Oldest UFO – December Update

Thanks to a long delay on Amtrak last week, I made a good amount of progress on my oldest UFO – Cats on a Staircase.  Everything in blue and the beginning of that cat tail with the hanging thread was completed this month.  It’s probably my largest block of solid progress on the piece in, well, years.  Next month I’ll finish the cat that’s attached to said tail and hopefully fill in the gaps between the blue and the browns, most of which will be white on white stitching.

It was good to do some stitching on this again – it really hadn’t seen my needle for about a year and a half.  It’s one of the pieces I really hope to finish in 2012.

*****

That said – bring 2012 on.  2011 was quite possibly the hardest year of my life emotionally, and I will not be sorry to see this year end.  Both personally and professionally, this year has been challenging and exhausting.  The personal issues are ones a bit *too* personal to discuss online, but they were serious ones – ones I knew I had to deal with head on and essentially alone.  A few friends do know about everything, but after a couple of missteps in confiding to friends who I thought would be supportive as the situation unfolded, I decided instead to shut down and just work through everything on my own.

The good thing on the personal front is that I know things are healing and getting better, even though from time to time, I’ll get a wash of overwhelming emotion and just need to acknowledge it, release it, and continue on.  The professional issues sorted themselves out, for the most part, as the year progressed and I’m hoping that they’ll continue toease with some recent news at work.  The problem is that I got smacked with both major problems within a two week span at the beginning of the year, and I truly spent the entire year in survival mode for the most part as I just tried to keep myself righted (and sane).

But yeah – I don’t want to ever relive a year like 2011.  And I don’t wish anything similar on anyone.

I’ve also learned to put on a VERY convincing “things are fine” face, when no… they haven’t been.  But they’re getting better.

And ultimately, I think that’s all that matters.

Happy New Year everyone – may the next one bring all of us better times.