Well, I did manage to find some things at the craft shop! How one of my best friends, Nikki, resisted buying anything is beyond me. That store is crammed full of stuff. There is barely room to move. I hope they never have a fire. Anyway, I found many things that I realised would be very useful. I found two bits of fabric - a lovely floral that will quite possibly fulfill the 10" square of florals that I have been collecting - and another, a Hoffman of wild rainbow colours in sort of stripes and dots and is really vivid. Then, I spotted some 505 basting spray, which I have wanted to try for quite some time. I also bought more white and black velcro - who knew you could use so much on various craft projects? I want to make some monkeys, and I need the white for their paws and ears and faces, so that you can do the "see no evil, hear no evil, speak no evil" positions if you so choose. In that section I found absolutely zero red rick-rack, so I'm glad I have a trade with Julia in MN! But I did find this blue crinkly plastic (cellophane?) which will make a nice noisy thing in a baby toy I want to make for one of my friends who is pregnant and due in October. I have some squeakers and jingle bells as well.... somewhere.... I also found some tiny black buttons, which will do nicely for the eyes on the "Three Little Friends" wallhanging I'm making for the triplets' birthday. They had 5 differently coloured zippers in a bag for 50 pence, so I bought one of those. I like to use them for kids' pencil bags, or the backs of large stuffed animals for overnight bags... I find that once I have zippers, I find a way to use them. Two cards of nice metal buttons, teapots and teacups, also jumped into the basket. I think I'll use them on one of those sweatshirt-jackets for myself. And to round it all off, I found a little set of stickers that say "baked for you specially" and that sort of thing, which will be nice when I give cookies and baked goods away. That was the haul from the craft shop. Then we went back to Nikki's and had a chicken/vegetable stir fry, many cups of tea and lots of chat. She's away to Lyon, France on Wednesday to be a nanny for 6 months and boy will I miss her. So we had to talk and talk and try and make up for some of that lost time! Oh, and I presented her with a late birthday present of a tessellating cushion cover. You can see photos at:
-- Jo in Scotland