A Colorful Thread: June 2019
Weaving together my life as a maker and other spheres of life.
Best of Stitched in Color {June}
On My Mind
Experimenting:: with surface design. Brandon and I spent the morning on Illustrator, designing new packaging for Stitched in Color quilting services. We’re creating a custom-printed mailer box that folds together as a secure and sturdy container (like so). I can’t wait to see these in person! I hope they will be fun for my customers to receive.
Reading:: nothing at the moment, unless the Dutch Ikea website counts! I’ve been browsing Ikea in Dutch so as to learn some new vocabulary, haha. We’ve moved temporarily out in the Dutch countryside near Lochem. We’ll be here for a few weeks until we move back to Enschede into our rental apartment.
This Lochem house has a little room that I can set up as a sewing space. My new work table arrives today from Ikea! Don’t worry, it’ll come with us when we relocate. It’s exciting to start collecting some permanent pieces of our new home.
Anticipating:: Setting up my longarm. On August 17th we move into a rental apartment that we can stay in until our home is purchased. I’m super excited that this apartment has space for my longarm! We’ll be setting it up and testing it right away, because getting back to work is a big priority. I expect to start quilting for EU customers the week of July 22nd. I am soooo excited! I’ve really missed longarm quilting and the parade of beautiful work that comes through my studio.
Following:: Svetlana of Sotak Handmade. Svetlana and I have been friends for a good while. We first connected on blogs, but now I’m more likely to see her creations appearing in my Instagram feed. She’s a whiz with pouches, pillows and such, which you can find in new book, That Handmade Touch.
But what I enjoy most about Svetlana is her improv style. Her improv patchwork always makes me want to pull out some scraps and play with color and scale. It’s such a relaxing way to sew. Maybe I’ll make an improv quilt when I finally settle into our real home.
Excited to get to meet Svetlana this weekend! She moved to The Netherlands last year, so we’ve been chatting a lot about our experiences.
June was an odd month. It felt like we were either scrambling around trying to do everything at once or the opposite - waiting for critical appointments days to arrive. We’ve made so much progress as immigrants to The Netherlands, and for that I am very thankful. In the upcoming month I hope to be able to reconnect with my creative side in a more nourishing way. I’ve really missed the rhythms I had built in the United States, which supported my business and my mental health. Transitions are hard. Everything gets shaken up, stirred and mashed around. I’m not good with so much fluidity. I need to recreate form to support the functions of our days. Here’s hopping that happens soon.
many blessings,
Rachel
