Checking in

In my end-of-year clean up I was shocked to discover that it's been over 2 years since I last blogged, and wondered if blogging is even a thing anymore. And, for that matter if miniatures is even my thing any more.

Fortunately, I had a decent and relaxing summer break this year, which gave me the time to think about if it was time to decide to put the blog to bed once and for all, and seriously consider doing the same with minis.

The decision that I've come to so far is really an anti-decision: since I've been telling myself for 2 years that I'm not buying any more minis because a) I don't have the budget and b) I'm not using the backlog of ones I already have in stash, but then continue to come home from trips to New Zealand with just a few things I couldn't resist (mainly from Daiso), perhaps it's time for a recalibration.

I'm not sure if I'm making much sense, but am being gentle on myself because my blogging voice is very very rusty, and there's a jolly good chance I'm writing to myself.

(Which suddenly makes me realise that one of the things I miss about blogging in the good old days is that sense of community and regularly checking in with what other blogging buddies were up to. And makes me wonder how long it's been since my collection of RSS feeds disappeared, and why that happened. Microblogging, I suppose, but it's something that I should make time to look into and see who's still around from those times).

So my idea is to start by doing a round up of the small amount of mini stuff I've done since December 2021: mainly Instagram challenges which I'd hoped would kickstart my mini mojo, but deteriorated into a recycling of old images, which sometimes made me feel worse about the whole situation.

Here we go:

In February 2022, the Kaleidoscope House that I no longer own returned from its extended visit to the Doll house: Miniature worlds of wonder exhibition in Melbourne, and along with it, this carefully-wrapped parcel which contained the originals of the prints that they'd made for the exhibition:

(Unfortunately, they're still stacked in the corner of the library as I have no wall space to hang them: although someone did suggest I have a nice large empty wall in the garage!)

In March 2022 I had discovered a fabulous handywoman and as that year's (early) homeversary gift to myself, got her to come in and finally hang the art on my horribly hard plaster and brick walls (after almost 4 years in the place, that was quite a relief).

While she was here I also got her to hang some cube shelving that I've had for ages on the wall above my studio desk, with the plan that if I had minis staring at me at eye level directly above my computer, it may inspire me:

(Alas, It only seemed to inspire me to dwell on how little I was doing with them, and fill the rest of them with half-completed and abandoned projects in the hope that having them at eye level just above my work space would inspire me to work on them. It didn't.)

In July 2022, I finally made a thing, finishing the salad I'd started working on in August 2020, along with a few other small things that had been banging round for far too long:

And I didn't do anything else until the beginning of 2023, when I made a mini copy of a book a friend took the photos for:

(And photographed it in front of one of the bookcases in my library that I was pulling apart, dusting and reorganising at the time).

In March 2023 Canberra Modern's exhibition Model modern: Iconic design at miniature scale at Manning Clarke House during the Canberra heritage festival enticed me to try venture out to it, so I booked myself a ticket to the exhibition launch and panel discussion, but alas the number of unmasked people jammed in a very small (but quite fabulous) house, and the realisation that my skills with small talk had disappeared during lockdown, meant I felt deeply uncomfortable and left after only 20 minutes. And although I took quite a few pictures of the models, only one was worth sharing:

(It didn't help that I was on the scooter as I no longer own a car, and hadn't considered how cold and dark it gets in Canberra at that time of the year early in the evening :-/)

Things looked up in July 2023, as I joined in the July Mini Fun challenge on Instagram and was delighted that I not only finally used the wooden heart pieces I 'discovered' in December 2021,

but also threw together a very basic scene for a later day's Instagram post:

I was pleased that I also made a new scene for day 3 of the challenge, 'Magical thinking', but not so pleased with the result, although I consoled myself that it was a theme I'm not drawn to, and I'm very unpracticed at scene making these days:

But with the 'done is better than perfect' approach I pointed out that I'd finally used the plastic octopus I was given as a mini challenge back in 2013, that the Issey Miyake perfume bottle top I'd had in stash for about as long works perfectly as a modern crystal ball stand, and one of the chopsticks I'd received in a swap a few years ago worked just fine as an emergency wand.

I'm also still really struggling with the light in my not-new-anymore flat, and the studio in particular.

Finally, in August, while having coffee with a friend, she introduced me to a friend of hers, who happened to be one of the artists that originally created Bette Noir, the miniature gallery that lived in my downstairs hallway for quite some time and which I last bumped into back in early 2020.

He was pleased that I kept it safe and told me that it now lives in Tuggeranong Library, and that I was welcome to exhibit in it any time I want.

So I took a trip down south the following weekend to say hello and see how she was going, which was a bit weird as I've not been to Tuggeranong Library since I used to occasionally work there well over 20 years ago.

So that's me pretty much caught up mini-wise, although I've not mentioned the small number of purchases I've made since I last blogged, or mini gifts I've received (although while pulling out the photos for this post, I discovered some pictures I took of my purchases and gifts from my mid-2022 visit to New Zealand, so perhaps I can cobble together a show and tell).

If you happen to be reading this: hello! And thank you! How are you going? How's your mini-world looking these days? Are you still blogging?