A surprise Hoot!

Well, look at this! What do we have here?

This is an early edition Flickettysplits "Hoot" owl .... that I discovered, quite by chance, on display at GJ's Discount Fabric Store in Lygon Street!

It was such a nice surprise to see this little guy set up on a shelf. I remember selling this one at a Made N Thornbury market a looooong time ago - maybe three years? - so it was a really pleasant shock to see him again.

GJ's have lots of toys on display to show what you can do with fabrics when you put different colours and patterns together. I feel very proud to have one in the mix.

A beauty of a bathroom bag

Oh, who was I trying to kid. Of COURSE I ended up sewing yesterday. It was inevitable, wasn't it? Of COURSE it was.

After the fence festival of ugliness was only very slightly improved by a very slightly less ugly wire trellis with a poor limp passionfruit trailing weakly off it in an effort to disguise the Ugly - and that took the better part of too many hours to count - I could hardly stay away from the sewing machine, could I?

It's how I decompress, after all.

And so I made this. It's a cute little bathroom bag made from vinyl-covered Kokka babushka fabric in an apple-y lime green. I especially like the little mushrooms (look closely, she instructed, look closely).

I've got the same fabric in sugar-pink, so Im going to make a few in the same material.

This one here is a prototype; I was going to put it on the stall for the Thornbury market, but it's a little bit wonky around the base seam, so I gave it to the Amateur Actress instead. She doesn't mind my dodgy offcästs, in fact she said quite happily "It's good living here!"

I'll know the tricks of the pattern better for the next one (I hadn't tried this one before).

But my goodness, the market is coming up in five days time and I've hardly any stock left after two markets already in two weekends. What on earth am I doing here on the computer, blogging?

Must sew!

Come to the Thornbury market

Right, people. Time for some shameless advertising.

See this picture at the very top of that right'hand column? The one titled "Come To The Market"? The one advertising the Thornbury craft market? That one right there? See it?

I want you to come to the market! Support your local community. Feed a local artist. Come and finger my wares. That is, I mean, you know, pick up my pretty little things and admire them. And then hopefully buy them too!

At this market I'm going to be all stocked up with soft toys - Hoots, and Ellyfumps, and Pussycats, and I'll have some new things as well. I think a fish. And perhaps a giraffe. Maybe a dinosaur as well - we'll see how much time I can snaffle for sewing between now and then. I'm really going to have to take in my machine for a service soon before it expires with a last exhausted gasp.

Or if you don't want one of my things - crazy, I know, but possible, in an alternate universe type of situation - maybe you'll like one of Curlypops' things. She does lovely bags and other goodies.

Or perhaps one of Tinnigirl's things? She does lovely tins with surprises inside - nice ones, not nasty. And gorgeous recycled album covers filled with papery goodness on the inside. Sometimes there's nothing nicer than a little surprise, is there?

So come to the market. Support your local community! Feed a local artist!