Tweetie bird

Well, I'm getting slightly addicted to this cross stitch malarkey, I've done another one!  Unfortunately, as I didn't really pay close attention to the pattern my song bird has ended up more of a chicken and then because I wanted to include some background it's ended up too big a picture to wrap around a button.  It's still pretty, I'll just have to think of some other way of showing it off.

rather well stuffed bird on a branch with leaves and flowers surrounding it.

I'm also considering massacring an old handbag that was destined for the charity shop to use it's faux leather hide to make pretty creatures from for jewellery or appliqué, is this acceptable as although I'm depriving someone of what might be their dream bag, it's old and have been wondering if it's not good enough to give to the charity shop and just think it's probably better for me to up-cycle something than to buy something new.  What do you think?