happiness is....

... a new rotary cutter blade!

It's amazing how much easier cutting patchwork pieces is with a sharp blade. But each time the blade gets nicked, and/or starts to dull I end up persevering with it long past the point that makes sense. Especially when I still have a spare in the cupboard!

Getting hold of replacement blades hasn't always been easy though I have to say. When I first emigrated here I discovered that the brand I have wasn't available here, and the nearest equivalent had a different shaped hole in the middle so couldn't be substituted. So I eeked out the blades I had with me for as long as possible and stocked up on return trips to the UK. Finding new ones is now much easier, not only can you buy just about anything online these days, but the brand I have is now imported. Sure I can't get the ones I want here in Kaitaia, but I go to the main cities often enough to be able to stock up if I don't want to pay postage (and it gives me a good excuse to visit the quilting shops!). But still that mentality of having to make do with a dull blade is a hard one to break (it never once occurred to me to buy another rotary cutter of the brand that was readily available!).

I've read a few articles and listened to an essential oils conference podcast recently that have mentioned inherited emotional DNA, and how emotional trauma is passed on down generations who can find themselves with a seemingly irrational fear of something, or habits like hoarding. The expression 'the fruit never falls far from the tree' has long been used to describe such hereditary traits that science is only just starting to be able to explain. The endless debate of nature vs nurture has developed an additional twist. Is my squeezing every last drop of usefulness out of something even to my own disadvantage due to my many experiences of living within a tight budget? or some deeper ancestral experience of living with a scarcity of resources? With Scottish and Yorkshire ancestry (amongst others) it is perhaps unsurprising that there might be an element of 'short arms and deep pockets' in me; but perhaps those traits are due in turn not to simply being 'tight wi' tha brass' but from a past of shortage, after all both populations are also known for their friendliness and looking after their own which doesn't really stack up with the image of being penny pinching.

A friend of mine has recently been posting on Facebook about her DNA test results which include all manner of health indicators, and as I type my Mum is waiting to get her DNA results which hopefully will tell us more than we already know about our ancestry. So it probably isn't surprising that my mind managed to make the jump between dull blades and DNA! But it also fits in with some work I've been doing on counteracting thinking errors (primarily shoulds/oughts and mind reading!), and this too was echoed in another of the conference podcasts I listened to, often the ability to name an issue goes a long way to being able to deal with it. It is much easier to break a habit that appears to make no sense when you can identify why you do it that way in the first place, once you've identified the thinking error/issue behind it you can start finding a positive way forward instead.

So when my currently nice sharp rotary cutter blade starts to dull I need to remember to tell myself it's more important to change to a sharp one that won't stress me out when trying to use it, rather than dwell on that fact that I didn't used to be able to get a new one easily and so I ought to 'make it last'! Now if I could just get a round blade sharpened I'd be even happier....