ideas.  And I've realised how massive a motivation that audience is for me and how I create.

I've been mourning the lack of passion in my craft since the light dimmed in me!  Which was....ooooo.......the last time that we regularly visited markets and festivals :)  Whether it's doing workshops, or festivals, or markets, or book launches or anything like that........having an interactive audience is just awesome.  And community forming.  And bonding.  And oxytocic.  And was the missing ingredient to my passion.  There just didn't seem to be that much point to it, once I'd made all the things I wanted for our family, unless there were people to appreciate it.

So I've got this little corner of the kitchen, and I've realised that it's my studio and practical shrine and altar to creativity and passion.

And it's where you'll find me as often as I can, often first thing in the morning, and late at night.  The photo below is from before I spunked it up a bit.  Crafting hard with Spiral, making the Slats (sleeves/legwarmers/hats) pattern.

Or sitting right next to my studio/altar/bed, and doing the spinning meditation.  Just lately there's been a big deal going on, like I alluded to before, and it's been a bit of a nail biting experience for large chunks of it, and there's been a lot of physical endurances, and some worry, and a few other emotions thrown in.  And I've found that more and more, rather than turn to many of my other traditionally healthy and unhealthy avoidances, using spinning as a meditation to shut off my babbling brain, and sink into my subconscious and just be for a while.........has been just divine.  I can slip into and out of it easily with my spinning wheel.  And still be present for all the younglings and animals that we're shepherding.  The best thing is, that the beautiful meditation has the result of a ball of yarn.  Something practical that is useful!  And it's made our house colourful with skeins.....

So when there's a spare moment, or when I'm really stressed, or when inspiration strikes and the family allows, I sit and create.

I've been writing patterns for the first time.  And quite successfully too.  At least I hope.  I tried to get some folk to make the Slats pattern on facebook, and lots said they would but no one got back to me, so  I'm just gonna have to go with the flow on that one.  I think it's fairly straightforward!  I've combined photos with explanations, and some of the terms I use are the same used in traditional crochet patterns, so I'm pretty pleased with the result.  

So I'm presently taking photos....

And writing notes......

And collecting photos of my pallette and tools and methods and materials.....

And coming up with kooky creations inspired by appreciation....

These are Pentapusses.  So named, cause they look like octopuses and definitely sea creatures, but they've only got 5 tentacles, and like I described the process on my Hellena Post Creatrix page on fb.....

"Made a hat that had dangly carroty things hanging out the top, and my fingers wanted to go into it, so I thought I'd try and make a puppet for my hand, (which I've threatened to do for a long time), and started out making a long bit for a leg, and then I started an arm - even had a hand with five fingers and everything on it - and played with it to see if it would work. The hand dangled in a way that wasn't very attractive, and to work as a movable hand would need some wire, which would stop it from moving at all, so I pulled the hand apart, and turned it into another leg, and made them all legs, which turned into tentacles, and then when I let it sit on my hand to see what my hand wanted to do........it wanted to move around in a poi like fashion, and swing figure eights, and fly through the air with the greatest of ease, so that's how it turned out. And then I wanted it to be an octopus, but I couldn't work out how to get another 3 legs on, and having them dangle from my palm wouldn't move in the same directed way, so I decided to leave it at five hanging off fingers and leave it at that. And then playing with them with Currawong, he said it needed eyes, so then the eyes came. And then flinging the ends round, I realised that beads or bells would be lethal, so tassles were the way to not turn it into a weapon."

It's also got me and Currawong back into photographing each other and the family, and all the things we do more often.  And Currawong gets to slip photos like this in, when taking photos of me hooking first thing in the morning.  Funny how a lot of his photos end up as cleavage shots :)

I've gotta mention too, that this is all going on as we're going about our daily lives, caught here in a photo by a beloved friend, walking the main street of our home town Nimbin.  And incidentally, with me wearing the moth wing cape that I've made a pattern for, that's in my PPP  Ebook.  By the way, being photographed under the Happy High Herbs sign was totally incidental.....and funny :)

And it's also going on while we've been having one of our busiest times with visitors, and people staying for extended periods, and crafting around them and sometimes onto them, or at least onto their dreads :)  There was a veritable rush on dread cosies and hair extensions for a while there!

But overall.....it's been a tremendously exciting experience as well.  I've been totally blissed out that I feel like my computer skills, software, hardware, photos, and the ibooks author template, have all come together in an alchemical magical act.  Had a minor freakout, when I thought yesterday that the ibooks author program was going to only let me publish through ibooks, and charge 30% on all my books!  Thought for a minute I was going to have to copy and paste the whole bloody lot to a free program.  but I got my genius IT expert daughter Jess onto it, and she worked out that it was all fine, as long as I kept my book as a PDF, which I was going to do anyway.  I'm absolutely over the moon with how it came together.  I'm still finishing it off as we speak, but I'm gonna make it on time for Nimbin Show, even if I have to pull off an all nighter.  Might even try and get some wine and nibbles for my little one hour launch :)  Here's the first page to show you how it looks.

And all 70 plus (haven't quite finished it yet!) pages, of photos and stories and patterns, will be available as a PDF file on my Etsy site, and you can also email me (address in my list of places on the right further down).  So you can download my book, or buy it in a crocheted necklace pouch, that also doubles up as a finger puppet.  $20 for the PDF download, and $25 for the crocheted pouch and usb stick.  I"ll keep you posted :)

P.S.  So it's been a little while since my launch now, and I'll post a link to my Etsy page now, just in case you want to go over and check it all out.  

Enter Etsy here

I

Flowmadic Flo.....

What a synchronistic journey.  What a journey full stop!  In exactly three weeks almost to the hour after our lovely green machine died, Currawong drove in the driveway with our new home on the road.  How quick was that?  And exactly two weeks after our back up green machine died also.....was when we bought our new home.  Love that this story had all these little timing details.  

In case you hadn't heard the story, we've been travelling for nearly eight years in our green van, and it died by the side of the road.  We thought it was okay, cause we had a back up vehicle, but after getting it ready, that one died too.  

We were low on funds, and suddenly transportless, and I cried 'HELP!'.  And a lot of you answered.  Between our internet friends nearly two thousand dollars was raised to try and help us get a Coaster, and to move to the next stage of our vehicular journey.  One very generous donation - you know who you are and thank you darlin - in particular got us towards our goal.  And then money just kinda magically came together from all sorts of places, and I got my crochet mojo back, and put my book 'Balthazar & Nimue - A Love Story' into a pdf file ready to send out (send me an email if you'd like to read it.  I'll send you a copy, and if you like it, you could send me a donation...), and listed wearable art for sale on Etsy, and all sorts of life came out of the death of our van.  

A bit like in real life.  I've been having a lot of thoughts about birth, sex and death lately, and how they all interrelate and feed each other, and wrote a piece about it that's coming soon as a guest post on an amazing womans blog.   And I'm also totally inspired by a new direction I'm taking that's combining all my favourite learnings - blending my old desktop publishing skills, with all the photos of our life that I love to show off and tell stories about, with my words that I'm increasingly happy with my crafting of, and my favourite topics that I have stock standard stories and experiences I want to tell the world about - and turning that all into ebooks.  Self sufficient.  Self motivated. Self designed.  And a totally flowmadic way of trying to make a living from our living.  I'm thick in the middle of a colourful 'Post Phyber Philosophy' ebook at the moment.....

But all these serendipitous occurrences have occurred, and within three weeks of what seemed like total devastation, Currawong was driving in the driveway in our new Coaster.  It was beautiful and easy from the beginning to the end, Currawong made friends with the awesome dude we bought it off, and was looked after by a wonderful friend after he flew to Melbourne to buy it.  And took a swift two days to drive it home.....

And it took within seconds of him getting home to be mobbed by kids.  We all really missed him.  In fact we all miss any of us when we're gone.  It's like together we're the full orchestra, but when someone's gone, the most essential instrument is missing.  

Especially Currawong.   Currawong is like the battery of our family.  He's always on the move, and on the think, and on the hop, and trying to do a million things at once, and full of laughing and songs and silly quips, or full of sorrows and grumping, but no matter what he's full.  And alive, and talking and joking and surprising people with what he comes up with, or doing a somersault, or pushing the trolley hard at the supermarket and then lifting his feet and flying down the aisle.  He motivates us and spoils us and spends all his time working out how he can do his part of the deal to keep us all moving.  And when he's gone he leaves an awfully big hole.  Almost unsurpassably big.  Everything's a bit drier, duller, mundane, and more humdrum without him buzzing round.  So we all really missed him.  

Max and Merlin were really stumped by him being gone.  They yelled 'Daddy!' from the verandah a few times, hoping he was just on a walk, and the first morning after his first night away, Merlin snuggled up to me and very seriously said "Daddy.....work".  And I tried to explain that in a way he was working, cause he was buying us a new bus, and how he'd be home as soon as he could.  As soon as he got back they were in the bus and on his lap and stayed close to him for as long as they could.  

And it also didn't take long before the cow skull went on the bumper bar, cause it's become a bit of an icon for us.  A symbol and talisman of the wide open roads.  Buying a Coaster has been our ultimate dream for a long time.  A full sized bus is just too big for us to be a daily driver.  And a Coaster with a camper van trailer, is the ultimate way that we can have beds and a kitchen on wheels without having to do a huge amount to set it up.  Which is going to make our Flowmadic lifestyle a lot easier.  Thank you so much for helping us to reach our dream!  We're so incredibly wrapped....

But I'm almost a bit embarrassed by how sooky we are.  We're hardly ever parted, and spend all our time together, and are regularly having impassioned conversations, got some kind of plan or idea on the go, and shunting the kids off to bed so we can have our minutes together.  You've gotta come up with something pretty alluring to tempt us out of our nights together.  Cause we love em.  And each other.  A lot.  

So we hadn't been parted for anything longer than hours for over 10 years now, and then he was gone for THREE DAYS AND TWO NIGHTS!!  They stretched an eternally long time.  For all of us.  And Currawong and I went all Wuthering Heights and got on the phone to each other whenever we could, trying hard to connect as much as possible in our minutes, to make up for what we were missing.  And hanging out at home with 4 little boys under the age of 4, with various tactile obsessions like silk, and pillow slips, and that bit of skin webbing between your thumb and forefinger.......translates into spending lot of time sitting, and laying, and carousel hugging, cause if one is getting some love, you can almost guarantee that another one or two will want some too, and I hate for any of them to miss out.

So we survived our separation, and spent some days without dad.  

Balthazar fell asleep in the cupboard.....

And hung out with Zarra who he loves to distraction.....

The kids watching Winnie the Pooh.  Zarra's starting to really take his place more in the family.  He's awake mostly during the day (and night still....sigh....), and loves hanging with the kids.  Getting in on the action, and eating what everyone else does.  He's got the most gorgeous smile this little one, like the rest of them, and I can pretty much be guaranteed that every time he sees me I get a huge one.

And then the conquering hero returned, our new steed looking very 'Yar' (as Katherine Hepburn said in 'A Philadelphia Story'), and a great reunion was had by us all.  And the morning after she got here, we decided to call her Flo.  Both for our heroine Flo in 'The Darling Buds of May', who answers every problem with a huge hug in her ample bosom, and some gorgeously cooked food, and also for The Flow, that we're going to step into every time we step into our beautiful new bus.  Flo the Flowmadic bus.  What a perfect name for her.  

And there's this seriously groovy thing about her that makes her even more perfect than any other Coaster, and that is, that the owner who bought her new, had her fitted out with custom made, cherry red lengthwise seats.  Which happens to be totally perfect for us as a 9 person family, cause we need a lot more seats than your average motorhome.  And this seat means we can leave the original seats in, but remove the ones we don't need, and this lengthwise seat is perfectly opposite where we're going to put our kitchen, and then there's room for a monster bed for all the babies and us at the back as well.  Didn't get time to write the wish list before it happened!  And just as well, cause I never would have imagined this seat.

So all's well that ends well, and like I have any right to ever worry considering the miracles that have happened in the past, this story just shows that we've never got to worry about anything.  The most amazing solutions can create themselves as a gift when you're not trying to craft it too much.  And from seeming disasters always come valuable lessons and treasures.

Now we've just got to register it, and get it ready for travelling, which is a whole other story...........

And just cause I can, and just cause I love my gorgeous babies, I'm throwing in these photos, cause they were in the same folder as the photos of Flo, and they show our loverly outdoor bath, but mostly cause they are some very loved faces.

This is bath time at our place.....

Life is good!

Thickening plots

Thickening plots

There's so much happening in my world.  For a start I'm 8 months pregnant, and after being distracted with a whole heap of stuff - moving to Victoria, moving back, looking for schools, realising my lover and his troupe are percussive geniuses, moving onto a community, trying to prepare my three other little ones for baby 'wildcat' (that came to me in a dream), doing the NEIS scheme and starting up an internet business.................well after all that, it's kinda hard to really sink into the feeling of being pregnant.  To just be with it and realise it.  

I've been really getting into writing about birth and our phobia's around it all, but all of that's for another blog.  More personally, I've been realising for the first time ( this is only my 5th baby!) how birth is meant to be painless.  But just lately I realised that even saying painless is still focusing on pain, so I changed that thought to easy, comfortable and orgasmic!!  Just think about it.  We're mammals!!  How many other mammals have horrific and fraught births??  Why should we??  How would we have survived evolutionarily if it was so horrible??  Surely there must be benefits??  But I've digressed.  This isn't my birthing blog which I haven't created yet, this is my beggining to selling my wares and my theories online blog.

So believe it or not, even while all this is going on, I'm still making making making, creating new ideas and beautiful mohair creations, luscious wraps and folds to lay near your skin.  Seductive fringes that move with your rhythms.  I keep trying to get around to making more felted creatures, but truth be told, I think I'm preventing myself from making them, because I can't bear the thought of selling them.  I find them so personal and 'birthed' and part of me, that to sell them is almost like selling my children.  I did sell one, and I've never stopped regretting it.  

No matter how much I try to fit my passion and art into the box of 'things to sell', I never manage to be very good at it.  I can never make another of something because 'it will sell'.  I try, I really do! But the inner rebel and passionate artist always ends up yelling "I'm not a factory!!" and it invariably turns into something completely unique and quirky.  

Anyway, here it is.  My latest offering to the goddess of creativity.  

7 balls of hand-spun, hand-dyed mohair from my favourite breeder, and two different dyepots. The body of the wrap is one dyepot, and the fringe another.  Rather clever use of different sized hooks to shape it, and a suprising collar when wrapped in a certain way.  Shown off by my beautiful Currawong in our backyard garden.  You may notice the spiderweb I've put in a tree.

Enjoy!

Beginagainbeginagain

I seem to have lost contact with my old blog.  I don't know how it happened, but when I tried to log onto it, I just got brought here, with a brand new blog.  Maybe it's symbolic.  Maybe it's a really good thing.  Start fresh, clean slate and all that business.  

So I will.  Start again that is.

We're living on a community in the Adelaide Hills, about to have our 4th baby together, and my 5th child all up.  I'm writing books and making things that flow, and trying to start up an internet business doing it all.  Inviting you into the world I'm creating from fibre and attitudes, Quantum Physics and plain old ancient's knowledge, wool and mohair and bunny fleece and crochet and felt, and just whatever comes to hand at the time.

I've been creating for 7 years now, and the time has come for my art's Saturn Return, to mature and come of age, and launch itself into the next stage of it's life.  From past experience, and reading, and checking stuff out on the internet, and words from the grass roots, I've decided to steer my way towards Europe and America, where  it  seems the whole handcrafted movement has hit long ago,  and  there is a greater population of alternative folk. 

I reckon I'm a genius, and a revolution waiting to happen.  I've got a whole new approach, and techniques, and attitudes that can lead to an explosion of creativity in your life, that will leak across into all aspects of your creativity, as you decide to try and make things yourself in your own way.  When you get the incredible power and beauty of things that people make, when they're in love with what they're doing.

Passion and love are all that really matter when you get down to it.  We've convinced ourselves for far too long that we have to make compromises, and do our duty, and earn a days work before we do what we really want to do.  Bollocks I say.  You have to just do it.  Follow that passion and do what you want and the universe magically makes it all as good as the feeling that inspires you to just do what you will.

Stay tuned.  I'm going to be making things and taking photo's and videos and organising events, and showing some of the beautiful photo's we've taken along the way. 

Everything is connected.