Latest treasure

I know some of you might be waiting with bated breath to hear what treasures I found at the flea market this week. Well I was happy with my find even if most people wouldn't be impressed!

No less than 58 pairs of knitting needles, 3 crochet hooks, a stitch holder and 2 big sewing needles for £6 - must be a bargain! Mind you I don't actually need lots more needles as I probably have every size I might want to work with already. I think maybe I was tempted to buy because of the packaging.

I've always got some knitting on the go. The Giro d'Italia cycling race has been on TV the last couple of weeks but although I'm keen to catch up with the race highlights in the evenings I never watch TV empty handed. If I'm concentrating on the screen my knitting has to be something I can manage without looking or counting!  I'm using this pattern to make the sleeveless top in cashmere merino silk aran but I've opted to use moss stitch rather than follow the 24 row pattern repeat suggested. Makes life much easier and should look OK I think.

I only knit at night. The daylight hours are when I sew. I always have a few different projects in progress at the same time. That way I can choose between machine sewing or hand sewing and make best use of my time. I am often asked how I get so much done but it's easy if you always have something you can pick up for a few spare minutes. I'm making new cushion covers at the moment. It's the quickest way I know to freshen up a room. I think I'm destined to be Laura's best Fingerprintfabric customer - I simply couldn't resist having a piece of this glorious print. We have 3 of these shrubs in the garden so it's lovely to bring the same colour and shape into the house. Deciding what colour of thread to use for the quilting is one of my favourite things. I could have gone with any of these but in the end I plumped for the leaf green.

I had planned to keep the quilting really simple by stitching the central vein and then outlining each leaf but I enjoy free motion quilting so much I never want to stop. The green background had to have a little vermicelli quilting too.

I'll let you see how the cushion turns out when I've made it up. This is in danger of becoming quite a long post so I'll call a halt by showing you the dress I have almost finished from one the Rag Market fabrics we struggled home with this week.

All it needs is its self coloured belt and the hems turned and it will be finished. Laura has claimed it as her own so you may see her wearing it on DMTV very soon!

Thanks for reading this far - I enjoy your company! Bye for now,

Linda