Gorgeous giveaway

My lovely friend Jo in Tassie is having a gorgeous giveaway. It closes today, so get your skates on and rush over to her blog to find out all about it. Anything involving Lynette Anderson's fabrics, Marg Low's patterns and Theodora Cleave's buttons has to be good, right?

Purse swap

The online group I belong to had a framed purse as our latest swap challenge.

And it proved to be more of a challenge than I had bargained for. I ordered a purse frame kit from the wonderful Nikki   in Melbourne and set to work.

The instructions were impeccable and all went well until it came to crimping the frame after the glue had set.

I got a little carried away with the hammer and the frame wouldn't shut - oops. I emailed Nikki for advice and she was so encouraging - she even offered to try and fix it if I couldn't. Wasn't that lovely - thanks so much, Nikki.

Normally if I stuff up I give up, but because I had committed to the swap that wasn't an option, so I ordered another frame and had another go - and this time everything was fine (maybe because this time I used pliers to crimp the frame, with cardboard in between to prevent scratches. )

The purse was for Kerry in Nundle, and the one she received (pictured bottom left) is in the same fabric as the bag I made her for Christmas.

And she made me the one at the top - it's in soft green wool with a pretty bowl of roses on the front - so gorgeous. Kerry's much smarter than I am - she chose a sew-in frame. She also sent a cute tape measure and little scissors and wrapped everything in pretty pink fabric.

Thanks heaps, Kerry. And thanks, Sarah, for organising another fun swap.

And speaking of swaps - I've signed up for Fiona-Marie's Great Global Christmas Swap and have a partner in the US, and for Chookyblue's Christmas swap (not telling you where my partner is from). Which means I will have to make more stuff, but before I do, I will have to clear up my sewing room. I started a tidy last week and just made a worse mess. At least I found some stuff I was glad to see again... Better get to it. Hope everyone is having a great weekend.