I'm back

A good time was had by all - the weather could have been a little kinder but we still had lots of fun and, more importantly, there were no fallings out!

My in-laws are now safely back in Greece - they really enjoyed the cooler weather (it was 42 degrees when they left and 39 when they went back so rain was a relief) and loved seeing Lia. They will get to see her again when we go out there in five weeks time and we've also booked them as childcare for the February half term next year (I'm already working on holiday cover!)

I don't have any holiday snaps to show you as yet - I didn't have a camera so am at the mercy of those who did uploading their pictures. But I do have pictures of my holiday stash purchases from the quilting shop at the farm.

As well as the money I had saved up a lovely friend contacted Jo (shop owner) to organise a belated birthday gift of vouchers to spend so I got to go a bit mad!

So here's my birthday present purchases:

The blue fabrics are for the book bag I'm going to make for Lia, the christmas ones are for my (future) christmas Baby Jane and the rest are just because I liked them!

I also got a bit more pink fabric - there's another baby girl addition to the family due in October and I'd hate to run out! (please note the sarcasm)

I also got some girlie blue fabrics as Lia's school colour is royal blue and, whilst there aren't any rules about colour of bags, I thought I'd try and keep a little bit in their colour scheme:

I'm making a flannel quilt for Lia (you probably know that I keep adding it to my monthly goals to get it finished LOL) and I needed backing so I got four metres of this:

My Mum has been making comments about getting me to make her a bag so I told her to pick some fabrics. She'd originally said she liked one of the patterns I'd already made but she saw a bag in the shop that she preferred so I ended up having to buy the pattern for that one too. As MIL was with us I offered her a bag as well and not only did she choose the same pattern she chose the same fabrics as Mum. Spooky how similar their tastes are! Anyway, here are their fabric choices:

And here are the patterns for the two bags - the one for the Mums on the left and Lia's book bag on the right (sorry they're so dark!)

MIL also really loved a panel so I bought it for her to do as a gift (there'll be a lot of hand quilting so it won't be gifted this year). Here's the top half of the panel (it's very large, I couldn't get it all in one shot!)

And finally I got a gypsy gripper which is the pink thing in this picture - it suctions on to the ruler so you get a good grip, your fingers are out of the way of the rotary cutter and you get a nice even pressure. I love it, it makes cutting so much easier.

So quite a haul!

I now have five bags to make in the next month - the two for the Mums, Lia's book bag and PE bag and a bag for a friend at work who is leaving. The work friend wanted to pay for the bag but I bartered instead - she is fantastic at icing cakes so is going to give me a lesson. I've always wanted to learn how to ice cakes properly - every time I've tried it looks like I've buried several mice underneath the icing - so I'm happy for the swap.