Permit me to introduce myself...

Hello, and welcome to Things Made Slowly, a blog about doing things by hand, and taking the time to do them well.  I’m a thirty-something rare books librarian with a nasty habit of picking up new hobbies--mostly costuming and its associated crafts (sewing, embroidery, knitting, crochet, spinning, tablet weaving, etc.), with occasional forays into other areas such as pottery, woodworking, and odd culinary avenues.

What my stash looks like now: a mixture of old
Renaissance Faire costume bits, unfinished
projects, fabric, and other textile-related
tools and supplies.

Formerly based in Southern California, I was for several years a regular attendee at the San Bernardino/Santa Fe Dam, Ojai (now defunct), Long Beach (also defunct), and Escondido Renaissance festivals, Vista Viking Festival, Riverside Dickens Festival, Labyrinth of Jareth Masquerade, (Los Angeles) Edwardian Ball, and of course, Costume College.  Consequently, my crafting projects ranged from early medieval to late 19th century, with plenty of fantasy and gothic styles thrown in.  I made (too) frequent shopping expeditions to the L.A. garment district, amassed a tremendous fabric stash, and racked up a staggering number of unfinished projects.

In 2012, I moved from West Los Angeles to rural Scotland, near St Andrews.  In packing up my collection of fabric and unfinished projects for the move, I was appalled at how much *stuff* I had accumulated.