Birthday Loot

I had a great weekend in Newark and NYC for my friend's wedding.  I went into the city for two short trips -- one on Saturday night and one on Sunday morning/afternoon.  Saturday I walked around the village with a fellow bridesmaid (and new friend).  We were exhausted from the wedding festivities (the food! the food!) but decided to rally and take the train in for a little visit.  We ate slices of pizza even though we swore we couldn't eat another bite.  I forgot how good NYC pizza is -- even at a little dive.  Then we walked over to Magnolia for some cupcakes which we saved for the morning.  I'm a huge fan of their cupcakes (and cupcakes in general).

Sunday, after the post-wedding brunch (more food!), I bid farewell to the bride and groom, old friends and some new friends and headed to Purl Patchwork.  The shop is even tinier than I imagined.  And I was prepared for small.  It's teeny-tiny.  It's also delightfully lovely.  I'll admit to feeling a bit overwhelmed.  The NYC yarn crawl was going on so the store was busy with people popping in from Purl a few doors down.  The customers were a mix of locals and tourists (I wasn't the only one taking pictures).  About fifteen minutes into my browsing, my phone rang.  I almost didn't answer it because I didn't recognize the number and I think it's rude to talk in a store, especially a very small one.  It was US Air, calling to let me know that my return flight home had been canceled.  I spent the next forty-five minutes standing outside the store, trying to figure out how I was going to get home.  I was nearly in tears.  After dreaming about visiting the store and lucking out that the post-wedding brunch was in Soho, there I was, spending half of my precious shopping time on the phone with the airline!  I called my husband and asked him to take care of it for me.  At that point, I couldn't deal with it and wanted to get back inside.  Inside I went and here's what I bought:

It may not look like much but I assure you that I spent all of my birthday money (and probably took an advance on next year).  The top two fabrics (the dots and stripes) are for an upcoming project that I've been excited about for the last month.  I can't wait to get started on it!

The splurges were these fabrics:

The one on the left is a Liberty of London cotton lawn.  The print is dandelions.  It's so lovely that I'm afraid to cut into it!  The center is "piglet" by etsuko furuya.  The right is a linen/cotton by Nani Iro with pretty turquoise and pale yellow flowers that look as if they were hand painted.

I couldn't resist these cute little notions: an iron-on patch and zipper pull from Putidepome.  The patch says "Bonjour" and the zipper pull says "Bonne Journee."

All in all, it was a fun trip to Purl Patchwork and part of me wishes I still lived a short Metro ride from the city.  A girl came into the store with her mother and said "Look, Mom -- that's a new print."  I asked her if she came to Purl a lot and she said yes.  I told her she was a very lucky girl.