At the end of last week I got a gorgeous box of fabric and notions from Sooz in Thailand. I love reading her stories about life in Chiang Mai, and seeing the way she uses local material in her craft, so I am very excited to get my hands on some of the things she uses! It's really inspiring to see some fabric that's so different to what's in the shops here - rather than being printed this has woven designs and slightly more muted colours. 
And the trims and bobbles are great - lots of elephant designs.
I'm now trying to work out what to use it all for - the pile of fabric in the cupboard is rapidly growing, and I have a bunch of ideas in my head, but actually finding the time to get the sewing machine out is difficult.
When I have sewn recently, it's mostly been little bags from this book and some zippered pouches... this tutorial is fantastic and makes it really easy, even if you hate zippers like me. The two-tone totes and the smaller one are from the Japanese book, and were lots of fun to make - they are a good size, big enough for a book but not too huge. More photos here.
