... on packing, or not packing, and somewhere inbetween.

A little while ago I mentioned that we're moving house. At the time it seemed like the most imminent thing but due to one thing or another (more like 'one thing AND another, and then many more other things') it just hasn't happened yet. What with the holiday season and a long delay to a certain process (we're waiting on YOU, concrete-floor man!) it seems that my builder's maxim ("Double the time you think it will take and you'll be halfway there") is ringing true for us moving house, too.

I feel a little bit in limbo. I've been hesitant to get too involved in making anything, and my Etsy store remains closed for the moment. There's a number of piles of weeks-old half-started things on my worktable, and this sits awkwardly with me. Small hurdles seem insurmountable (WHY can't I drill right through one of my plaster eggs without breaking the bit, damnit?!) and the idea of packing up my lovely studio weighs heavily. I feel like I've only just moved in to it, although it's been more than a year. The as-yet-unpainted bathroom door mocks me somehow - I'll need to do that (insurmountable!) before we get our little house on the market. The garden here is running a bit rampant in parts, and is desiccated and bare in others. After all, there's not too much point in getting more vegies going when we'll be leaving them, is there? My gardening head is already thinking forward to the removal of weeds and sunburnt bromeliads at the next house.

So, as someone who doesn't really embrace change all that willingly, the stalling of this one has put me out of kilter with the things that are most good for my soul!

But, on account of the fact that it is suddenly February already, I'm feeling like I need to take control of this wait somehow. My Ma has suggested that I reopen my Etsy store, and pack up most of the studio, leaving out only the things I need to fill any orders that may come through. It seems so simple, but I needed someone else to point it out!

If anyone has any advice about how to manage indecision, running a handmade business through a house (and studio) move, and also about a vague and persistent lack of focus, please do share! I'd be greatly appreciative!

... on now.

A lovely morning... the studio is warm, a 'This American Life' podcast is on, my hands are dusty with plaster, the sun was out but now a misty winter shower has come across, the latest pour of eggs are curing and I've got lots to do. Lots! I'm going to be doing my first BrisStyle Indie Market in the beautifully restored rooms of Brisbane City Hall on Saturday 10th August. I've got a whole table to fill, display ideas overflowing, a stall helper arranged (thanks Ma!) and just over three weeks to prepare.

I'm about to package up this set of five speckled eggs and send them off to a secret destination that I hope to be able to reveal more about soon. Exciting!

I had a visitor with a camera yesterday (more on that soon, too), so the scurf that usually lingers about in the studio has been momentarily tidied away. It prompted me to find a proper home for the huge pile of newspapers that had previously been living in the hallway, and helped me accept that although I may have hoarding tendencies, I'm not too bad. Not yet!

A cup of tea and my morning will be perfect! How's yours?

... on a room less empty.

I can't say I've officially moved in yet, because all I've done is pick up everything from inside the house, walk across the deck, and deposit it somewhere in the new room. But, as I've got a market on Friday night to prepare for, all those things that I've put on the floor will just have to wait until the weekend.

However. My CD player (which had been unused since we moved in here at Easter) is now throatily blasting out some tunes that I hadn't heard for ages. I don't think I'll ever get around to digitising all my old music, so I feel like I'm going to be reunited with some very old friends in the next few days. Speaking of old friends, I've also been reunited with my big work table, and there's just enough space on it at one end to get some work done. The morning light pouring in the big window is just so lovely - it really feels like home already.

So, to market! I'm busily be-speckling a batch of my new small bird's eggs for some kind of christmas tree to bedeck my half-table on the night. Fairy lights may be involved. I do hope so!

Red. All red! These eggs are tiny tiny versions of my original cast plaster bird's eggs - just over half the size. They are wee and small and sweet and I am enjoying speckling them up very much.

I still haven't painted the bathroom door, though. Wicked girl!

... on an empty room.

I've been awaiting this day for what seems like ages. This day is momentous. This day means that situations like this will soon be a thing of the past. 

That's our dining table somewhere under there. One morning recently I had taken over the entire kitchen bench as well, and poor C stood there with his bowl of cereal in hand, forlornly looking about for somewhere to eat it, and had no joy.

No more, because today is The Day. Moving in day! or, depending on your perspective, moving 'out' day! From C's perspective I will be moving all my dust-creating clutter 'out' of our house. Now, I know it was waaaaay more than two weeks ago that I was predicting I'd be moved in here in two weeks. That was because I forgot to apply my Builder's Maxim. "Double the time you think it'll take and you'll be half way there." I hadn't reckoned on just how long it would take me to mask everything, fill every nail hole, sand them off and give all the architraves and skirting boards enough coats of semi-gloss enamel.

Okay, so I haven't yet painted the bathroom door, and the fan light fitting is yet to materialise, but pfft! Mere trifles!

Because I'm the sort of girl who needs Places To Put Things, C has indulged me and put a lovely old floorboard in the bottom sill of the big window. A Place To Put Things!

How wonderful is an empty cupboard to someone with a lot of stuff to organise? This one came out of my grandmother's garage, and I'd started to sand it back with a view to painting it some nice grey colour. Only, after I'd removed the pegboard from those top two cupboard doors to reveal the dusky pink interior, the Mission Brownness had grown on me to the point where I just stopped. Perhaps one day I'll continue with it but I'm liking it just like this for now.

I can't hold back any longer... I just have to put things in those drawers! Bye!

... on Kuberstore news.

Something happened here a few weeks ago, to little fanfare, but was accompanied by considerable personal excitement. What can I say - I'm biased about this particular issue! What happened was this; I made a change to my Etsy store name.

I was in two minds about whether to do this - and asking for opinions on the Etsy and BrisStyle forums revealed that people generally think a shorter business name is better. Perhaps it's easier to remember. Plus, I had been operating as 'Kuber' for some years, and some suggested that a name change could disrupt any connections I'd made out there in the handmade world.

One thing I was sure about was that it was time for me to set things up properly. I want my little handmade business to be just that - a business. I've been declaring any income from Kuber under my ABN on my tax return for years, so I don't feel like I've been ripping off the tax man - but I looked in to what else might need to be done. I found that it was necessary to register my business name, which is where I came up against a block. When I went to ASIC, who are responsible for maintaining the new Australian national register of business names, I found that Kuber wasn't available. Humpf. These are the perils of having a short name, and for not doing all this years ago when I should have!

It was easy, after that. I HAD to make a change, so I did. 'Kuber' became 'Kuberstore' on Etsy, and 'Kuberstore' was registered with ASIC. Kuberstore.com became mine, and my lovely old colleague Clinton set about making me a placeholder webpage to fill it. My new business cards arrived just in time for me to use them at my first market, and over the course of the evening enough people took cards for me to be glad I'd got them and the placeholder page sorted out in time. The market was a blast, by the way! I had fun, and I'm hoping to do another before Christmas.

So, what's coming next?

I'm very much looking forward to moving in to the little studio across the deck, which is almost finished. Another two weeks should see me in there, and making stuff like crazy. After initial naming as 'The Shed', it's now more often referred to as 'The Outhouse' on account of the fact that it contains our second bathroom!

This little room has a similar treatment as our existing house - white walls, black-stained plywood floor, and dodgy-old-rusty-fan-made-new by spraying with matte black paint. The louvres are a new feature, though, for cross-ventilation as there's only the one big window, otherwise. 

In the bathroom, the undermounted lab sink is big and deep enough for me to wash brushes out in. The room has the same subway wall tiles and tiny white square floor tiles as our existing bathroom.

Here's the floor finish - it's structural plywood sheeting which has been sanded, stained black and polyurethaned. Curiously, it came up much 'blacker' than the same treatment in the house - lovely!

It needs some garden as a skirt. I'll get onto that!

This has been one of my jobs over the past few days - prepping and painting the architraves and skirting boards ready for C to install.

Even more excitement to come... I've received a very promising inquiry about a wholesale order for some of my plaster egg wall hangings, so I've feverishly put together a wholesale terms and conditions document (thanks must go to Aliya from Sailor Mouth Soaps for coming to my rescue via the BrisStyle forum and very generously sending me her wholesale policy document as a place to start - a thousand thankyous!) and started thinking about exactly what that might mean.

Lots to do. Lots to do!

... on lurking, and noisiness.

I've been lurking about in the front garden, as it's been a bit noisy out the back.

The everlasting daisies that I planted last year have finally decided to do something spectacular. 

Inspired by this post over at Bungalow Bliss, I looked carefully for bees. I was delighted to find a little pack of native bees rummaging in the poppies. I've been thinking about getting a hive of native bees, but if they're here somewhere already that might not be such a good idea. I don't want to start a bee war!

Just about everything I planted in the herb garden next to the driveway is bolting to seed! It's looking very lush, and I'm loving the look of the emerging seed heads. The dill makes an incredible cut flower, don't you think?

And the noisiness? Well, you know how C told me the roof would be on by the end of the week? It was!

A few days ago a chap I've never seen before walked by with his dog when I was checking the letterbox. He said "I hope your new shed isn't going to shade your lovely garden out the back!" I assured him it wouldn't, and I really liked that he called it a shed!

... on an exciting thing, underway.

A while back I mentioned a possible solution to the how can I not take over the whole house when I am making something problem, and I'll admit, it has become a problem. Before we moved in, I had envisioned that it would be fine for me to spread out on the kitchen bench or the dining table, and it's turned out not to work so well. The whole house gets covered in a fine layer of plaster dust, and I've been having to pack everything away because someone is coming to dinner quite regularly. More often than not I wouldn't get it all out again the following day, or even the following week.

So, the solution. This house is small, and C had planned from the start that perhaps he'd build an extension to add another bedroom and bathroom. Substitute the word bedroom with studio and watch my enthusiasm levels!

So, what's this? A little building with a skillion roof containing one bathroom, and one large room. Entry is via a full glass door that opens out onto the existing deck. There'll be a tall louvred window in each end, one inside the bathroom. The main east-facing window will be very large, and set low, at bench height. The subway-tiled bathroom will contain a full-sized bath, and a lab sink instead of a basin, for washing brushes out in. A tank set out the back will more than double our water-holding capacity, and it'll block the view of both the high-tension power lines and the very ordinary houses that you can currently see from our living room.

Two weeks ago, the excavator arrived, and things started happening fast. Now, C assures me, the roof should be on by the end of this coming week.

Photobombed by three Pekin tails.

I really don't believe my own eyes, nor the notion that I'm going to be able to fill it with plaster dust. Pinch me!