Back from Bath and ready for Christmas... well, the first bit is true.

Hello my lovelies I hope you haven't missed me too much! I am back from my shed in Bath - and loving the warmth and dryness that we all associate with having 4 walls and a roof over your head. And a heater.
Actually I had 4 walls and a roof. Although they were all wooden and one of the walls had a great big hole in it through which to sell my wares. And to see out of. To see the rain, the hail, the gale force winds... I kid you not, Bath was enjoying particularly seasonal weather for the 2 weeks I was there. The day I left, the day after the market finished, you can probably guess that the weather was beautiful - blue skies, sun, a crisp winter's day.
But loads of you hardy folk came out prepared for the weather and to buy buttons, for which I thank you all muchly, without you it would have been cold, wet, and....boring. And while I'm thanking people, I'd better say a quick thanks to my mates in Bath - for lizzie for bringing me lunch every day, minding the stand while I went to the loo and for nikki and chris for putting me up for the whole time (and putting up with me)and cooking me lovely meals and being my personal taxi service on a lot of occasions, also minding the stand and putting up with my moans about the weather and being cold and my sick foot (see pic). Ahhh, I lurrve my friends... (no vomit sounds please, it'd ruin a lovely moment.) On the subject of my sick foot (ok, I know we weren't talking about it but I like to go on about small injuries to make them feel more important...) it's not that bad really, I just pulled a muscle or something in the sole and couldn't walk. It was like an injury that you'd get from wearing nice high heeled party shoes, but no, I got it from a pair of flat boots and a march home in the rain. But thanks to the St Johns Ambulance man who was passing by and agreed to strap it up for me. (and thanks to chris for the strong painkillers, such a bonus to be staying with doctors)
Thanks too for Kate, the lovely customer who gave me my first christmas present of the year and cheered me up no end on a miserable day. Who made me think how nice people can be and therefore I phoned up my mum to apologise for being mean to her on the phone a couple of hours earlier.
On the whole it got me into a lovely christmassy feeling, all the little chalets (the correct term apparently for garden shed) with their twinkly christmas lights. The smell of gluwein and mince pies and hot dogs and other lovely things drifting up fromonce side, lavender from the other. People wrapped up warm with bags full of lovely presents.. I sold a whole load of my button brooches for christmas presents - they do make good presents, I wish my family and friends didn't associate me so much with buttons - it's a little too much of a cliche for me to give them button related presents.
Anyhow, I am back now, to lots of exciting new things, - a shipment of Japanese Fabrics this morning - very exciting I am going to make a melly & me little kitty I will show you when it's done - and at long last the Amy Butler fabrics will be delivered hopefully sometime next week. Hurrah!
Now I need to concentrate on finding more lush papers - I'm going to have a stack where the christmas papers used to be to fill up so I'd better get cracking. Any ideas?

Stash in Suitcases

Aaarrgh i am rubbish at this! I honestly dont know how people can do this everyday - I really wish I could, I totally mean to, but then one thing after another happens and suddenly it is months later and I am sooo behind in updating this. I cant even say I have been working on any cool projects, (the list of things in my head just keeps getting longer) I have just been uploading item after item to our website. But here and now, in the presence of all of you (anybody out there?) I hereby promise to update this blog every day...every other day...ok, at least once a week. Promise. Fingers and toes uncrossed I am not lying I promise.
So, apart from the website I do have a legitimate excuse this week. This week I have been internetless because we (mum, me & the lovely corinne) headed off to houston, texas (yee hah!) to bag me a cowboy. Ahem - sorry - I mean, to learn us some stuff about quilts. and oooh boy did we learn good. I had been warned about the excitement of the quilt market out there, but even so, nothing can quite prepare you for it. And the impact it has on your bank account. We definitely spent a lot of money we didnt have (the shop is still very early days yet and we are still paying off the initial startup costs) but I think we've bought a lot of very cool stuff. And most of it we ALL agreed was lush (if you know us, especially me and mum, you'll know that agreeing on something we like is something not to be taken lightly, when it happens, you know you have to just go for it, to hell with the money!)
So we have some gorgeous fabrics, loads from Japan and Korea (after working there it seems I can sniff them out a mile off and just have to have them) Amy Butler's fabric to go with the patterns (you've all been asking for it so I kinda had to, huh?






I can only find a pic of some ribbon we ordered in the japanese range - we ordered this with fabric to match... aw, it's so kitschy and cute I am gonna be in heaven the day this fabric turns up!



And check these out - perfect for a mix of japanese and Amy Butler fabrics?
These patterns are by Melly & Me and were so fresh and vibrant we all just gravitated towards them. These aussie girls really know how to part a girl with her money! We were sat on the floor of their stand picking out patterns for a fair while, getting totally in the way of everyone else, luckily they didnt seem to mind! Unfortunately we only got there on the last day so we missed out Magoo the Monkey's pattern (have to wait for that one I'm afraid) although we did get most of the others - including mad mozzie (check him out at the back, he's the one with the crazy eyes - ok, the one with the REALLY crazy eyes!)

We also went to classes, overslept for classes, giggled like naughty schoolgirls in classes, nearly fell asleep in classes and learnt some pretty good stuff in classes. On the Saturday 10th Corinne will be in the shop (she hasnt had enough of us yet yay!) showing you all some of what we learnt and some cool new products we brought back. We didn't quite have to pay excess luggage fees (phew!) but let me tell you, on more than one of the cases the weight was exactly on the top of the tip of the scales. And that's a skill worth having. Although i wasnt such a fan of the skill of filling cases to overloading at gatwick where a lovely worker there wrongly told us the bus to the carpark was downstairs when it was on the floor we were on. 5 cases filled with fabric down a large ramp is bad enough - but up???!! Good thing I've been working out and lifting all those boxes of buttons.
So now I have a list of things to make as long as my arm inspired by all I have seen - hopefully in the next couple of weeks I'll have some cool stuff to show you. But I'm sure I've said that before!