A few months ago I posted about sign ups for the Best Birthday Ever Swap. My friend Kristy and I have both been a bit swap obsessed recently and we decided it would be fun to organize a swap to ensure you get fun birthday gifts.

My first partner’s birthday isn’t until June, but I decided to make something for Kristy’s birthday this month even though she wasn’t my partner. Kristy loves budgies so I knew I wanted to cross stitch some for her. I used water soluble canvas and stitched this design up (I found a random Japanese sticker picture doing a Google image search and used that for my pattern).

I used the needle book tutorial from nanaCompany. I’ve been wanting to try out this pattern for awhile and I really liked it a lot. It’s a really simple tutorial and can be customized so many different ways. My patchwork is a little wonky but I really love the fabrics I used and I still love it despite the imperfections.

With the help of some awesome Instagram friends, I added a pocket to the book. I stuffed it full of fun extras, I clipped some Clover Wonder Clips* to the pocket and tucked a little Omnigrid 2-1/2-Inch by 2-1/2 -Inch Grid Ruler* in there too. I got a couple of these mini seam rippers when I was at the Needle Shop in Chicago and it fit so perfectly in there. I also included a little pair of embroidery scissors because you can never have enough embroidery scissors.

Then finally I sent a selection of fabrics for a quilt I knew she’s been working on. Then a few silly other things like some bird socks and emoji stickers.

I had a lot of fun putting this together and I was really excited to send a surprise package her way. Normally we send each other pictures and get advice on projects we are working on but I managed to keep this all under wraps. Now I just need to finish up the birthday package for my actual partner!

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