Happy Birthday to me!

Here I am in the skirt I posted about last time.
Today is my birthday, and it's been a very good day. Plus I got fabric! My lovely husband got me a gift certificate to Gail K Fabrics, which is a magical and wondrous place. It's not a very big fabric store, but it's got fabric stacked quite literally to the ceiling all over the place. It's packed very full. Kind of an organizational nightmare, but quite a place for a fabric junkie like me! Surprisingly, I haven't been there since before I got married (so, probably 2000), when we went and picked the fabrics that my mom used to make my dress (and the bridesmaid and flower girl dresses. My mom rocks.) Ever since I've gotten into sewing clothes, I've been meaning to go down there, but it's just far enough (and has weird enough hours) that I haven't made it. So today I got a gift certificate (yay!) and the time to go explore. And this is what I left with:
Okay, admittedly, this cost more than just my gift certificate... but actually, the prices are really not bad for what you get. And I'm really excited about them all - the current plans include dresses for the girls (the purple), shorts for the girls (the pink and green), shirts for me (the stripes, the butterflies, and the green dots), a swimsuit cover up (the blue dots), and well, actually, I really don't know what I'm going to do with the other two, but they're absolutely beautiful. So that was a very fun trip. (It's just as well that it's a little annoying to get to, though - I'd be utterly broke if it was closer!)

Then this evening, my mom and sister and her family came over for dinner, which was a lot of fun. Iestyn has gotten very into records lately, and today he went digging around in our crawl space for all my old 45s. So we had a fabulous time listening to some of them - I love this picture of my nieces dancing:
Plus I got some more crafty gifts - gift cards for Joann's/Intown Quilters, plus these:
The Dressmaker's Technique Bible and Vogue Sewing, both of which look super useful in my continued clothing sewing. Plus Julie made me this adorable bag, which is fab because I'm kind of tired of my purse, but I haven't been in a purse sewing mood. So now I can switch without having to actually make one!

All in all, a very good birthday. :)