When not sewing....buy more fabric!

I have hardly sewn a stitch in the last two weeks, which is highly unusual for me. Sadly my father in law is critically ill and my husband has been interstate visiting him, so it's just been me and the kids. Let me tell you it's exhausting looking after kids by yourself - single parents you definitely have my respect. And since my sewing room is above our garage which is separate to our house I can't go in there when the kids are finally in bed asleep. But I haven't been completely slack - I have cut out and pinned four projects and have unpicked several previous makes for a reworking (ie fixing up previous shockers!) so hopefully I can start being more productive soon.

But like any frustrated sewist who isn't sewing I've instead been buying more fabrics and adding to my already extremely long to do list. In order to shame myself in to using them soon and not just adding them to the stash I thought I'd confess here on my blog.

First up I bought several pieces from fabric.com because I discovered the postage cost for four pieces wasn't much more than it was for one (around $25). I haven't purchased from them before so fingers crossed the quality is decent and it doesn't take too long to deliver.

I have been searching in all the fabric stores here in Sydney for a dark denim chambray to make a shirt, but have only been able to find really light blues. So I purchased this Robert Kaufman dark indigo chambray:
 

 

image via Pinterest

image via Pinterest

After seeing so many great pieces during Jungle January I decided to buy my first ever piece of animal print fabric, this leopard print cotton that I intend to make a pencil skirt:



image via Pinterest

I also bought some navy blue and white jumbo polka dot cotton fabric (well I hope it's more navy blue than the colour of the photo below) also to make a pencil skirt:



image via Pinterest

The final piece is this mint green and white mini polka dot cotton possibly to make something for the kids but more than likely a shirt for myself!



Image via Sportscraft

Then of course there's been a little bit of real life shopping. I broke my cardinal rule of never buying anything from Spotlight full price because I saw some gorgeous tan and black chevron stripe cotton Japanese duck fabric that only had a little bit left on the bolt. I didn't want to risk it selling out so I bought it then and there - and of course less than a week later they had a 30% off sale! It wasn't too expensive though, and I do love the fabric so no harm done I guess. I've already cut this out so hopefully I'll have something awesome made soon from it:

And the final act of fabric gluttony occurred a few weeks at a pre sewing bloggers lunch meet up at the Remnant Warehouse. I swear I wasn't going to buy anything (unless I found the mythical dark chambray) but after I spotted some bizarre but cute ponte knit with puffy giant polka dots and some dark charcoal 100% wool suiting both for only $9.95/m I decided to pick up a few metres of each.

I was going to end by saying I think that's enough fabric purchasing for now (ha! as if), but I've just received an email from one of the ASG ladies revealing that the Fabric Cave is having a sale on the 4th - 11th April. Their prices are insanely good value to begin with, so I cannot imagine the bargains that will be had at one of their sales. And since I dropped off a huge bag there recently I'm sure I can rehome some other pieces instead!

And a big hello to Gabrielle from Up Sew Late - we met up today in the city to take some photos of her lovely new silk top and had a great chat/rant about sewing, blogging and children who are too unfocused to learn how to sew from their mums. I love meeting up with bloggers and fellow sewists in real life, I feel like we're all part of a secret society!