CHARM ABOUT YOU

I am absolutely thrilled with my new Flying Geese Bucket Bag! I joined the #giucygiucebucketbagsewalong hosted by @giucy_giuce, for his fun and simple tutorial click here.

My original plan was to use up some of my selvedges but I was worried it would look a little messy and I really wanted a cool bag I would actually use. I have a clutch bag that I've taken out a few times but I have never made such a big or practical bag before. 

I realised I had the perfect fabric to fit in the paper pieced flying geese, the brilliant Geekly Glasses in off white, Geekly Chic by Dorothy Tsang - which lovely Esther recently sent me. I paired it with Metallic Essex Yarn Dyed in black, which has the most stunning gold sparkle! The brass eyelets add a little bling too and I had to use some Cotton + Steel for the binding. In the tutorial you turn the bag through and top stitch, but I was worried I wouldn't be able to do that neatly and having seen both Laura and Giuseppe use binding I really liked it!

I live in Manchester, UK and it tends to rain quite a lot so I decided to use this Torino polyester waterproof fabric for the lining, base and tabs. I hope it will make the bag stronger and keep my stuff dry! 

The bag is pretty massive and I was worried it would be too long on my short body but it actually looks great and is surprisingly comfortable to wear. I think using thick twisted rope helps.

So now I can pack it up, ready for the Festival of Quilts 2016 which I'm heading to on Thursday!

If you are there on the Thursday please come and say hello! I'm the one carrying the bag with the flying geese glasses!!

Big thanks to @giucy_giuce for the great tutorial and fun sew-along!

And then we made all the teaching staff in his class these lavender (from our garden) stuffed hearts:

So it's 'hello summer' and I'm dreaming about some lovely fabrics!

Like the totally gorgeous 30's Playtime at the Fat Quarter Shop 

I'm hoping fabric fairies magically send me some of this!

Prints to Polka Dots have now got Geekly Chic in stock, as well as a great sale going on.

Fluffy Sheep Quilting has these cute Little Matroyshka Dolls and Clocks on sale, as well as other gorgeous prints.

and Christa Quilts is having 20% off Laural Burch Fabulous Felines this week.

So I've been busy... yes with my 3 kids... housework boringness... but more importantly sewing the blues away! There's nothing like starting a new project to lift my spirits:

They'll be more on this at some point but it is the most brilliant cheater print I've ever seen!

Other fabric I adore is Geekly Chic, available here at the Fat Quarter Shop

and those glasses were my contribution to the fabulous Low Volume Swap brilliantly organised by Rebecca - these are my beautiful 10" squares:

and if that wasn't enough she sent me some (can't get in the UK) Denyse Schmidt fabric:

Rebecca is a total star and the gal knows me well! Thanks so very much chica!

In other yummy fabric news...