Send a Little Love Swap 2017

I have just taken part in Tracy (at Mad About Bags') 'Send a Little Love' swap 2017.  I have taken part in this swap for several years and always enjoy it.  This year I was partnered up with Pilar from Cenefas de Flores who is from Barcelona.  We were given some guidelines with this swap:

"The idea of this swap is to send 5 things to include :

Some sewing or yarny notions that have a love theme

Something heart shaped or themed

Something deliciously edible

Something handmade

Something red "

So, we emailed and looked at each other's blogs, as usual, to pick up some clues and then we got making and swapping.  My parcel from Spain arrived and it was the hardest thing not to peek before grand opening day, although I did manage to leave it alone until then.  As you can see from the top photo, I had been sent the most beautifully packaged gifts.  I loved the floral tissue paper with the labels.

Here's what was inside...wow!  There was ribbon, lip balm, heart shaped decorations, rose scented flower petals, violet flavoured sweets, heart shaped buttons, pompoms, red flower linen material, two beautifully made cross stitched pin cushions/decorations, a fridge magnet and two recipes.

 I was, yet again, extremely lucky.

 She had been so generous.

 Aren't these absolutely stunning? I found out that the little black cat was inspired by Scruffy.

The wooden decorations will be added to my seasonal tree stash.  Thank you Pilar (she has put her post up about the swap too) at Cenefas de Flores so much for all the lovely gifts - they are fantastic - you were an amazing swap partner. 

So here's what I sent to her.  The heart swap things are on the left, including heart bunting, heart cutters, love heart sweets, heart ribbon and washi tape, a felt heart (of course), a heart mug and a polymer clay and gemstone bookmark.  On the right are the extras, a UK cross stitch magazine, some pearl earrings and some wooden pegs.

 Here's the heart things...

...and the extras.  I did wrap them in heart wrapping paper, but forgot to take a photo before I packaged it all up.  Thanks to my lovely swap partner and also to Tracy for doing the organising. 

Scruffy enjoyed playing in the wrapping paper, but of course he moved when he saw the camera and although he does actually have his eyes open in this photo (amazingly), he is studiously ignoring looking at the camera.

Send a Little Love Swap 2016

I recently took part in the Send a Little Love Swap organised by  Tracy at Mad about Bags .  I have taken part in this swap for a few years now and 'met' some lovely people. This year, I was partnered up with Lyn from Australia, who, serendipitously, I had been partnered up with for this same swap last year.  I emailed her to find out whether she was happy to swap with me again, and luckily, she said she was.  This gave us a challenge - to find some different things to send each other.  We did our shopping and making and sent off our parcels on the same day.  Her parcel arrived with me last Tuesday but mine didn't get to her until today!  (I managed not to open my parcels until I knew she had received hers). A lovely scent came from the parcels - tea tree? eucalyptus? All would be revealed...

 Well, goodness gracious, Lyn had been so generous again.  There was: (take a deep breath!) a lovely hand made bag with the loveliest happiest sheep embroidery on it, some wool for felting, a Felting magazine, a Welcome sign with hanging hearts, a wildflower calendar, some flower seeds, some ginger teddy bear sweets, an embroidered heart, a seedpod perfumed oil container (more about this in a minute) a teabag/tea strainer stand, a heart cutter and a card with a heart brooch on it.

 The teabag/tea strainer stand is already in use.

I shall have a go with the seeds this summer - that will be an interesting experiment.

 The perfume container is actually made from a Banksia seed pod, and had been hand turned by a local craftsman.  It has some eucalyptus essential oil in it and smells lovely.

You can see a hairy texture on some parts of this fascinating container.

 The little embroidered heart is beautifully made - just stunning!

 As is the sheep bag.

 I love the happy sheep and again, the embroidery is superb.  A HUGE thank you to Lyn, who has again been so generous and has sent me the most wonderful gifts.

 And what did I send her, you may be thinking?  Some ribbon and material (as she does lots of sewing), a mug and some lovely English Breakfast tea from a very nice tea shop in the city, a Lincolnshire Plum Bread tea towel, a little ceramic 'L' tile made by a local ceramicist, and a black and white stripy felt heart, some earrings, and two bracelets made by me.

 The mug says I 'heart' Lincoln.

There were also some magnets, a hanging heart decoration with little bells and some heart pegs.

 There's a closeup of the memory wire bracelet, with pearls and black and white gemstone chips...

 And the macrame bracelet.

Here are my parcels ready to be put in the box.  I have put a few more photos of what I sent as Lyn doesn't have a blog, so this is for both of us.  Thanks to Tracy for organising the swap and to Lyn for being the most amazing swap partner for the second time!

Send a little love swap 2015

 I have recently taken part in the Send a Little Love Swap organised by Tracy from Mad About Bags and was partnered with Linny from Australia.  As is usual, we emailed to find out a bit about each other's hobbies and likes/dislikes.  Linny didn't have a blog, so I needed to ask lots of questions! As part of the swap, we needed to send a minimum of 5 things; something heart shaped or themed; something delicious; something handmade; something red. We made and bought and posted the parcels.  I received a beautifully wrapped mountain of goodies!

 Scruffy found the parcels almost as exciting as I did and I had trouble removing them from him!

Here are all the unwrapped parcels.  Wow! (Can you see the kangaroo keyring?)

 I had been sent an apron, some wildflower seeds, a calendar featuring Australian wildflowers, some mango green tea and an Australian felting magazine.  Linny had obviously done a lot of homework on my hobbies.

 There was a lovely heart shaped pan...

 and some beautifully made bags, some handmade felt and a felt ladybird to make.

 The bags were really lovely.

Heart shaped material and a heart button.

Inside, there were lots of pockets.

 The zipped bag was covered in pawprints which even featured on the inside too.  I was delighted by all the gifts, as you can imagine.  A HUGE thank you to Linny for being such a generous and wonderful swap partner and thanks to Tracy for organising.

 So, here's what I sent.  Yes, a felt heart and some earrings and a key ring all featured.  I also found a heart bag and a felt heart garland, sweets, buttons, ribbons and postcards. At the local art sale, a few weeks ago, I bought the little white glass heart which had been made by a local glass artist and that was included too.

Here are my parcels ready to be packaged.  (Unfortunately, in adding the Maltesers to the parcel, I hadn't taken into account the temperatures in Australia and on arrival, they had melted.  Apparently they were solidifying in the fridge. Oops!)  It was a great swap to take part in and I really enjoyed 'meeting' Linny, albeit in a virtual way.

Send a Little Love Blog Swap

 I signed up to take part in Tracy's (from Mad about Bags) 'Send a little love swap' in January and was partnered with the lovely Melanie (from The Patchwork Robin). We needed to send a minimum of 5 things, including a heart shaped/themed thing, a delicious edible, something handmade and something red. As is usual for a blog swap, we emailed each other to arrange dates for the swap and to find out whether there was anything we shouldn't include.  Then we got on with making, choosing and buying.  Swaps were duly wrapped up and posted and then received.  Here's what Melanie sent me...

 ...beautifully packaged in red and gold.  It was so exciting!

 What was inside those parcels? A beautiful hand made notebook cover around a very useful notebook, chocolates and jelly hearts, a little red bucket containing some CK tissues and some pink heart ribbon, a white heart decoration and two sweet little heart-shaped tart tins.

Here's a view of the inside of the notebook.  I was so lucky to receive such lovely things and would like to say a HUGE thank you to Melanie for her generosity. So, what did I send her?

Red heart cotton material and heart pins, ribbon, buttons, washi tape, notebook, some flower seeds, stickers, heart cutters, a heart ceramic magnet, some hot chocolate and some chocolates, a bracelet, some earrings, a felt heart and a polymer clay heart.  I did wrap the presents in heart gift wrap, but forgot to take a photo.
Thanks to Tracy for organising the swap, which was great fun and thanks to Melanie for being a great swap partner.