October is my favourite month. It's also my birthday month, which makes it doubly annoying that I've barely had a minute to enjoy it.
This is the month when I should be pottering about the house, making soup, baking bread and cooking enormous pots of stew that make the whole place smell lovely. Lighting candles, closing the curtains before it's even properly dark and generally embracing my inner old woman.
Ideally, I'd have a log burner going, too. There's something about coming home from a cold, muddy walk and lighting a fire that makes everything feel right with the world.
Instead, I've spent a good chunk of October making stock, fulfilling wholesale orders and trying to keep all the plates spinning. It turns out that running a small creative business involves considerably more than making things you love. There are orders to pack, stock to replenish and an endless list of jobs that seem to reproduce when you're not looking.
Still, it's been a good month in many ways, and one of the highlights was the Cumbria Life Show with Shop for the Senses.
Friday was spent collecting stock, delivering it to the show and getting everything set up, ready for the weekend ahead. Then came two very busy days spent alongside the other makers and the lovely Shop for the Senses team, chatting to customers and meeting all sorts of people who came along to shop & browse.
It was exhausting, but in the best possible way.
I'm someone who is generally happiest outside, preferably somewhere quiet with a decent view and no particular need to speak to anyone. So spending an entire weekend in a busy show environment, talking about my work and meeting people, was perhaps not the most obvious choice of weekend activity for me.
But I genuinely loved it.
We had a lovely space, alongside Ali from West Coast Interiors. Having the two spaces together made such a difference, and seeing everything displayed together, with the work from all the makers against that beautiful backdrop, was a real pleasure.
I felt proud of what I'd brought along. And, more than that, I enjoyed talking about it.
There's a difference between making work in the studio, where it's just you and whatever you're trying to figure out that day, and seeing it out in the world, where other people can experience it for themselves. I found myself chatting quite happily about the pieces, explaining what I do and sharing the work with people who were interested.
It felt natural, and I came away feeling really pleased to have been part of it.
Of course, all that stock didn't make itself, and the wholesale orders didn't disappear just because I'd spent the weekend at a show. So it's been a case of getting home, catching up and carrying on, with the to-do list remaining as optimistic as ever.
Which brings me back to October being my favourite month.
I feel as though I've spent much of it working through the very things that should be allowing me to enjoy this time of year, rather than actually enjoying it. I want the slow mornings, the muddy walks with Brock, the smell of bread baking and the comfort of something warming bubbling away on the hob.
Instead, I've occasionally found myself looking at the calendar and wondering how on earth we're nearly into November.
Still, there have been plenty of good things tucked into the busyness, and I'm trying not to lose sight of that. It's a privilege to have work to make, orders to fulfil and opportunities to share what I do. I know that.
But I also know that at some point I'd quite like to shut the studio door, put the kettle on and do absolutely nothing that could be added to a spreadsheet.
November brings a few new things, including showcasing some of my work at Lyzzick in Keswick and a couple of commissions to get stuck into.
There are also plenty of ideas bubbling away in the background, as usual. Some of which I'm keeping to myself for now.
More than anything, though, I'm hoping November will give me a bit of space to get my head down in the studio and just enjoy painting. No grand plans to reinvent anything or make any great declarations. Just time to make work, follow a few ideas and see where they take me.
And perhaps, if the universe is feeling particularly generous, a few evenings at home with something warming on the hob and absolutely nowhere else to be.
I'm not asking for much.
See you in November.
