Leprechauns

I'm now in Ireland, where I will be for probably the next 3 years or so, barring disaster! \o/

Yesterday was Moving Day (Part One). I packed up as much as I could into my car, got on a ferry, and now I am in Dublin. Today is Moving Day (Part Two) as I actually move into the house I have rented for the summer and unpack, and later this summer I will be experiencing Moving Day (Parts Three to ??) as I find a long-term place to rent, move all my worldly goods here from the UK (including the largest part of my sewing stuff) and settle in properly.

I made a big decision right before I left: not to bring my current sewing machine (a very basic Janome 2200XT that I bought when it was on sale for £89) but to bring forward buying a new machine by a few weeks. The new machine I've bought is the Janome 6260, which comes with a couple of things I've been wanting (an extension table and a walking foot) as well as various other bits and bobs. I'm super excited to get a better machine! Not that my 2200 was bad, AT ALL, in fact I would recommend it without hesitation to anyone looking for a first machine. However, I've kind of wanted to upgrade for the last six months or so for something with a little more range. Not going to lie, I really REALLY wanted a Janome 8200, and I probably could have afforded it if I waited until the end of the summer, but I have a hard time really justifying such an expensive purchase, no matter how much time I spend on my hobby. At any rate, I hope I get on with the 6260 all right. The reviews on the internet are pretty good. I guess we'll see! I should get it later this week, courier delivery permitting. In the meantime I'm going to allocate my daily sewing time mainly to tracing and adjusting patterns and cutting out, since I pretty much know exactly what I want to make over the next few weeks. I also need to do the last couple of things on my jacket for the Wedding Outfit.

Meanwhile, I've already managed to locate two of the allegedly reasonably large fabric shops in Dublin (Fabric Select in Parnell Street and the main Hickey's, which has fashion fabric as well as home dec, allegedly) although I didn't have time to do more than see the outside of each (and it was totally coincidental that I saw them at all -- I had to run into the city centre for various bureaucratic reasons and happened across both of them on my travels). They both looked pretty tiny from the outside, though. :| Requires more investigation, I think! I did manage to glimpse a reminder for the Knitting and Stitching Show that is in Dublin in early November, and which I wanted to go to in Harrogate last year but was too ill for at the time. I've noted that down on the calendar for later in the year, depending on how expensive the tickets are.