Friends make me happy

Today I received my first Christmas mail. I was so excitedand in a hurry I couldn't take pictures of opening it(we had just finished eating and I was going to drive into village with DH to mail my Christmas mail). It was from my dear friend Eileen from across the ocean. There was a sound to be heard from the envelope! A jingle!


This cute little bag was in the envelope, and a familiar piece of feedsack she had told about on her blog. In the bag were three cute owls she had been teasing us with, showing the bits on her blog, and I thought she was making some flowers!

There were also two lovebirds made of feedsack fabric, and some scented tea and a cinnamon stick to mix it with. I feel so lucky to have a friend like her! Now I need to clear a corner of the house and hang the owls there. The lovebirds are already hanging from the lamp above our dining table, jingling their silver feet.

A couple of weeks ago I visited the Elma Countryside Fair in Helsinki and poseted about it. I forgot to show something I bought there, a real bargain for 7 € only:

I have so much plaid in my stash and some more easily available from DH's closet that I thought I could use some patterns for the next plaid quilts I'm going to make in future.

At the fair there was also a woman who made decorations of straw. I posted the pictures, because I had sent some straw and some links to my friend Melanie in England, thinking she might be willing to give it a try. And there it is, in her blog, today, a genuine Finnish Christmas decoration made by her. Go and have a look, she always has such wonderful pictures. And if you want to know more about the himmeli decoration, click the link and you can see a Finnish page with a video of the basic idea.