Annual Fabric Sale! ....and a nice surprise.

Last Sunday afternoon, I went to the annual Nantwich Fabric Sale. This happens every January and is a good opportunity to stock up with fabric, books and general bits and pieces. There is usually a small exhibition of quilts too, with some stalls giving information about local courses.

I went along with my friend Hilary, a fellow quilter.

I bought quite a nice collection of fabrics - some to fill in the browns and yellows of my fabric stash.

Also, some reds and a couple of patterned fat quarters. The first of these is a Japanese print, which will go nicely with the Japanese themed quilt I have languishing in my WISP collection. The second, I really could not resist. It is a black and white Art Nouveau Alphabet. I have no idea when I shall use this, but it really pleads to be put into something.

Then there was the book stall. This was wonderful. I bought four books.

All of these were amongst the many second-hand books there. The Samplers book has such a wonderful cover with some really inspirational Blackwork designs. The second book will go into my small collection of old DMC books. It also has some wonderful designs there which I can see myself adapting.

Then I found these two books. I love the idea of making boxes, but have not made many so far. The first book, by Jackie Woolsey is one of those wonderful books which records the techniques ready to be used in whichever way you choose. Perfect. The second may seem a strange choice, but look at the following page from inside.

I just love the swirling design of paisley, having played about with this in the past. These drawings - it is a book of drawings of different paisley designs, just tempting me to start exploring possibilities again. The book is by Gregory Mirow and is one of the Dover Design Library publications.

This week I have been busily knitting Liz's jumper. I gave her the yarn for Christmas with the promise of completing it sometime. Luckily, I didn't make any promises about exactly when it would be complete and she understands my workload..............

This is the design on the front. Plain up until the chest area, it has this design up to the armholes. Then I intend to continue in the darker shade of blue, joining in the sleeves. So far I have got to the halfway stage with the first of the sleeves. Its definitely coming on now. I had been getting so very bored with the plain blue.

This weekend has been very pleasant. We had a visitor staying with us - a friend of my younger daughter. She and I had a lovely chat about various crafts - she is a knitter, sewer and felter! Imagine my surprise when she and Rosie came into my workroom as I started writing this to give me this delightful little present.

As the fabric label states "A very handy little tape measure". I just love the tab with the fish on it! It sits proudly on my shelves, just within reach whenever I need it. How very thoughtful.