Me? Addicted to hand dyed fabric? (And a giveaway)

How did you know about my addiction?

Oh, right, I'm showing you :)

Putting away the new hand dyed fabrics that had arrived over the last couple of days (yay, stash mail!), I decided to organize them by size and loosely by colour families.  I thought I'd count them too while I was at it.  Well...  Let's just say I could start a new project every day for the next three months and still not run out of fabric.  Does this qualify as an addiction?

I still remember when I first saw hand dyed fabrics.  There was still a great local needlework store in Ottawa, the Cross-Stitch Cupboard, and they had just received Lavender & Lace's Firefly Fairies.  This must be a good ten years ago.  I was quite horrified at the idea of putting bleach on a cross-stitch fabric.  The ladies at the store suggested I could use already hand dyed fabric, and they now had several pieces in store done by some lady in Ontario.  I thought they were tacky.  Ah, the uninformed opinions of my youth.  But none of the models on their walls were stitched on these newfangled hand dyed fabric, so I hadn't seen the effect that was possible with them.

Now of course, I'm crazy about hand dyed fabric.  It gives so much more life to a project and lets me express my individuality and sheer love of colour.  Looking back on it, I kind of regret not getting those fabrics.  They were likely Sugar Maple Fabrics, a Canadian business that closed down five years ago, I think, and their fabrics are prized beyond all others.  People snatch them up and a piece even went up on eBay a little while ago for $100.  For a fat quarter.  Luckily, I've found several companies to keep me in hand dyed fabrics - Steph's Fabbys, Under the Sea Fabrics, Sparklies, Polstitches, and Youthful Hands Needlework (aka Sunny Dyes) are my current favourites - and I've found I can't resist a pretty piece of mottled 28 count fabric, as many of them have Facebook sales.  Which is how I ended with this much fabric.  I may need to start stitching faster.

And so I need your help!  In my sorting, I found three pieces of fabric I will not use.  Two I bought from Silkweaver's weekly solo sales, thinking I might give another count a try and because I liked the colours, but who'm I kidding?  And the other, I have no idea when or why I got it, but I'm really all about 28 count.  So I'm having another giveaway.

Fabric Giveaway!

I'll draw names next Wednesday, February 20, let's say at 10:00 a.m. EST.  To enter, you have to comment on this post and tell me which piece you would like to win.  You can of course also say that you'd like to be entered in all three draws :)  Who am I to judge fellow fabric addicts?  And while you're at it, I'd like to know, what is your favourite cross-stitch fabric type and count?  Feel free to answer even if you don't want to be entered into the giveaway.  I love learning more about you guys.  Please note that this time, I won't be entering my followers, since I know these counts are not necessarily to everyone's liking.

And now I'm off to stitch so I can buy more fabric use the fabric I already have.

What?  You want to see what I'm giving away? Well, ok, if you all insist ;)

Piece #1 is a fat quarter, approx. 13" x 20" of hand dyed Newcastle Linen (40 count) from Silkweaver in Witch's Brew.  This is my favourite of the three, but my eyes hurt just thinking about stitching on so small a count.

Piece #2 is 18" x 20" of hand dyed 14 count Aida, also from Silkweaver, in Thunderstorm.  It is a dark gray, with a few slightly lighter areas, and some dark purple.

And piece #3 is a fat quarter, 13" x 18", of yellow Belfast Linen (32 count).  It's yellow.  And linen.  And 32 count.  That's three strikes.

Good luck everyone!