Mel's Own Place

It's totally to die for - so perfectly sewn together with hand appliquéd whimsical flowers and tiny red hand quilting.  I love the colors as well as the design.  The scallops, polka dots, plaids, yellow and red, the detail quilting - priceless!!

A bit more about Sandy, she and I were paired together for a fat quarter swap in May. I found out she is from Buenos Aires, Argentina which was of particular interest to me since my parents are living there too! I was excited to talk about her country and the area a bit. Sandy and I have continued to chat via email and she's helping me with a project - more on that later!

Part One of my OP winnings from Natalie of School of Crafts (a great blog by the by!) A delightful collection of six fat quarters from Sew Mama Sew! These juicy FQs arrived two days ago (shipped directly from Sew Mama Sew). Urban was excited to, he said "YEAH!! We won them?? I love them!!" I've taught him well the virtues of color and cotton! Part Two of my OP winnings came yesterday - I got this darling ensemble! A very useful apron, it has three compartments, I'm thinking one for scissors, one for threats and one for CHOCOLATE!! And a matching towel, to wipe up the melty chocolate! (NO WAY, I'm NOT going to use the towel, except as a decoration to my studio!) ThAnkS Natalie!! No, it hasn't gone unnoticed to me that this duo is from the very SAME fabric I used to make TESSA's Market Bag out of! Hmmm, it may be a while more before Tessa gets her prize!

I personally know Tessa!!!! We met through our blogs and have been communicating via emails. Wait . . . this is great!! YOU know Tessa too . . . she is the one I bought those darling sanitary bags from!! Remember? I'm sure she's going to love being known as the sanitary bag lady! My hubby formatted a spreadsheet in Excel and programmed it to accept just those who had left contact info, then I went to random.org and plugged in my numbers. I wanted to make sure the pick was generic, and totally random. It spit out the a number which coincided with Tessa's entry!!!!! I had posted once about how reading her blog inspires me to 'let go' of rules and just freely create. THanKs to ALL who participated!! I enjoyed 'meeting' so many creative people!

Big mail day here!

Guess who was in my mailbox on Saturday? My fun blogger friend Jane! She and I arranged to swap Christmas Cottages and there it was, beautifully constructed in bright cheery colors! Jane also added a special treat in the form of two whimsical charm packs! What a gal - huh? I also found my personalized stationary set I won from Natalie's Fall Soiree. Natalie posts about several entrepreneurial people who promote their web businesses by donating giveaways all during the month of November. My stationary set came from Mandy of Popsqually & Co. I was able to pick the colors, style and font for my stationary. Mandy also does announcements, personalized items, gift tags and more!

A couple of packages, just for ME!! Sherri's Christmas Cottage arrived safely! She even snuck in a charming Christmas Pot Holder! Don't you just love the colors?? Perfect Sherri, THANKS!! Of course I'll use the pot holder as a decoration in my studio as I am allergic to cooking!! ;) This little, darling, soft, owlie is from Nikki at Whimsy Love . I won it in one of her giveaways! She has plenty more in her Esty shop! I have a lodge pole pine (fake) behind me when I am sewing and I put all the homemade ornaments I acquire through the years on that tree for a permanent display of my love for all things homemade! I have become friends with a neat gal who does all the artsy stuff that I'm afraid to do. I live vicariously though Tessa and her blog: How to Make Art!! She has a whimsical vibe she puts into her art that I love! Tessa is also 'walking' me (and everyone else who reads her blog) through the steps of creating 'art' type art. I snapped up a couple of prints from her Esty shop for my husband to give to me for Christmas and Tessa let me pick a print as a gift from her! In Tessa's Esty shop I also found a wonderful companion to some gifts I'm going to be giving this year to my friends who sew. I'm not going to show the present now, because some of my readers will be receiving the little gift for Christmas and I don't want to ruin the surprise! Thanks to Sherri, Nikki, and Tessa for making my day brighter!!