Update (long time coming)

Well, what a year it's been. I have spent a long long time trying to work out what to do with this blog and how to start anew. In the end I have decided that what does it matter? It's a blog. It can be whatever I want it to be; I don't have to follow rules. I don't even think there are rules.

So, as mentioned in a previous post, I had been a vegetarian for over 20 years. During the last maybe ten years I had become lazier and lazier about it. I never ate anything that wasn't vegetarian, or anything like that, but I had started wearing leather shoes again and had become lax about checking for non-tested cosmetics. Then around three years ago, I started to develop an intolerance to milk and made the switch to soya milk, but still ate other dairy products. But as time went on I looked into veganism more and more and started to think about it as something I could work towards. I began a couple of years ago by having two days a week when I would avoid all dairy products and eggs as well as continuing to be vegetarian. As of January 2011 I have been eating 100% vegan all the time.
I spent the first year getting rid of all my 'pre-gan' shoes, bags and toiletries. I also thought long and hard about wool. For anyone who doesn't know, vegans don't eat or use ANY products that come from or are produced by animals. I wasn't sure what to do about my stash. Like most crocheters, I have built up a ... well, 'massive stash' sounds bad, but that's kinda what it is. Having spent a lot of time, not to mention money on various types of yarn including wool and wool mix ones, I wasn't immediately sure if I could just get rid of it all. Since becoming vegan I have not bought any yarn containing any wool, but I decided not to get rid of all of my stash yarns that contain wool straight away. I went back and forth a lot, in my mind trying to establish my own line about what I would and wouldn't do. In the end I have given away almost all of my wool/mix yarns to various charitable causes - the organisation where I work has a weavery and much of it went there. Other yarns I have used to make items and they have been given away to various non-vegan friends, family and charities. Some are still to be found homes, but they will eventually all go.

So, having a shop selling wool items and a blog showing wool items doesn't really fit with my new lifestyle. I wasn't sure what to do about this blog. I wanted to start a food blog about all the new stuff I am cooking and eating but also, I still crochet a lot and make other bits and bobs so I wanted to still have somewhere to talk about that. I thought about shutting this blog down and just starting another one, but since I have been so lax about making entries here I thought starting again would be too hard. So for now, this is it. Sometimes I might write about crochet, sometimes I might write about food, and sometimes I might leave it empty for months at a time.

I've been working on a few patterns to share, so my aim is to get one of them up in the next month. I've also been playing with felt (polyester of course!) and have made a couple of things that I'll show another time.

Take care.