Sunday 19 August 2012

Heaven on Earth

  On Saturday afternoon I made an impulse decision to visit the Craft Fair at Newcastle the following day. A quick text to my kids dad and it was all organised. As he lives fairly close to where the Fair was being held, the kids would be spending the day with him.

   Next morning we were up bright and early to catch the 6:30am train. I love the early morning train rides (not the getting everyone organised for it though). I get in a solid 90 minute - 2 hour crochet block (I am 10 rows from completing my swap project!). The kids are always hyper as train rides usually mean movie's or visits with dad. They play games, sing Harry Potter songs, count Kangaroo's out their windows... then crash.


Five minutes after this was taken, Little Miss was fighting with her little brother.
  After dropping the kids with dad, I made it to the Fair. Now I must say it was the first time I have ever been to a craft fair. When I walked in those doors my heart was fit to burst! Aisles and aisles of crafty goodness! There was very limited crochet or crochet tools to be seen, but I really didn't mind.

Want to see what I brought?


Yes, My budget was blown to smithereens.Do I feel guilty? NOPE!
 Some booths were strictly no photography and others it was hard to get clear photo's because of it being so crowded.
 The first booth I stopped at was Stitchabout. I stayed at this booth for a very long time, admiring the finished works of art


and choosing my own purchases. It has been many years since I have done cross stitch and I have never tried embroidery.



I love this morning prayer.

A more realistic Aussie Christmas.


I thought this cute fella would be fun to test out.
  I enjoyed checking out the scrapbooking booths. Admiring all the little bits and pieces of adornments and tools. The cardmaking booth was facinating and I caught several demonstrations of different techniques. All the inserts for the cards were beyond gorgeous. But I knew they would make some very expensive hobbies, so admiring was as far as I was willing to go.

  I made it around to the Twiddleybitz booth and fell madly in love with their chipboarding projects. More Christmas decoration projects were brought.


Completed countdown calendar.
 

Christmas countdown calendar and cute townhouse.

Gingerbread House.


 I imagine I will be a regular visitor to their online store. Must check and see if they do giftcards, cause my list to santa is growing.

 I visited many stalls that sell yarn and thread. At one stall I saw a gorgeous scarf that was made out of three rows of cute little flower thread granny squares. It has now gone on my to-do wishlist. I petted many hanks of yarn that were totally gorgeous and totally out of my price range. Spent a ridiculous amount of time at one stall that sold alpaca yarn. Had a great chat to the stall owners about their alpaca's and how shearing time is a pain in the arse. I splurged ( conviently forgetting the whole day was a splurge) and brought my one and only yarn purchase from these funny and sweet people.
Aptly named. Sweet,spitty alpaca, you are going to make me an alluring scarf.
I have a love of owls. Of course everywhere I looked there were owls. I found some cute little felt owls that I am going to be using in my Special Art Project (did I mention I can't draw?) and a cute little owl magnet.


I brought myself some early Birthday/Christmas presents from the kids.(The joys of being a single mum).















I didn't buy these but they were pretty nifty!


Here is some beautiful textile art I admired done by some artists at 'Beneath the Southern Sky'. They really capture the essence of Australia.



















I had five heavenly hours at the Craft Fair, fully endulging my inner crafty child and basking in the contentment it has given me. Then it was time to pick up four tired children for the long ride home. I tried to hold on to that feeling as I was rudely thrust back into reality.







2 comments:

  1. Oh, I am so jealous! Your craft shows are definitely a better quality than mine! Thanks for the pictures! I love love the felt owls!!

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  2. I think if I ever go to another craft fair and it isn't up to those standards I will be very disappointed! It was brilliant. I adore the felt owls too :D

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