Discovering a New (to me) Shop

Do you read Red Pepper Quilts? If you don’t you really should, lots of eye candy and wonderful inspiration. She also hosts wonderful give-aways. A few weeks ago she hosted a giveaway from Little Crafty Shop, an Australian based store which sells both yarn and fabric.

The night before we flew to Australia I received an email from Rita telling me that I’d won a $50 gift certificate to spend in the store. I perused the website carefully and when I arrived in Australia placed my order.

The website was really easy to navigate and shipping was really quick. We only had 13 days in Australia and the package reached me before we had to come home.

I purchased both yarn and fabric. Since it was a gift certificate I splashed out and got yarn that was more expensive than I’d usually buy for myself.

I thought I’d see what all the fuss was about over the Madelinetosh yarns…

There was also fabric.

The two on the left will go into the hand-pieced hexagon quilt and the sheep will make a knitting bag at some point.

Shipping is free for orders over $50, this came to just over $50 so I qualified for free shipping.

Thank you Rita and Little Crafty Shop. I’m looking forward to using my purchases.

 

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Crafty shopping

My outing with Sam was not the only visit I made to a yarn store. Once we had unloaded our gear at the cabin we headed into Estes Park to get some groceries. I had used the fabulous Trip Planner tool on Ravelry to discover that there were two yarn stores in the town and so I had my eyes out for them. Imagine my joy when we parked right across the street from The Stitchin’ Den. Some yarn came home with me. I think this store was a little smaller and less overwhelming than Fancy Tiger.

The neon is for Gorgeous Girl and the Tofutsies is for me. I’ve been wanting to try this yarn for a while and this was the first time I’d seen it in person.

We also visited a Jo-Ann’s so that Gorgeous Girl could pick up some embroidery thread for making friendship bracelets and this fell into my hands.

Gorgeous Girl has taken a liking to hand knitted face washers (wash cloths) and so I’m happy to indulge.

We also visited The Loopy Ewe, but I was very restrained and only picked up some new needles for myself. Gorgeous Girl made a beeline for the fabric (she has a fabric stash even though she doesn’t sew very often) and half a yard of this came home with us.

I wish the exchange rate had been a bit kinder to us as they had so much lovely fabric that I dearly wanted to bring home.

And that my friends is the sum total of crafty purchasing while we were in the USA. We won’t talk about the scrapbooking supplies I bought on return to Australia so that I could scrap the last few trips we’ve made…expect to see them appearing on layouts soon.

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Should I be worried…

…that Gorgeous Girl has twowords: ‘Daddy’ and ‘Gone’, but still won’t say ‘Mummy’?

The Gone is said in relation to food and bottle more often than it is in relation to Daddy, but even so…

It’s been a hectic week. We’ve had some changes in the care for Gorgeous Girl. The girl that has been coming to watch Gorgeous Girl didn’t turn up for work Monday and Tuesday (which made working from home with no childcare interesting) and then on Tuesday night she resigned. I’m happy for her. She has a new full-time job for one of the major supermarkets here, so financially and career-wise she’s better off, so it’s good for her.

While I was in the USA we had two people looking after Gorgeous Girl during the day, so I asked D if she’d be interested in taking over. She was,  and Wednesday and Thursday were great. D has a little boy about 10 months older than Gorgeous Girl and she had great fun chasing him around the house giggling hysterically. Then Friday she came to tell me that she needs to study for two weeks. So I am once again without a carer for Gorgeous Girl (for the next two weeks). It’s only 3 hours a day, 4 days a week, but it’s such a huge help, especially since housework gets done while Gorgeous Girl naps…

So D is bringing a friend over on Sunday to see if she can take over for the 2 weeks while she’s on study leave. Of course, all this would happen while Gorgeous Man is away 🙂

There’s been a bit of knitting going on, and I’m hoping to have a FO to photograph by the time the camera comes back from its travels with Gorgeous Man. I’m also hoping to get a bit of sewing done this weekend. I picked up a very cute pattern for pants, and some fabulous lime green fabric with red embroidered ladybugs while I was in the USA.

Our little breakaway from the guild group had it’s first meeting this week (with *gasp* an agenda!!!). We had a great time. We’ve decided to call ourselves the Free Radicals. Interestingly, with the exception of F we are all foreign. There are five of us so far, and we are thinking that a group of about 10 would work well. The other names that were floated were mostly foreign as well. Given the recent guild dramas, we are being very selective about who we invite. We just want people who are nice, and who want to sew without powerplays etc. We have some exciting plans, and I think it’s going to be fun, and Gorgeous Girl is more than welcome.

Well Gorgeous Girl is sleeping and there’s a pattern waiting to be traced off and cut out. This post was longer, but my internet died and I can’t remember what witty things I wrote…

Enjoy your crafting, and for those of my friends in the USA – happy voting!

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