Alleluja! An Etsy Treasure

Dear friends,

I have been wanting to share the following gift...no, make that wonderful "experience" I received for my birthday from my sweet husband. I know you will love this as much as I do.

This little curious envelope from Japan arrived one day last month, addressed to my husband. Okay, I won't lie and say I didn't know what it was. My husband is good, but he's not telepathic about gifts (even with my dropping major hints on Twitter). The envelope contained the little porcelain ceramic octopus pincushion that I had been eying on Etsy by Alleluja (aka Sawako Hayakawa). The unwrapping process was so beautiful, it felt almost ceremonial. I won't spoil it by showing it all here, because I really hope you will be so enchanted and buy one for yourself! (You deserve it!) I truly felt like I just received a treasure...


Inside was a lovely note written to my husband from Sawako in which she hoped it made us happy.

(Pincusion with it's accompanying pin along with some common millinery items for scale)

So she hoped it made me happy. I am ECSTATIC! Just look!


Here are some more (and frankly much better) photos from her Flickr photostream.


and she has other very lovely designs...

I simply adore these bobbin spools:


I also ran across this interview of Sawako on Lou Lou & Oscar, a beautiful blog. I enjoyed reading about how she named her shop and her love of movies.

(Thank you Sawako for allowing me to mention your beautiful and very original work here. Yes, you certainly made me happy.)