Warning: Some over sharing may be involved in this post.
Last November was an exciting time. The shop needed more space and was on the move and my daughters health was looking on the up, we were planning a February trip to Vietnam as well as our annual April trip to the country town of Bright.
Opening to the public was great fun! I loved the new location, the fact that I had accidentally filled a gap in the area of missing quilt shops and meeting current and brand new customers. In the first few months Mondays and Thursdays were busy with customers whilst also whirring around in the background packing online orders. What was also happening in those months was my daughters health beginning to wobble again and I very soon started finding that on the days the shop wasn't open, I needed to be home. This then meant that I had little to no motivation to stay on top of social media, newsletter content or even consistent creativity and online sales began to suffer.
By February I was already exhausted when we boarded the plane to Vietnam for our whirlwind two and half week holiday and whilst it was an amazing trip, navigating Maggie's needs in a foreign country, though not dire, meant that relaxing into it was never on the cards. Don't get me started on the morning she dislocated her shoulder high on a mountain in the north of the country with not a hospital in site.
By March her health had taken a major turn and by the end of April she was no longer able to attend school. This really meant that thats where all my energy needed to be. The 35 minute drive to the shop and back began to take its toll and my love for all things Scribbly Gum began to falter.
I knew something had to change but it hadn't even been 12 months since I opened to the public, I was feeling a little bit like I'd made a huge mistake and that I had let people down by wanting to scale things back but it was the right decision. Family first.
So if you've read this far, you're probably wanting to know what the changes are. Well if you saw the sale, it was huge and I hope you were able to grab yourself a bargain. I was able to condense my fabric stock down by two thirds and if you have been on the website in the last day or so, you'll notice that except for the sale fabric, fabric from the bolt is no longer available. This also means that I am unable to continue on with custom orders and of course I am no longer open to the public. It's time to go back to Scribbly Gum's roots of focusing on curated bundles and quilt kits. Where I can, as I mentioned in an instagram post a few weeks ago, keep showing up with intention, creativity and joy.
So after all that the current update is this. The shop which is now the Studio is located on my street. Yep. In amongst a leafy suburban row of shops. Above a wine bar and the post office with yummy gourmet cafes at either end. Maggie spent three weeks in an outpatient program and then an intensive week long inpatient getting the help she needed and last week was her first week back at school. She was actually the one who saw the For Lease sign for this space a couple of months back and I can now see her coming down the street after school as the school is only about 600 metres around the corner. I have set her up a desk next to my sewing table in the studio so that she can hang with me when she's not at school as she is currently on a very reduced timetable and is doing the best we have seen in the last five years.
It's been a bumpy few years with the shop (I still don't think I've told you the story about the first week of having the shop back in 2022) but this feels like its it. This is how it's meant to be and I thank each and every one of you for coming along on this bumpy ride. I am looking forward now to my creativity opening back up, throwing myself back into lots of sewing and having more space and time for everyone and everything. Including myself.