Secret Santa Gifts Unwrapped!

Yesterday, being Christmas Day, I could unwrap my Secret Santa gifts. The first one I opened was from my SS in the Knit for Charities swap. And this is what I got...some fat quarters in the most beautiful colours. My SS knows what I like, clever lady!! ( My SS reads this blog!!) Thank you Secret Santa! 

  Now I was Secret Santa to another member of K4C and I sent her a knitted wreath that I had bought at our Parish Christmas Markets...

  Now back to the unwrapping....

Then I opened the parcel which had come from Michell in New Zealand. Michell was my SS in the Chookyblue SSCS.

And look at the lovely table runner that Michelle made me...the fabrics are gorgeous...the background fabric has gold flecks in it...beautiful! 

And Michelle popped in some other goodies, just to spoil me!

I love the Manuka Honey hand lotion and always buy a supply when I visit NZ, so I'm thrilled to try the lip balm! Thank you so much Michell! 

I was SS to Tonje in Norway. Tonje stitches but she also knits and that's what I focused on when I was deciding what to make her. Yes in the Chookyblue swap the items must be handcrafted by the Secret Santa. I love making Judy Newman's Dillybags and as I have a stash of 'knitting themed fabrics' I combined the two! By stalking around Tonje's blog, I established that she rather liked mice. So now I was combining those 3 bits of info. And this is what I came up with...

Knitting themed fabric hexies...

And a stitched 'Lily Mouse' from a design by Threads on My Socks, on a hexagonal panel appliquéd to the bag.

But that's not all! 

I forgot to take a photo of the two skeins of hand dyed Aussie wool that I placed in the bag. So next time I was at Knitch (a yarn shop in Paddington, Brisbane) I took a photo of the types of yarns I bought for Tonje.

Some sock yarn...

And an eight ply yarn...

Hopefully both ladies who had me as their SS were pleased with their gifts. I certainly loved mine! 

All this talk of Naughty vs Nice...it's all subjective surely?

When I get together with friends who stitch, do patchwork etc we often describe how we keep buying fabric even though we don't necessarily need it...but we want it! And we joke that we've been naughty and bought new fabric/kits/ expensive threads etc. 

Remember a few months ago I was 'naughty' and instead of just buying a few fat quarters from Jodie Carleton's fabric range, Backyard Circus, I bought a bundle of fat quarters of the whole range...very indulgent...but I loved the brightly coloured, quite whimsical range of fabrics?

Such fun fabrics...I've fussy cut elephants to make I Spy hexie flowers and plan to cut some squares to have a 'play' as well.

Now Jodie had a stand in the 2015 Houston Quilt Show, and at that show she released her new fabric range...2 ranges in one year no less!!! For quite a few months she had 'teased' readers of her blog, Vintage RicRac and followers of her Instagram account, with photos of items made with this new range. She said that the range wouldn't be released in Australia until early 2016. 

But no...Jodie and the rest of us got a big surprise because the range, Cat's Pyjamas, was released last month. And I was 'naughty' again. Yep! Bought the bundle again! :-)

I love these cat faces!

This latest bundle didn't include the doll panel...so I'm thinking about that!

There's something about that little kitty dressing gown! Lol.

So there you have it...fabric buying naughtiness personified! :-)

And I have!!!!