VISIT US AT THE MELBOURNE CRAFT & QUILT FAIR

We're excited about next week's Craft & Quilt Fair at the Melbourne Exhibition Centre from Thursday 23rd - Sunday 26th July.

Come and say hi to us at Stand G28. We look forward to meeting some of our regular and new customers!

I have been working hard to upload many "NEW" fabrics into our shop and there are loads more Japanese fabrics and designer collections still to come! We have a large stand at the fair and will have many of our fabric collections and pattern ranges available. If in Melbourne, take this wonderful opportunity to see and touch the fabrics, view made up pattern samples and brand NEW fabric ranges and pick up a few sale items. Yes, we will also be filling our popular remnant baskets full of old and new goodies!

Shannon Lamden aka Aunty Cookie will be joining us again with many of her lush hand printed fabrics available for purchase!

Well done Kristen on your rockin matryoshkas making it on the front cover of 'The Craft Fair Friend' here!

Feel free to email me if you are after any particular fabrics from our store and I will do my best to have them available on our stand.

1st five comments get a $10 gift voucher to spend at our stand during the show. First five commentees please email me so I can return email your vouchers to you! Hope to see you there!

NEW Heather Ross Far Far Away

Above image courtesy of Heather Ross

The much anticipated Heather Ross, Far Far Away collection is in store now and it really is exquisite! Printed on the softest double gauze, this collection will look amazing for adult and children's apparel such as skirts and blouses or make a stunning quilt, doona cover or cushions!

If you love this collection do not delay as it is deemed to be extremely popular and there have been many queries as to when it will arrive.


My appologies for the delay in announcing the June Handmade Inspiration Gallery winner! We have recently had large volumes of new arrivals and more to upload onto our website over the next couple of weeks. Winner for the month of June and July will be announced early August! Customer entries for both months will be uploaded into our gallery soon.

Creative Customer May Competition Winners

And the winners are......





Melinda sent me this pic of her fabulous fabric covered boxes that were a gift for her mum. I immediately loved them and I think it shows perfectly how stunning fabric can make anything just like an ordinary box beautiful. Boxes, lamps, buttons, tin cans...... the skies the limit!

Pop over to Melinda's new shops here and here. Way to go Melinda!

It is always exciting to see what our customer's make with our fabrics on the other side of the world! I just love this Japanese fabric I call 'Animal Tea Party' and thought Nicole from Texas did a marvellous job with her funky kids palazzo style pants! Visit Nicole's lovely store here.

Thank you to our customers for their inspiring entries last month and I look forward to receiving more competition entries for our June gallery comp.

We have also recently added loads of new fabrics to our store with more to come in the next few weeks so keep an eye on our 'new arrivals'.

NEW Japanese Fabric Imports - Nina's Sewing Factory & Nani IRO 2009

A HUGE long weekend and 15 large boxes later I have finally stocked our shelves with Japanese Goodness!! Here are some of the gorgeous double gauze and linen cotton blends which I hope you enjoy as much as I have been! I would love to find out your favourites in this bunch.

I just love this unique design 'Girly & Bitter' by japanese textile designer Asuka as part of the Nina's Sewing Factory collection. An amazing watercolour design running along one selvedge with a bird on chain design running upwards on a lovely soft double gauze. This would be perfect for unique fashion pieces such as dresses, skirts and blouses for both children and adults.

Here is not a particularly good shot, but a shot none-the-less of Girly & Bitter from selvedge to selvedge.

I can't tell you how excited I was to receive the NEW Nani IRO 2009 fabrics... it was like Xmas opening these boxes! Fuccra Rakuen (above) is a gorgeous design on a linen / cotton blend perfect for home decorating items such as cushions, bags, and would even make a stunning skirt.

My absolute favourite is the same design but in a beautiful aqua. My plans for this beauty is to run the full width of this one down the centre of a king size doona cover with either white, latte or lemon on either side... mmm decisions?? Fuccra Rakeun is also available in white. Love it, Love it, Love it!

Another of my favourites is Fuukei in a colourway I like to call 'earth' for obvious reasons. Another great all-rounder but particularly well suited to homewares. Here is a shot from the Nani IRO website as a tablecloth providing a great shot of the overall design... very nice!

Below is Fuwari, which having little girls I think would be amazing made up into little quite simple style dresses.


Fuwari, Pocho, Muji and a couple of the colourways in Fuukei are a beautiful 100% cotton double gauze which is incredibly soft to the touch. For those not familiar, double gauze is simply two layers of gauze joined together providing a fabric that is not too sheer. Its open weave properties make it lovely and light to wear with the bonus ability to breathe.

Many designers I think are heading in the direction of double gauze fabric due to its versatility for clothing as well as some light homewares such as linen, cushions etc. Designers such as Etsuko Furuya and Heather Ross whose NEW fabric collections are also a double gauze are considered along with Nani IRO to be a work of art on fabric and I believe will also be popular as wall art either behind a frame or over a canvas. I cannot wait to receive the Echino and Far, Far Away double gauze collections in store soon!

Rounding up, if you are feeling inspired by the fabrics above why not pop over here for some fabulous free online patterns - only drawback is they are in Japanese but can be worked out if you are a master at following drawings! I hear there is also a fantastic pattern by Liesel that appears in the current issue of Sew Hip proving that gorgeous fabrics like Nani IRO and amazing patterns like Oliver + S = Stunning Result!

Aunty Cookie "NEW" Papercuts Design

Shannon's latest gorgeous 'papercut blooms' and coordinating 'papercuts' design was Hot! Hot! Hot! at the Stitches & Craft Show and I am so pleased to have it in the store.

Available in raspberry on birch and grey on black (divine!) 'papercuts' is a great all-rounder for craft, sewing and light home decorating projects. I also think this design would lend itself to lovely applique as the papercuts range in size from large to small and would suit either adult or children's apparel.

'Uptown Girl' - NEW Make it Perfect Pattern

Toni Coward for Make it Perfect has outdone herself with her latest sewing pattern NEW release Uptown Girl!

This gorgeous, reversible hooded jacket is a must have for your children to wear this winter and uses a light weight pellon between your two fabric choices for added comfort and warmth. This very stylish jacket is bound to turn heads down the street!

*NEW PATTERN SPECIAL* - We are offering 10% off this fantastic pattern for the first week only and can be purchased here for $15.75 until 10.30pm 19th May.

Happy Sewing!

Creative Customer April Competition Winners

Thank you all for your April submissons to our Handmade Inspiration Gallery!

All submissions were fantastic as usual, but there was something I just loved about the sweet little clutch that Megan made above. I am particularly fond of the japanese 'my folklore' fabric collections and just loved the style, design, gorgeous button and size of this clutch purse.

Please visit our gallery regularly for wonderful inspiration from our customers, find out about some of their businesses and to read further info on how you too can enter our monthly competition.