Fabric love

I have a new fabric designer to add to my favourites list. Erin McMorris. And her latest fabric collection is called Park Slope by Free Spirit Fabric. I mentioned in my previous post I'd finally bought some of this wonderfully happy and bright fabric. And here's a look at my new fabric piles, they look so pretty together.

I found this fabric at the Fat Quarter Shop. Great service, I had my fabric (and there were some extra fat quarters I purchased as well, but that's for another post) within a week of ordering.

Below is a sneaky peek of my first project sewn with my new Park Slope fabric. I can't give too much away just yet as it's for my swap partner in Mel's gratitude swap group.

I'll finish off today with the links to two fabulous little stores I visited last week. A friend and I go off every couple of months on little shopping trips around Sydney. We both have a love of food and crafty things, so we're finding (or in some cases re-discovering) great little spots around Sydney. Our last visit found us in Summer Hill and Leichhardt.

I used to live in Leichhardt for a few years when I was first married. Emily spent the first 11 months of her life there (which is why we say she loves her pasta having spent many evenings in her pram while Paul and I had pasta for dinner in the fabulous cafe's along Norton Street). Anyway, back to last week. Here's two stores we visited:

• Rick Rack Retro : Stepping into this store was like stepping back into my childhood.
• Reclaim : Monica Trapaga's fabulous store full of beautiful things.

That's all for now. School holidays start today - YAY. I say it every time "I love school holidays!"

Thanks for visiting my blog.

Cheers

Fiona x

cupcake pincushion and handmade bags

Last week I received a little box in the mail. Inside was this little bit of gorgeous-ness.

Lovely Kylie made this for me. I had admired Kylie's cupcake pincushion on her blog a couple of week's back. I was so excited to receive this little cupcake pincushion I took it out with me when I had coffee with some friends one morning to show it off! Thank you so much Kylie, you know I love it :-)

Last Friday was cold and rainy here, so it felt like a good day for some sewing and Kylie's pincushion was put to good use.

I started making a bag for a friend during the day, it's her birthday this week. When Phoebe arrived home from school she reminded me we'd planned on making her a bag. My friend's bag was sidelined for a while while we pulled out Phoebe's material and cut out her bag. She sat at the sewing machine quilting her fabric. Then I helped her sew the bag together. She likes sewing the straight lines, and isn't too keen on the curvy lines at the moment. Here's her finished bag, her quilting is so neat.

Saturday's weather continued to be miserable, so I finished my friend's bag. I used fabrics from Amy Butler's Midwest Modern Ohio Sky collection. This is the same bag as my pink bag I made back in July.

Last week I also received some gorgeous fabrics in the mail from the US. I'd bought some beautiful fabrics I'd been wishing for from a US store. My order arrived within a week. I'll post some photos of my new fabric stash in a few days when I've taken some photos.

Sophia sent me an award. Thanks so much Sophia.

There are so many wonderfully creative blogs out there in the blog world I find it hard to name just a few. As I come across blogs I like, I add their links to my side bar, so I hope that you might take some time to visit some of those.

One great list of creative blogs which I've discovered lately is this site:

{edited: I can't create a link from the button above, so here is the link to the big list of sewing blogs: http://www.suzical.co.uk/sewing-blogs.html }

Lots of my favourites are listed here, and I'm having fun visiting others on their list.

I've just made a big batch of cupcakes, which I need to go make the icing for now. Emily's school has a "system" (for want of a better word) where the girls take cupcakes for each other's birthday in their tutor group. At the beginning of the year a roster is worked out, and tomorrow it is Emily's turn to take cake for her partner's birthday. I love the smell of freshly baked cakes through the house.

Till next time.... thanks for visiting.

Cheers

Fiona x