I just had to add...

... what a great day I have had. I haven't done one thing that I planned to do re this mornings blog - well not directly anyway...

P and I went out for a coffee to Ringwood - a suburb directly in line with ours but about a fifteen minute drive. It has a huge retail development as they all seem to these days. But the best bit was they have a large Salvation Army op shop - or rather they refer to it as a 'family store' - which means in essence, it is big enough to find anything there - and probably what you least expect to find. P and I went out separate ways once in the store. The up shot of this all is that I had some wonderful time. I came across a furnishing fabric sample with a palette of colours - 33 in all. The feature piece of fabric is a soft sky blue and is about 2' 1/2" by 2" 1/2" - now while the palette colours are only narrow pieces of fabric 7 1/2" X 4" - they would be good for a small border or a splash of colour. This cost me the princely sum of $2.50 - but folks, there is more - on the way out I noticed a jewelry bin with bagged bits and pieces. Now this is where I get very excited - they had some great bits and pieces - perfect in fact if one was contemplating life as a crazy quilter... 5 pieces for $3.00. So this shopping venture cost me all of $5.00.

We then went down to Eastlands which is the shopping complex - after a cuppa and looking gleefully at my stash I went off to Lincraft which despite their demise is still operating as a fabric store. Here I found some little strings of seed beads for 49c each - I bought an orange one and a white one. At this point I bought a beading needle - $2.20. Onto Riot Art and Craft - a craft store- where I spotted some more beads - perfect for a mermaid's tail- normally $5.00 for $2.00. My total spending $10.20 for the afternoon. I was one happy girl...

Now G @ Patra's Place and L @ Chloe's Place this is for you. I still had some time to pass this afternoon while I waited for P, so I went across to the newsagents to browse at their craft magazines. I picked up an English one called Stitch - with the Embroider's Guild. Well, you could have knocked me down with a , well a whatever - there as one of their spreads, was a full colour two page 'Chicken Scratch' article. I can tell you, I felt like I was being haunted!!!! The magazine was $12.95 and I was reluctant to spend that much otherwise I would have bought it. There were some very good photos and explanations of the varieties of this stitch - the person who wrote the article said she had learnt it while staying over here in Oz. Apparently, both we and our American stitching sisters, claim it as our own. But hey, let's not fight over it. Now in case one of you two ladies would like to buy the magazine it was No 34 - April/May edition. Not all newsagents have it - but most of the larger ones do stock it... Talk about coincidence - until the last week I thought 'Chicken Scratch' was well, what chickens do - scratch.

Again, all this blogging isn't getting any stitching done... But isn't it fun!! I am slowly adding to my side bar. Digging down deep in the 'hope chest' - it is amazing what I have packed away. And I have decided that I shall endeavour to get them all framed and hung...