If you’ve recently looked at the Workshops page you will know that we’ve got several planned for this year. The two London Knitting & Stitching Shows will probably not surprise you, but why on earth one at Dunchurch Baptist Church? For a very simple reason – I am a member there, and we are raising funds for a new building.

The rather sad reason why we need a new building is that the old one, built by the members themselves in the 70s, is falling to bits. The much more joyous reason is that it’s getting too small! But whatever the reason, a new building needs a new budget. As anyone who has ever tried to raise money for a good cause will know, it takes a lot of ingenuity and creativity to come up with enough events and projects that will interest people. Our Elders decided to start from the Parable of the Talents – anyone who wanted to was encouraged to collect £10 from them, and to use that money to raise more in whatever way their particular talents suggested. So far this has yielded a Murder Mystery Evening with 3-course meal (tomorrow, and we’ve got tickets!), a Christmas Cookbook (recipes to be handed in in March and cooked/baked in April – book to appear just before the Village Fête), an Arts & Craft Exhibition with cake stall, a sponsored walk/run/cycle ride/pram push, several Quiz Nights, a Beetle Drive (I had to look that one up ) and a concert. Oh, and a Hardanger workshop.

It wasn’t until I’d offered it and picked a date that I realised I’d need twelve 4″ hoops. When I teach at the Knitting & Stitching Show, hoops are lent us for the duration of the workshop, but here I’d have to provide them myself. And oddly enough I didn’t have twelve 4″ hoops just lying around…

As you do nowadays, I Googled hoops, and found that even with my husband’s and my £10 pooled I wouldn’t be able to afford twelve. Until I came across a Gumtree ad. Eight red 4″ flexi-hoops. The hoops were somewhere in Wales (I think), and only local pick-up was specified, but I thought I might as well contact the seller and see if they’d be willing to post them. The lady was very helpful and said yes, she’d be happy to send them. I asked if by any chance she had any more hoops. “Not red ones,” she said. “But I do have twelve green ones.”

Just the right number, and for a great price that was well within our Talent budget – they were obviously meant to be! In the end I bought the eight red ones as well, on the grounds that some workshoppers might like to buy one to take home. And here they are: my serendipitous collection of hoops. Now all I need is twelve people to use them on Saturday 28th June.