Birmingham Blogger Meet-up

I went to my first blogger meetup! Very exciting, got to meet the lovely Marie of A Stitching Odyssey. I won't tell you all the details of the day, as you can find wonderful roundups from most of the attendees blogs (a list of them here, along with some sneaky pics of me... can you spot me and my not-yet-blogged changed dress?) I'm going to do a proper post on this as soon as I get a chance to get some close-up shots of it. I definitely made the right choice re-making though as I haven't stopped wearing it since it was completed.

Here are some pics  of the meal.. where we talked fabric, patterns and jobs (definitely not as exciting as dresses I think we all agreed).

There was a massive swap shop!

I got some brilliant finds, including the material that Amy of Almond Rock made a lovely dress with. My two swap finds were cotton viscose, which I haven't sewn with before but are lovely, soft and drapey, so I'm thinking some more sleeveless Mathildes maybe?

I bought some lovely fabrics in Barrys, but didn't get anything in the afternoon (one very full canvas bag was enough for me, seeing as I'm trying to stash bust, not stash build.

One fabric that will actually help with stash-busting is below, it's a gorgeous digital rose print in a thick cotton-type material (never very good at remembering to write down material contents when in the shop). I already had about half a metre of this material which I had found in a bargain bin... probably 3-4 years ago? It was never enough to make anything from so it has wallowed in the stash. But now I have bought a further 1 1/2 metres so my options are almost limitless. I say that, but of course I'm going to make another New Look pencil skirt so my options are limited by my imagination apparently. One problem is that the quality of the material is different (though the pattern is exactly the same) my bargain piece is mostly polyester with a bit of stretch, and as I mentioned before my new bit is cotton. I'm thinking of using the poly for the pockets, as it won't matter if this is different. However, if you can think of anything I should do with it... matching bag, purse, flamboyant headwear... I'd love to get some suggestions.

Thanks to Marie, Claire and Kat for organising. I know we all had an amazing time, and you made the nervousness of going to my first meetup a breeze. I have already had a lovely email from an attendee and we are planning a fabric shopping trip in the near future, very exciting! As well as some technical help from Hannah of madewithhugsandkisses and a SuperSweet Blogger award from Dreaming of Avonlea Thanks! Long may meeting continue! We were discussing on Saturday a possible meetup in Manchester, maybe taking over Abakhans? Anyone interested?