Is this the longest a person has ever had a project on the go? We wonder… June Raymond wrote to us to let us know she has completed this table cloth after 66 years in the making.

When a letter addressed to The Manager, Coats Crafts, England arrived last month from Queensland, Australia, we couldn’t have imagined the contents.

June wrote to thank Coats for their Anchor threads which are still available in the same colour codes as when she began embroidering her cloth in 1943, aged 19.

She first purchased her cloth in a large Sydney department store along with Anchor embroidery threads to stitch the lily of the valley design. After a few years, the cloth ended up in storage before a family member remembered it and offered to take up the task of completion.

Again, life had its habit of taking over, and the cloth spent another 30 years in a drawer, until June remembered it and decided that she really would like to finish it.

And what a result – a pretty cloth in a vintage style that would grace any table. A cloth to be proud of, and a future heirloom to be treasured.