How to Brighten a Dreary Day

I have been sat here today feeling rather blah. Blah about the weather. Blah about Christmas ornaments. I have finished another dozen this morning and have now made over 80. When you get to these numbers in production, trust me, blah is putting it kindly. But all for a good cause - a happy Christmas in our household. Still, I was feeling blah. I also knew that I had to stop making ornaments and turn my hand to my nemesis - the dreaded zipper. Blah!

Then the post made a thump as it hit the floor. I am getting quite good at discerning a thump of something not for me and a thump that indicates goodness has arrived. Quilty, fabricy things make a undeniably happy thumpy sound as they drop to the floor. I like that sound!

A quick look at the return address and I saw it was from Sarah at FairyFace Designs. Everyone knows Sarah, but if by some odd coincidence you don't then please go introduce yourself. She is brilliant, and she is the great mind behind the Summer Sewing which had me writing lists and wringing my hands - until the end of the summer when I saw how the list had focused me and how much I had accomplished and then I was just smug. Sarah recently launched her linky Winter Sewing party getting people once again to join up and list what they hoped to accomplish by March. A huge group of talented people joined up this time. It's great to be a part of it.

But I digress. (I put that in for Rhonda. It's her catch phrase.) Summer Sewing was a success and at the end of it Sarah had a draw amongst the participants for a prize - and I won! (Cue little happy dance.) Today that prize arrived and how pleased I am.

Just a whole stack of goodness. First and foremost, Sarah made me a zippy pouch. Not only is it gorgeous but it is very well timed too - because though I might be wrong, I believe she has made this pouch using Ayumi's tutorial. This is one of the tutorials I was going to use in making things with those zippers I bought. So now I have a real, live properly made one to use as reference. And it's mine all mine. Yippee!

All the details are perfect and the fabrics show up brilliantly against the Kona Ash.
(Sorry, if I guessed wrong on the solid Sarah, but that is close as I get to fabric knowledge at times!)

Perfectly finished inside too, with little pockets for my cards.
Those cards which the bank laughs about when I try to use them.
Yes, those cards! But they would look good in there any way.

You would think that something made by Sarah would be more than enough but there was a charm pack of Terrain - something that some of my bloggy friends might have noticed me wanting on occasion.

Ignore the fingers with their layer of Stiffy on them and concentrate on the
jewel like tones of the fabrics, please.

And stuffed inside the purse on arrival were some of Sarah's incredible scraps. I am a lover of other people's scraps because theirs are always nicer than mine. But in the past few months I have been the very happy recipient of some gorgeous scraps from various locations around the world.

Don't all those scraps blend together and beg to be used together?

I know what I want for Christmas now too. No! Not your scraps - that would be a bit greedy. Proper storage for my fabric. Somewhere that things would be sorted and easy to get at and I would be able to find things. I have contemplated nicking Emily's toy storage but am a bit afraid of her and what she would do if I disorganised her room to organise mine. This is what I have in mind for me and my scraps though -

Minus the toys, of course. I dream of tubs full of sorted fabric.

So a huge thank you to Sarah for taking a blah day and injecting a little sunshine. Which is better than the weather man did! I truly appreciate your gift, other than the fact that I cannot think of any more excuses to avoid facing those zippers.

Susan