On 1 June 2021 I joined the 2021 100 days project.
For those that don’t know the 100 days project, the idea is simple: you choose a creative project, do it every single day for 100 days, and share your process on social using the hashtag #The100DayProject.
I joined for the first time in 2020, during that first lockdown year. Mum was interested to join in too – her creative project was to make a small painting each day, mostly of something from the garden. She would take a photo of her painting each day and then email it to me and I then uploaded it on her Instagram account. For most of 2020 we were not allowed to see one another, and this creative act brought us closer together and I think gave Mum a positive focus each day during those long locked down lonely weeks.
Then in January 2021 I came to stay with Mum during that lockdown. It became clear that she wasn’t quite herself, and at the end of April she was diagnosed with mixed dementia.
As I started the #100daysproject I reflected that my life was now very different from previous years… I shared caring for Mum with my elder brother; our routine was that we stayed in Galloway with mum for 2 to 3 weeks at a time, and then swapped. Because of covid restrictions it was quite an isolated time, those first months of 2021.
Anyway back in the first weeks of January 2021 I found this fisherman’s smock which mum used to wear when she was sculpting her pottery animals. She never wears it now and gifted it to me. I knew right then I wanted to embellish it, to embroider it with life.
Each embroidered element would connect to mum in some way. I had no idea if I had the skill to pull this off and create something more beautiful and meaningful than the smock itself, but each stitch would be so full of love for the remarkable woman who made me.
I recorded the progress on Instagram, initially posting every day (the 100 days are meant to be consecutive) but for various reasons my days were not consecutive, and I have also now recognised that this is a marathon, and not a 100 day sprint. So, 32 weeks later I still pick up the smock some days and stab the fabric. I still upload to Instagram each day I add stitches and if you want to see progress follow #TakingSmockOfTheSituation and #Smocktales on insta.
I started a fundraiser as a sideline of the project. Of course I did, I’m a fundraiser at heart and couldn’t help myself. So, if you are moved to contribute so no one in Scotland has to face dementia alone, please click here and support Alzheimers Scotland. I really appreciate your support, but more importantly so will so many others who are struggling to make sense of either their or a loved one’s dementia. It is a bewildering disease, for all of us.
I’ll add the backlog of slow stitching progress, and eventually I might catch up with myself and by then will have formed a regular blogging habit so you can see it (and my other adventures) in real time.
Edited to add blog posts relating to this story:
- Emotional investment
- Swooping swallows
- A big adventure
- Fly little swallow fly
- A superb 70s hat
- Posies of flowers
- You shall go to the ball
- London pigeons
- Biscuits that make you go oooooh!
- Starting anew again
- Reasons various
- Un-sewing
- Threading a needle
- Happiness has no history
- The crisis
- S L O W
- Caim
- Selfie with a Beltie (this should have been before Caim, but never mind)
- The new temporary normal
- I bought a vase
- How to draw a mule
- A roadside picnic
- The big pink cosmos flower
- The Operating Theatre (this should have been AFTER Parked Up)
- Mum’s world grew smaller
- Parked up
- I see the sea!
- Roses after the rain
- Investment in our futures
- Memoirs and memories
- So fragile, so precious
- Giving nature a wee nudge
- And I swam
- Tide out. Tide in.
- A N I M A L S
- Birdsong
- Snacks as Self Care
- Just click your fingers
- Escape Day
- Hot toast
- Black dogs. Brown river
- Slow worms and personal catnip
- Holding on
- It’s good to be home
- The War has ended
- The most precious horses
- So many layers
- What could he be up to?
- ALWAYS Breakfast Time
- Letting go
- A love letter
- Swallows on a line
- Living your best life
- We can all fly
- I can see
- Sisters
- Slow and steady
- Letter to Mum
- Newlands and Norwegians
- Seeing is believing
- A diagnosis
- Self care
- So many hankies
- Enjoy every moment
- A pet bee
- Letters to The Times and wetting the baby’s head
- The memory of madeleines
- How are you?
- Creativity
- Puck
- Nearly There (in so many ways)
The following are coming soon…
- MaDolly gets dressed!
- Me!
Trying to care for Mum as she developed dementia nearly broke me on a number of occasions. I would really appreciate it if you could make a donation towards Alzheimer Scotland. They’re doing stuff that makes living with this more bearable for so many people. Thank you, thank you, a thousand thank yous.
Shewolfinthevalley 
What a beautiful idea! Sending much love from across the pond to you all, dementia is a bitch for everyone in its wake ❤️
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Ah dear dear Sara, I hope the world is treating you well and that 2022 creates many memorable and lovely moments for you and yours. I do miss you and your lovely face x
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Same here ❤
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