Oh, the weather outside is frightful ....

So, it was an excellent opportunity yesterday to sort out stock for Shepton Mallet Flea Market which is on next Sunday.  It also gives me the chance to show you what I've bought over the last two months, although pickings have been thin so don't get too excited!

Lovely vintage chenille and velvet tablecloths (from Chiswick car boot sale)

Barbola-style candlesticks and powder bowl (Malvern Flea Market)

Carved wooden god .....

and - most appropriately for the current weather - a model polar bear wrapped up warm in a rabbit skin coat.

As you can see in the picture with the blue candlesticks, I've been having fun kniting flowers and making them into garlands.  I wired them together,  added artificial leaves and covered over the resultant mess with florist's tape.  It came out quite well so I did another one - little white roses - and then ....

....  knitted a bunch of larger roses.  Who cares if it goes on snowing when there's so much to do .....

They said there'll be snow at Christmas They said there'll be peace on Earth But instead, it just kept on raining .....

One of the things I would normally have done during a two week school break was lots of walking.  But, because of the inclement weather, the fields around us became shallow lakes and the paths were turned to mire so I spent most of the time indoors and did a lot of knitting.  When we were in Rome last autumn we bought these little chocolate dragee bunches of flowers as gifts ....

... and they got me thinking.

As I wander round car boot sales I often buy things knowing that one day I will use them for something.  Then they sit in a box waiting patiently for inspiration to strike.  Well, a quick search through the pile of things that time forgot in the garage produced these ....

..... which I bought years ago.  I used a lot of them to decorate garlands but these were left over.  I beheaded them ....

..... and added knitted roses which are a redesigned version of Lesley Stanfield's rose from 100 Flowers to Knit and Crochet. 

And then, of course, I got to thinking that I could make my own bunches just using wire and artificial leaves ....

I knew those odd bits would come in useful one day ....

Happy New Year Post

A very Happy and Prosperous New Year to all of you.  It is time to review our last year's resolutions and to make some new ones. Last year mine were:-

1. Not to buy anything at a flea market, antique fair or car boot sale that does not fit into a shopping bag (I have a very capacious shopping bag)

2.  To buy nothing at all, of any size or shape, that is painted with gloss paint

3. To use up some of the infamous yarn stash   

I didn't do too badly, although I did slip occasionally.  So I have decided to carry these three over into this year and make them into two-year habit-busters.

Then, of course, there are all the other resolutions which we all make and break almost immediately:  lose weight, cut down on drinking alcohol, learn Spanish, take up tap dancing, climb Kilimanjaro for charity - you know the sort of thing.  

There was an article in The Times on 1st January which should give us pause for thought.   Among the conclusions were that we should give up fruit (too much sugar) and eat veggies instead.  I wonder how peas are going to taste on my breakfast meusli.  We should forget the steady 30 minutes a day of exercise and instead do short bursts of 20 seconds of intense activity a few times a week.  No further details are given about this so I'll leave it to your imaginations.   And, quite the worst, 'The new evidence ... is that tiny amounts of alcohol increase your risk of cancer.  If a woman gets through only a very reasonable one bottle of wine a week, her risk of breast cancer goes up by 10 per cent'.  The article goes on to suggest that to balance benefits against risks, we should be drinking no more than 'a quarter of a very modest glass of wine' per day and that half a glass of wine might be described as 'bingeing'.

So, to add to the miserable weather we've been having, the floods, the recession, the fiscal cliff, and having to get through the next 3 months before the car boots start again, I now have to give up drinking.  Happy New Year!