I've done three swaps this year, two for supplies and one for handmade gifts. In my supply exchanges I've received tons of awesome buttons, so really pretty trims and ribbons, fat quarters that I never would have bought for myself but loved as soon as I had them in my hands, vintage bias tapes and scraps that I've done my best to make into lovely finished items.
My handmade gift exchange I sent off (in a huge rush) about a week before Christmas as soon as I realized that mail delivery was going to start slowing down and I needed to get my butt in gear. The rules of the exchange were one gift to spoil the person, one gift for the home and one gift to eat. (Don't worry, for the gift to eat my roommate offered to give me some outrageously tasty Holiday pastry balls (heh) to send so that my giftee was spared my baking.) I wish I had bothered to take better pictures, but I was flying to get them into the box.
The "for the person" gift was this granny bag. The handles are a brown suede lace and the fabric is a Kaffe Fassett print from my local quilt shop. I love a granny bag because they're so easy to throw a bunch of things in and tote around, but they're cute enough so you don't feel like your schlubbing a junk bag.
I ended up making two "for the home" gifts. I first made this fabric basket out of a creamy linen and (vintage, maybe?) floral print that I just LOVE, but I had such a small amount of scrap left over from the granny bag that I wanted to give the pillow a try. The envelope flaps on the back are the same print as the bag and the criss-cross on the front. It ended up matching so nicely and looked so pretty with the linen that I included it in the package.
I hope my recipient has as much fun opening these treats as I had making them.
I was just dropping by your blog to let you know that I received your package on Friday! My middle daughter immediately claimed the pillow (she loooooves purple even more than her momma) and it's happily residing on her bed with her stuffed animals. I laughed when I saw the bag because I had *just* bookmarked the pattern to make that style bag the day before! It will be perfect for a library tote. My daughters also claimed the fabric basket and are using it to corral all of their lotions, lip glosses, and whatnots so that they're not loose all over their dresser. My hubby loved the baked treats - he's calling them powdered doughnut balls... they were quite good with a cuppa tea! Thank you so much for my box full of goodies!! :)
ReplyDelete