‘The most dangerous form of human error is forgetting what we want to achieve’ Paul Nitze. I love this quote. It manages to sum up me with my blogging. I start...I forget that I started it to be like a mini diary and tadaaa I forget to write in it. Today I found myself on the App Store searching for a journal app cos nowadays everything is in app form, long gone are the days you write a diary...again I started that and failed, writing took too much time and didn’t allow me to edit. I suppose the point of the diary is to not edit your thoughts and feeling, where as on a blog you always feel the need to make it sound better, be funnier, look nicer for those mysterious few people that somehow fall onto your blog and read it.  After years of me faffing with this blog, I’ve decided to revamp it. I’m not spearheading it into one niche. This blog is going to be me. A mixture of thoughts, diary entries from travels, my long term struggle with moving my ass to the gym, photos of hea...

Short update today! Busy Bee and all. Today I completed PiYo Day 3 - Define: Upper Body. Let's just say my upper body needs a lot of strengthening. I'm still loving the workouts and the added bonus about todays workout, it's only 20 minutes long! So even when my back was hurting, I've had barely any sleep and I have a million things to be doing, it was only 20 minutes out of my day. I am still working on my tricep pushups, I'd like to see them improve the more practice I get. I also want to see my general fluidity between movements improve. Only time will tell.  I've printed out the workout timetable and I'm writing in my little notes underneath. Today was also the day that I was sup;sed to be running with the NHS couch to 5k app, I'm in week 4 of that, but life is getting in the way. With family members in hospital, dental appointments and an attempt at catching up on sleep after 10 hours in A&E, running maybe getting put on the back burner for ...

So if you haven't noticed before, I'm a flitter. I latch on to the idea of a new workout routine. I've attempted Jillian Michaels' Body Revolution, Insanity, T25, general walking using my fitbit. I am happy to say I am keeping up with the fitbit challenges but the rest unfortunately dwindled away. I Love Jillian Michaels and I will one day go back to it, but for now my new little test is Piyo. Now if you don't know what Piyo is, it is pilates and yoga merged together with high intense intervals. Hard work but easy on your joints. I always knew I wasn't very flexible or strong, but I gave myself a little credit, I wasn't a weakling. I'm here to say, Day 2 down - I am a complete weakling! I kinda love it so far. I found it so hard! Normally, when I find an exercise routine difficult and painful I quit pretty quickly. This time something is different. It is kind of like a competition with myself to become more flexible. I am determined to be able to compl...

A few weeks ago I was having a conversation with my Nanna, about how she grew up. After listening to her reminisce about learning to bake, cook, sew and learning general household knowledge, I realised that the majority of my generation have grown up, completely bypassing this. When I was at school the curriculum was full of electronics, business studies and science, all very important subjects, but where were the subjects that taught us vital life skills? Now school are reintroducing home economics...good! I am fortunate enough to have a grandparent who has time to show me how to cook and bake and get those pesky stains out of clothes. Others aren't so lucky. I know people my age who cannot cook, bake or generally get through life without the use of technology or the internet. The following weeks I found myself at a family party that was catered by my Nanna, the usuals of pies, quiches and cakes. Throughout the evening my cousins and I made our way down memory lane, spending sc...

For the past month I have become rather obsessed with  Tilly and the Buttons . I signed up to her online workshop and cannot stop raving about how great it is! If you would like to sew a jersey top but are a bit wary of the material, get signed up! It is great! She also has a blog full of helpful tips and tricks as well as a collection of sewing patterns which I can't wait to try! If you are just setting out on your sewing journey and find all the jargon daunting, the patters bewildering and the skills required flabbergasting, I suggest  'Love at First Stitch'  by Tilly Walnes. I recently purchased the book to add to my collection. I love it! It is jam packed full of helpful information and is organised into projects, so you don't become overwhelmed. Already I have a list of great projects I want to create. Dressmaking projects from Tilly's website, book, online workshop and projects out of my new May Martin's Sewing Bible and British Sewing Bee book. Ye...

You've gotten half way through a project and suddenly your sewing machine has had enough of playing nice! What do you do?!?!?!  Panic?  Stress out?  List off a whole load of profanities?  Jump straight to Google?  Yep I did the lot! Over the Christmas period I enjoyed time to myself and spending quality time planning tops for presents and my own personal stash. Then as I was finishing off a top for my grandma, the sewing machine began to play up. Puckering, creating large thread messes on the underneath of the garment and making an awful racket. So I gave up. I went to good old google and searched for possible reasons why this happened, tried the thread tensions, unthreaded and rethreaded the machine...twice. Still no luck.  Now if you are like me and have been given a hand-me-down sewing machine, it is highly likely your instruction and cleaning manual is missing. Luckily mine did come with the original machine oil, but I have ...

At the beginning of the year, I set myself the goal of becoming fitter. Like so many people I'm realising just how busy and hectic life is without adding in trips to the gym and working up a sweat doing various different workout activities. As a solution to this problem, I dug out my old faithful Fitbit. I have a Fitbit Flex which is the basic wristband model. As far as I'm concerned it does everything I require: track my steps; allow me to input my food intake; monitor my water consumption; and track my sleep pattern. In the photograph below you will notice one shining light; this indicates roughly how many steps you've taken. Now this was taken at the beginning of the day, with my daily goal of 10,000 steps, one dot indicates 2000 steps taken. The reason I'm blogging about this today is not to give you the hard sell on a Fitbit or other step counting devices out on the market; and it most certainly isn't to make you go all calorie counting crazy. I simply ...

I have been a bad blogger! I haven't updated the blog quite as regularly as I had hoped So I thought I would start by giving you guys a brief update on whats been happening in my little world. I returned home after working abroad and took up dressmaking again. I also Set up a craft blog called Amy's Attic .                                               We added to our family. Meet Bella, the Cavalier King Charles Spaniel. She likes long walks round the village, playing with other dogs but hates the rain and new people! She is rather antisocial when it comes to humans!                                       I enjoyed a wonderful day in a local Spa and Hotel with my friend. I would definitely recommend a spa day to anyone who hasn't tried one! So relaxing! ...

Christmas has been and gone and I spent it being creative as per usual. As well as making a top for my grandma, I set out to make crackers with a personal touch. They went down a treat. I got them from Hobbycraft. Now I could have released my teacher side and made them with toilet roll tubes and crepe paper but I wanted them to match our presents, which were wrapped in brown paper with pretty bows and ribbons, so I opted for a Christmas cracker kit. The cracker kit I used is no longer on the website, but here is a version of the kit . This kit comes with the cardboard cracker paper and attached snapper, paper joke/trivia and an assortment of colourful paper hats. All that is left to do is buy the gift for inside and put them all together. I loved shopping for the little gifts to go in the crackers. I bought miniature bottles of alcohol, little bottles of scented hand sanitiser from the Body Shop and little tubs of lip balm. One warning I will give to anyone planning on doing thes...

Happy New Year! So 2016 has begun and many of us have started our New Year's resolutions. Mine started a while back. I plan on sewing/crafting more, because everyone has their outlets that relaxes them, crafts are my outlet. Now we are going to flash back a few week ago *Imagine T.A.R.D.I.S sounds here*. A friend and I were spending the day being ladies of leisure at the local Spa and Hotel, I felt so posh, when I began discussing my recent creative projects. Well after a glass of champagne, pampering and the heat of the hot tub, my friend had said how she found it odd I hadn't started a blog, documenting my projects. Now in the weeks to follow this thought had lingered and after a New Years Bucket List discussion my friends set me the goal of setting up a blog, thus Amy's Attic was born! The inspiration for Amy's Attic began months ago when I got sick, or rather my mother got sick, of me using her dining room table as a sewing/craft space. I then ran an idea passed...