Standing still for a moment...

My October teaching tour is now finished, and I have to thank the folks of Bath and Inverness for their hospitality! I got to see some beautiful parts of the UK and share in the love of knitting techniques, especially that of circles and knitting sideways.

I fell ill over the weekend at Lock Ness Knit fest and I'm still in bed trying to shake this lurgy. I got back to the bus 2 days ago and have barely moved from this spot, and it's confirmed that I need to slow down with teaching, and maybe even grind it to a halt for a while.

Don't get me wrong - I love teaching. I love sharing what I know and seeing that knowledge spark new ideas. But I've been through teacher burnout before, when I used to be a full time teacher in schools, and I promised myself that I wouldn't let that happen again when I started teaching privately.

I don't teach often - during this season I'll have taught a total of 23 x 3hr workshops (or 12 full days) across 6 venues, with a weekend spent at each. That's a lot less than many teach but it's too much for me right now. Given how easily I get exhausted and how painful it is trying to travel with two frozen shoulders, I've decided to not teach at all during Autumn/Winter 2018. Travelling is also difficult with a specialist diet and I get such anxiety about eating out (fear of being dosed again) and it'd be nice not to worry about that, too. After I'd completed my year end accounts I saw that financially, I could afford to teach less and indulge in more creative studio time (which is where most of my income is generated); thanks to Elemental, this year is going to be even better and I'm going to use that to buy myself some time off.

(who am I kidding? I'll still be in the studio, working. But I'll be buying myself some time off from travelling and planning and preparing for workshops)

So, that's my plan. From May 2018 until Spring 2019, I'll not be teaching anywhere. I won't stop teaching altogether; I've retired a few workshops that I no longer enjoy teaching, and added a couple of new ones that I know I'll love. I've updated my T&C to be kinda to me, which was really hard as it feels less kind to small shops, and I'm hoping they'll understand.

Internet access was limited whilst I was travelling and the SquareSpace blog app decided not to work (or at least it keeps crashing as I try and write a new post...) so I'm way behind with emails and stuff to share! Be prepared for an onslaught of posts ;) 

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The photo above is the crown shaping swatch for Circled 2. It's one of my workshop samples for Art of the Knitted Circle and Turning Sideways classes, and will also form part of the new Advanced Kitchener class. I've been thinking about circles a lot lately (more than usual, at least) and I'm really excited to have some studio time in the near future. It feels like such a luxury to have this to look forward to.

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Before I go, my November teaching tour kicks off in just under 4 weeks, and you'll find me at the Devon Sun Yarns retreat in Lyme Regis and at Purlescence for a whole weekend of knitting sideways! See you there? Otherwise, the only other places you'll be able to take a workshop with me for the foreseeable is Edinburgh Yarn Festival and the Woolinn in Dublin.