Phil is still making the Nankin house, the run is finished and the Nankins were in it this afternoon. Hopefully the shed will be finished tomorrow evening. I am repairing the ex batts shed which has a few worn battens. I hope to be able to finish that tomorrow and put the shed together so I can paint the outside and dry the inside.
I have an electric Hague linker and a Bond knitting machine on eBay which seem to be doing quite well. I have had shipping enquiries for the linker from Russia, Texas, Cyprus, Australia and Germany. It seems a very popular item. I found that although the electric linker was good I prefer the hand linker.
I am restoring a treadle for a friend of my daughter's. It has suffered some water damage on the top so I have had to strip off the polished finish down to bare wood. I was told I could bleach wood using washing soda and hydrogen peroxide, so I shall be trying that tomorrow. The fold over top had bad veneer damage, lots of bubbles and areas where the veneer had lifted, I tried ironing it down, but some of the bubbles were too bad so I soaked the veneer, steamed it with the iron and removed it. Tomorrow I will soak it again to remove the bubbles and dry it between 2 sheets of wood to flatten it, then reglue it and fill in any gaps where the veneer has broken. The irons aren't too bad, just need a good clean and wiping over with linseed oil. The machine needs a good clean and some attention to the chrome work with emery cloth and wire wool soaked in metal polish. Hopefully that will clean all the old rust and dirt off.
Sarah is going to a trade show at Biringham next Tuesday. She wants me to go down for a couple of days to look after Rowan while her and Casie pack and is going to collect me on her way back from Birmingham. We have to go to look at some sewing machines in Rushden on the way back to London. I will dismantle the finished treadle and take that with me so Liz can have it before Sarah goes to Devon on 1st March.
I still have to restore another treadle, this one is very bad, I tried to patch the whole veneer on one end but it looks bad so I'm going to take all the veneer off and replace it with some very thin plywood I've had for some time. I have already reveneered the foldover top with it and it looks good. There is a cut in the top where it looks as if someone tried to saw across the end of the table. The raised part of the top and the front flap will also need reveneering to match. The irons for that will need a good going over with a wire brush as they are quite rusty. Hopefully I will only need to clean it with vinegar and then linseed oil it. I haven't decided which machine to put in that, either a Singer 15 Sphinx, Singer 15 Filigree or 66 Lotus.
Soon we will have to go up the allotment and rotavate so we can get some seeds in and prepare the asparagus bed. There aren't enough hours in the day to do all I want and need to do.
Enough writing for 1 day. I need to go to bed as we are getting up at 7am now so we can open up the chickens.
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