New life, new year

My lengthy absence from this blog has been due to something of an upheaval in the latter part of 2012. In the course of a few weeks we have moved house (from South Wales to Somerset), I have finished my job, been away on the first week of training for my new business venture, and survived Christmas.  We are very grateful not to have been flooded, as so much of Somerset has been underwater over the past few weeks, and every outbreak of rain on the saturated ground leads to another round of road closures and sandbags.

Moving house precipitated a new wave of decluttering, paring down, and addressing the issue of stuff versus simplicity, which has been a preoccupation in 2012.  Whilst I am not convinced that I managed quite to achieve my decluttering target in terms of volume, it was heartening to be able to unpack fully in less than a week (bearing in mind that we both work from home, so inevitably have considerably more stuff than if we only lived here), with pretty much everything having found a home.  The new house is larger, which means that it is easier to have demarcation of function in each room - no longer is my wool stashed in corners of the utility room, dining area, office and spare bedroom, but it is now all sorted and to hand in the studio.  Ongoing culling will continue, together with the implementation of a 'one in, one out' policy, but a great deal of progress has been made.

Simplification of other aspects of life is a little less straightforward.  I am currently juggling domesticity, art, learning a new trade (traditional upholstery and furniture renovation) and adapting to my new habitat, while sorting out what shape my paid work will take.  It all feels a little disorientating at the moment, but new opportunities and contacts are emerging on an almost daily basis, which is exciting.  Having a little breathing space is also proving fruitful creatively.  And Somerset is a very art-orientated area, which is stimulating.

For updates on the art and furniture aspects, please follow my blog at www.TheFabrikantBlog.wordpress.com.  I shall be back on this blog before too long with further musings...