A lot of work ahead for me!

Last year, a lady who I shall call Mrs H, contacted Bundoora Homestead after my linens show - she wanted to give me her family linens when she moved from her home to a smaller unit.  When I spoke to her she said she would offer her linens to her daughters first, and would contact me again early this year.  I have a list of contacts who spoke to me along similar lines last year, but I haven't pursued any of them for a couple of reasons.  Firstly, I don't really need to add to my own collection; in fact I cull it regularly to try and keep my collection manageable.
Secondly, I have always believed that it is better for people to keep anything handmade by their ancestors in the family so future generations have an opportunity to admire their work.

Yesterday I received a call from Mrs H. She said she had got all her linen from the cupboards and was ready to part with it as she would be moving soon, and did I still want it?  I said I would love to have a look, so today I visited her and was pleased to hear that her daughters had all taken a few items to keep, even if they don't use them. However, there was still a lot left, and rather than see it all offloaded to an opshop as Mrs H was going to do if I didn't take it, I ended up bringing it all home.

Most of it is whitework - crochet and cutwork, some very beautiful, but mostly common designs that I already have samples of in my collection.  The embroidered items are nice, but nothing out of the ordinary as far as my own taste goes.  I will spend the next few days soaking them all in Napisan, and ironing them as they come off the line - believe it or not, my favourite part of the sorting process!  Then I will decide what, if anything, that I wish to keep.  The rest I will show to my colleagues at the EGV, and whatever isn't wanted at that point....well, some of it may well end up at our opshop, but I'm thinking if I post photos of individual items here, some of my readers might like to take them off my hands?


I've been doing some more work on my Peacock sampler and am quite happy so far with the colours I've chosen.  There are more motifs to be worked in the light purple, and two of those will have a gold filament thread running through them, so it will add another dimension to the overall piece.  One thing about cross stitch samplers - it is easy to pull out something if you don't like it, as they are mostly small individual items!

Have I used my new machine yet?  No....but I've cut some fabrics out for Ken's bike quilt.  At least it's a start!