One day a few months ago on a craft blog crawl, I came across Crafting Japanese, a blog which collects details on Japanese craft books and the items that people have made from them. I looked and looked and picked the books I liked best and ordered three of them from YesAsia.com
After many days of thumbing the pages, to select what to make first, I decided on a bag from the book Machine Made Patchworks.
Most of the fabric is William Morris Prints by Rose and Hubble, maybe this will be a Christmas present for one of the girls …… or maybe I will keep it for msyelf 🙂
Well actually all the Asian Studies girls bar me finished this year and we all passed our subjects with flying colours, I got two credits and two distinctions 🙂
So Andrea had a happening shin dig at her place on saturday night. Drinks, Pizza, old friends, new friends, Midori and Kiwi fruit, cameras and of course who could not forget Mr Berg 🙂 Go check out the photos
The party was the best I think I have ever gone too, small space, lots of talk, lots of drink, lots of laughs 🙂 Love ya Andie 🙂
Helen in all her craftiness is slowly making gifts to be given out and Andrea’s was the first to be completed so she got hers last night. The bag is made from denim and Japanese cotton, the pattern is based on Amy Butler’s Nappy Bag but a whole lot smaller and less pockets.
I also learnt how to free motion machine quilt on this bag, I used something like 3 or 4 bobbins doing the quilting on both sides of the bag.
Like most young Australians who listen or have listened to Triple J, I have always known who Ben Lee was but I didn’t really know him till last night. Before Awake is the New Sleep was released and he scooped the Arias, he was just the young Sydney guy, out in the background doing his own thing, who released his first solo album when he was what 16/17?, went out with Claire Danes for ages, got his start with the likes of Sonic Youth and the Beastie Boys. Sure his 1999 album Breathing Tornados was a huge success and Cigarettes Will Kill You is one song we can all sing/hum, but Awake is the New Sleep changed all that, all of a sudden he was everywhere and on all the radio stations and even though I didn’t real know his songs, I was so proud of him and his band for surprising us all. So like any new discovery/re-discovery, I headed back to the beginnings and started listening to the early stuff and wondered why I had not started earlier, I have known who is was since what 1998 but it took me to 2005 to actually start getting into him. I don’t know. Perhaps it is the swing I am noticing in my tastes to music for which the focus is the vocals not how loud or fast the lead guitarist can play.
But back to the actual point of the story, so last night two of my bestest buds (Andrea and Same) who previously didn’t know each other but are chumming it up now and I met at The Arena to see Ben Lee, Sparkadia and a solo artist who I can’t recall the name of. Both the support acts were fantastic and then came Ben and the band :), for what was to be one night of a big sing-a-long, Patience from The Grates popping in for a song, lots of happiness and pure fun, chatting about songs, playing songs from all the records and lots of flowers 🙂 ( I thought they were fake but when I got one at the end I noticed how real my daisy is, which is currently in a flower press 🙂 because that my friend will be one hell of a scrapbook page).
As a final little act, I can solemnly say that I have never acted like a boy crazy adolescent girl in my life before but it is safe to say last night that changed, I swear he is getting cuter and cuter as he gets older and it has to be noted, we do share the same birthday albeit seven years apart 🙂
15 hours later, I can assure you that we still have big grins plastered on our faces 🙂
The layout I did last night and the one I did this afternoon, click on them to see them bigger 🙂 I am off to see Ben Lee tonight with two of my bestest buds 🙂
As some of you may know I have recently had no real interest in scrapbooking but yesterday I printed off some photos and then this evening I sat down to have a little play and popped out this one. As long as I don’t spend too much time chatting to people on Messenger I am a relatively quick scrapper, as an image will pop into my head fairly quickly after selecting photos and cardstock and finish most pages in about 30 minutes.
AS part of my anti-boredness campaign, I rented a few DVD’s out the other day, I picked up Kinsey(which was so not what I expected), Crazy/Beautiful (oh the Romeo and Juliet story line set in teen angst, really liked this movie, seemed so real, the turmoil that Carlos had between his family and Nicole, etc etc good stuff and well Jay Hernandez the actor playing Carlos is pretty nice looking), Beyond Borders (really liked how this movie spanned the three events over the period of ten years and well the scene in the beginning where Clive Owens comes barging in just sets the whole scene) and finally Napoleon Dynamite(I got this out after hearing so many people rave on about it but I have to say I didn’t really think it was much of a decent thing, sure it was different to most films but still so not what I felt it was cracked up to be).
The Patchwork Tree had a sale today so I popped on down to add to my stash, I picked up some Amy ButlerCharm fabrics as well as some more Japanese imports, oh I wish I could find that company’s website as I would be in heaven.
Like most young Australians who listen or have listened to 
