Collections

This weekend the Lifeline Bookfair was on in Canberra.  The Lifeline Bookfair brings together lots of second hand goodies - giving you a hall full of books, games, jigsaws, magazines, CDs, records, videos and everything else related.  I've really cut down on the number of books I buy as I reason that I can borrow them from the library, so now I head straight to the jigsaws and the craft magazines. 

Since taking up knitting I've been proud of my restraint in not establishing a yarn SABLE (Stash Acquisition Beyond Life Expectancy).  But as I was making a beeline for the craft magazines I realised that instead of having a yarn obsession collection I have a pattern SABLE! 

I love patterns, especially retro and vintage ones.  As well as being full of potential garments they are a little piece of social history.  I can spend hours looking through patterns (old and new) - the giant hair and oversize jumpers from the 1980s, the men's cardies and ladies twinsets from the 1960s and the sparkly disco singlets from the 1970s - they are all there and I love them all in their own way (though I would only wear a few!).

Many of the retro patterns I have were given to me by my mum- she kept all her patterns from when she was a keen knitter - but others are ones that friends have given me or ones that I have picked up in Op Shops or at book fairs. 

The couple of pattern books I bought on Saturday.

Some books from my stash.  I'm not sure what makes me laugh more - the grumpy lady with a gun on the 'Suddenly there's Scotch Mist' book, or the faces of the man on the 'Masculine Moods' book!

And of course - now that I have taken up sewing, I have also started a sewing pattern SABLE...!

What's your SABLE?