The Great Gift Exchange-the Big Reveal

Today, SmallSmall and I ventured out to the wilds of Devizes, to meet the lovely Becksie and Lizzie from the great blog A year without supermarkets, for our Great Gift Exchange.

We had originally intended to make presents that could be posted, but following a little bit of e-mail chatter, Becksie and I decided that it would be lovely to meet up ‘in the flesh’.

To avoid boring you, I will refer you back to the original posts here and here for The Rules, and the 3 questions that we each asked each other, and our answers.

The lovely hubby and I scratched our heads, and came up with several possible ideas before hitting on this:

A Monopoly board clock!

I have to admit to having become a bit of a hoarder over the last year or so. I had seem quite a few things on Pinterest made from board games (see my Board Games board here), and so when I see some in charity shops, I snap them up (much to hubby’s delight…) A couple of months ago I saw a Monopoly set in a charity shop for the bargain price of £2.50, and when I got it home, there were nearly 2 whole sets squeezed into one box-yay! I also had picked up a couple of secondhand clocks at car boots as I have yet another Pinterest board with loads of ideas for cool and funky homemade clocks (you can see the clock in this post here)

I wanted to make something for the whole family, rather than just for Becksie, so a Monopoly clock seemed ideal. And to tie in with their ‘family colours’ we used the pink £500 notes, and the orange £100 notes to go around the edge!

I have to confess that actually, the lovely hubby made this.

But it was kind of a team effort (I did all the buying…). And hubby put the stopwatch on himself, and it only took him 57minutes (not including drying time for the glue!)

I added in a bag of white chocolate chip fudge, and a card made using old buttons

But I can hear you clamouring to find out what they made for us…So here it is…

Beautifully wrapped in an old paper bag, on which Becksie had written about a hundred times, “I used to be a paper bag, but not from a pesky supermarket”, complete with lovely vintage ribbon and buttons…

The Make Do and Mend Quillow!!

“What is a Quillow?” I hear you ask. Well, here is what Becksie had written on the label by way of explanation:

“Hello, I am your new ‘Make Do and Mend Quillow’! That’s right, I am ‘Make Do’ because I used to be a single duvet and pillowcase and an old Witney blanket! Now after an hours labour, I have been transformed into a Quillow! I am ‘Mend’ because I was made quickly so I will probably need some mending, he he! So….What’s a Quillow?? Well…I am a quilt and a pillow!!I am as green and yellow as a forage of Team Pugh’s house could produce and hopefully a happy balance between pattern (for the girl) and plain (for the boys)! As well as being great and a pillow and a quilt I have a million other functions-picnic blanket, beach mat, tent for small boys, cat bed, in car mate, storage in my pouch, small seat, helper when a family member is poorly sick, hat?? very makeshift mattress….The only limit is your imagination! Enjoy me! Oh, and one more thing, my pouch is big enough to fit size 11 feet inside-perfect!!”

So there you have it-a Quillow!

I love love LOVE it! What a fab idea, and as well as keeping us warm, and all the other zillion things it can do, we now also have a permanent keepsake from My Make Do and Mend Year!!

Everyone should have a Quillow in their life. (Stay tuned to A year without supermarkets, as rumour has it, there is a tutorial on the way, along with a You Tube video showing you how to fold it back up again!)

You can read their version of events, and find out whether or not they liked their clock here!