The Last Post

Over the last couple of years illness, house moves and personal traumas have changed the dynamics of our group, and only firm friendships within it have stood the test of time.  During the time we spent together our little group had collectively made a series of small quilts for children, with no firm destination for them in mind.

 Not long after the tsunami struck Japan earlier this year Midsomer Quilting responded to an appeal for quilts to help people who had lost everything in this disaster, and Sharon, Angela and Imogen decided to take our finished stash to them at Chilcompton to be shipped (with no charge to us) to Japan. On the morning the three of us took them over there I think the shop was being overwhelmed by the numbers of people donating the most beautiful quilts, we were pleased to have been part of this practical way of showing our sympathy to a beleaguered nation.

So with this last post we are saying goodbye and thank you to those people who have been interested in our little group.  Like all craftspersons we continue to work on but in our separate ways!

These two photos are taken from an article 'Quilts to Japan' written by Chris Howell from Midsomer Quilting for the December issue 2011 of British Patchwork & Quilting. 

Secret Pocket Lady

I had lots of fun last week making this "Secret Pocket Lady" skirt! 

My job share Karen borrowed one of these skirts, also called "The Walking Lucky Dip," a few years ago. We took turns wearing it at our school's annual Summer BBQ.

Karen had to return the skirt and I never quite got around to making one, as promised.

That is until this year!  

The skirt  was made using fabric up-cycled from some classroom drapes and a few new quarter metres of  "brights" for pockets with some flowers bonded on top. The finishing touch - lime green ribbon! There was also a bright patchwork bandanna to add to the overall "look."

How it works: 

The skirt has 20 pockets, each containing a prize. For the price of 20p, the child chooses any pocket and receives a surprise!

Karen and I had lots of fun taking turns wearing the skirt, raising a bit of money for our school and seeing the children's faces when they realised that the lady wearing a funny outfit that day was a teacher! 

Red and White Yo-Yo Quilt

A couple of years ago I saw a picture of a quilt similar to this at  Gooseberry Patch and fell in love with it! I simply felt I had to have one and then, typical me, put it to the back of my mind.

The Clover yo-yo maker craze was becoming big news here in England and so I gave it a try - it was so much quicker and easier than the "old fashioned" way which I found tedious.

I love red and white fabric - I "just"  happen to have a huge stash of it that gets replenished at every opportunity.  And so began my days of yo-yo making.

I decided my quilt would need 400 of theses round beauties  and divided my quilt into quarters - 100 yo-yo's in each.
It took quit some time and 800 pins to get the balance of colour and pattern right - but I have to say it was such a pleasure to see it spread out on the table!

Then came the hours of happily watching Poirot and appliqueing the yo-yo's by hand onto the white fabric.

For the backing, I knew I wanted red and white ticking. I was fortunate enough to find the "real thing" at my local fabric shop - and, as luck would have it, it was soft rather than stiff!

Next, I tie quilted alternate yo-yo's into place with red pearl cotton, the ties showing on the back.

My biggest worry in making the quilt was marking the white fabric ready for quilting!

I used a Hera Marker, another fab product from Clover. "Easy to handle tracing spatula allows you to place pressure when marking on fabric. Perfect for quilting and sewing". Truer words have never been written!

Again, using pearl cotton, I quilted the border in simple straight lines and got the "look" that I wanted!

Rather than traditional binding, I used my favourite method of folding in the edges to finish the quilt .

My labour of love took 400 yo-yo's and two years to complete! I enjoyed EVERY minute of it - it was so much fun that I even made several cushions!

Tour of Britain Cycle Race

Today's leg of the Tour of Britain Cycle Race started in Frome, Somerset. A nice bright morning, the town centre and roads along the route were crowded with spectators. Here are a couple of the photos I took.

The Throckmorton Coat

We paid a visit to Coughton, (pronounced Coat-un) Court (owned by the National Trust) , while we were on holiday in Shropshire last week.

This is the home of the Throckmorton Coat, made (as the result of a wager) from wool shorn, spun, dyed, woven and sewn all between sunrise and sunset on 25th June 1811.

Coughton Court has been in the Throckmorton family since 1409 when John de Throckmorton married into the de Spiney family. Home to one of the UK's oldest Catholic families, this house has witnessed defining moments in British history, from the court of Henry VIII to the Gunpowder Plot of 1605.

Bank Holiday in the Lake District

Striding Edge, Helvellyn (photo from Wikipedia)

We went up to the Lake District over the Bank Holiday weekend because our son and 12 year-old granddaughter were going on a camping and walking trip from Glenridding to the top of Helvellyn. Our granddaughter had never been camping before, nor done a walk longer than a couple of hours or so, so it was all a great adventure.

I am very glad that I did no research into their route, because in the photo above, along the ridge, is the path to the top!!

Rather than camping, our daughter-in-law, Chris and I found a comfortable B & B in Keswick, and the three of us spent a pleasant Sunday ambling round the lakes and visiting Windermere while they were walking.

The day started off quite well weather-wise, but by mid-day the mist was coming in and the rain started to fall again. We all met up in the Inn-by-the-Lake in Glenridding at the end of their walk. Unfortunately there was no hot food available late on a Sunday afternoon, so we made do with lots of hot coffee and sandwiches. Simon was pretty tired, but Kay was quite keen to go for a walk with her Grandad in the evening!! She told me that she didn't know that she was scared of heights until she was doing that path accross the ridge. We think she did amazingly well.

On Bank Holiday Monday we had said we would take a Boat Trip around Ullswater. This was the view from the window of the boat. It had been blowing a gale and pouring with rain all night. Kay slept through it, but Simon got soaked packing up the tent and spent the first hour of the boat trip hanging over the heater trying to warm up.

We were all dressed for the weather and spent an exhilarating time on deck towards the end of the two and a half hour trip with tourists from all over the world.

Pilling the Cat

Mitzi, about seven years ago

We have just been cat sitting for our daughter-in-law, which as well as feeding the two cats and keeping them company meant pilling the older cat, Mitzi, twice a day.

I have to admit being a trifle nervous about this to start with, and had looked up opinion via Google. Definitely not encouraging, although there were some humourous anecdotes to jolly us along.

In her youth Mitzi had not been the calmest of cats, and a tickling session could suddenly result in a scratch or nip so she surprised me by taking her pills, for a thyroid problem, in a resigned and laid back manner. I suppose she has become used to it, and knows that to get food this indignity has to be borne, although on the next to last morning she clamped her teeth together like a small child refusing his breakfast and a little more persuasion had to be used, twice, as she spat it out the first time.


http://www.simonscat.com/ has some lovely little clips about life with a cat.

Gravity!

Every spring I struggle to tie up the hyacinths and it always spoils how they look. In fact it makes them look ugly. Then this spring I thought.... why fight nature? Let gravity do it's worst and hey presto! The hyacinths looked like this - elegant and ravishing! So listen up all you female senoir citizens! Gravity is nature's way of saying... that's how you're meant to be and you are GORGEOUS!

All Things White and Beautiful

My garden at night under a blanket of freshly falling snow. I couldn't go to bed for gazing at it's beauty - every twig and tiny ledge accentuating the garden's architecture.


Snowdrops in my garden early in the year - exquisite! A surge of life and hope from the death of winter; the Master Gardener at work.

Roses from my husband for St. Valentine's Day - ever the romantic at 71!

These are no ordinary cupcakes! These are ANGELA'S cupcakes - mixed and baked by Angela, in Angela's kitchen. ( read in sexy voice!) Thankyou Angela for an idyllic morning.


I should have published this blog in February but my life was taken up with the difficult journey of a very special human being and dear friend Jan. I dedicate it to her memory - she had SUCH a ZEST for life in all it's richness, it's joys and sorrows, it's beauty, humour and ultimate mystery.

Domino Knitting

This is my first attempt at Domino Knitting, very simple to do, but doesn't look it! My friend Joan heard about it first, and showed me how it was done, then lent me a little book by Vivian Hoxbro. My sample piece would look a lot better if I had pressed it, but I think I might felt it before possibly making it into a cushion cover.

I had to get my own copy of the book of course, it is very well written, and contains instructions for several projects.

Clever Girl

I was doing a bit of half-hearted tidying up a couple of days ago and came across a scrapbook of photos of past projects.

This one of a rather reluctant Sharon was taken by me in 1994, because she had just finished knitting this doll for her young son, who desperately wanted one. They were all the rage at the time and I think there were several different characters.

But what was truly amazing was that Sharon had never knitted before, and still says she can't knit. All for love, says Sharon, her child wanted one and that was the only way of getting it for him.

Below are a couple of cupcake pins, which I am lucky enough to have, one for me and one for my granddaughter, also made by Sharon. Utterly delicious. If you want one for yourself she has a contact e-mail address on her embryonic web site www.faeriegodmothers.co.uk

Dementia and Snowdrops

When the snow had melted we found that the snowdrops had come into flower. Florrie, an elderly friend, a true country woman, now long dead, called these 'God's Innocent Children' which is a bit tear-jerking but somehow so very apt.

The photo has absolutely nothing to do with the article which follows, from today's Telegraph, which, as I keep thinking my memory is failing, cheered me up.

Quilting, pottery and computer games 'may cut risk of dementia'

Taking up hobbies such as quilting, pottery and even playing computer games in later life may substantially cut the risk of dementia, a new study suggests.


Crafts and other activities which exercise the brain, including reading novels and computer games, can all have a protective effect on the mind and help prevent memory loss, the study shows.
By contrast, watching television for hours on end significantly increased the chance of suffering problems, the research found.
Previous studies have shown that those with mentally demanding jobs and high levels of education were less likely to suffer the memory problems associated with the condition.
Researchers found that those with stimulating occupations were less at risk, even when they had physical damage to their brain cells.
The latest research will be seen as further proof that so-called "brain training" machines, such as the Nintendo DS advertised by Nicole Kidman, can help to delay brain decline.
Those who kept mentally active in their middle age, through reading, arts and crafts and other pursuits, were about 40 percent less likely to develop memory loss than those who did not.
The scientists found that those who kept mentally active in later years cut their chance of developing memory loss by between 30 and 50 per cent.
But volunteers who watched television programmes for more than seven hours a day in later years were also 50 per cent more likely to have memory problems than those who spent less than seven hours a day in front of the box.

Chasing Rainbows

When I decided to post this picture I thought I would accompany it with a line or two about rainbows from some romantic poem or other. For a country that has a lot of rain there seems to be a singular dearth of positive thoughts about rainbows. It's all about chasing rainbows, rainbow's end, somewhere over the rainbow!

This was the most distinct rainbow photo I have ever taken, and it seemed to end in the field below us. I didn't rush out to look for the pot of gold, maybe I should have done, but the sheer delight of it appearing to be so close was it's own reward.

The Sling Bag

Browsing around on the web a few days ago I found a picture of a sling bag, made from an Amy Butler pattern. I couldn't find a local stockist of this particular pattern, ( not even at Get Knitted, who stock a range of Amy Butler products) evidently it has been out for a while, so I made a sort of look-alike for myself. Not quite the same, I may have another attempt, but I am still pleased with it.

Because of the regular snowfalls we are getting I have spent a lot of time sewing, as well as baking and eating!! A couple of UFOs have even been completed.

Diddy's Quilt

Some quilters give their quilts /work of art a name. I don't but this quilt is an exception- it should be called 'Lucky' - third time lucky! The piecing has been completed and redesigned three times and has been a real learning curve for me. Why? THE COLOUR PURPLE!! After finishing my third quilt I felt I could call myself a quilter and decided that I would do one for my schoolfriend of fifty years. I forgot momentarily after announcing this to her, that she taught A level textiles among other things! However she was delighted but had to wait a few years! She said she wanted pinks and purples in Ohio star (which she seen on one I had done). In excited anticipation we chose some gorgeous fabrics together which I added to over time,and meanwhile busied myself making a cream quilt for my daughter and her husband.
Then three years ago I started - with the Ohio star and fabrics as planned. When the blocks were assembled, it was alright, in fact quite nice -- but that is all. It did not have the WOW factor that I wanted. Remember this was going to be a gift for my dear school friend. SO - I took it all to pieces and started again. I tried larger blocks using pinwheel and abandoned some of the pinks, thinking that that was the problem but as I worked I had my doubts and wondered why. When it was finished I looked at it with utter depression because that was the effect of the fabrics. I would not have liked either to sleep under it or see it in the morning. How was I going to make a pink and purple quilt for Diddy that I actually liked? Answer - call a quilting friend! My mistake was to choose very beautiful COLD tones instead of warm. The fabrics were re-sorted and many abandoned. Then taking one warm purple fabric, I went back to the fabric shop and started again.
This time the fabrics felt right but I didn't know what design to sew. I decided on two blocks of all the ones I'd never tried - eighteen pairs altogether. My friend likes symmetry and I like random so I went for a compromise - several different blocks and an a-symmetrical design.The overall link was one particular fabric in every block. My family were very interested, supportive and encouraging - it became a family enterprise! I loved sewing new blocks and when all thirty-six were completed I laid them out on the dining room floor and started to arrange them. They were swapped around many times over the next week until I had created the design. It was amazing how this came about really. My husband said the quilt was exotic and I knew I thought so too. This was what I had had in my mind's eye in the first place - a quilt that looked jewelled. I sashed them together with a mauve batik looking fabric. I added a half inch dark purple border inside the outside sashing, which framed it and finished off with an inch of the dark purple for the edge.The giving of this quilt just before Christmas was very special for me. To create and make something entirely original , that you really love,and then give it away to someone special---that makes it all worth the effort! My school friend loves it. In fact I can hear her saying ''Imie! I LOVE it!''

Celebrating the Season

Our niece Jo calls this her credit crunch Christmas tree. She spotted it on the shoreline of her local beach a few weeks ago, part of a tree that had been tossed about by the sea. Although interested in its possibilities she was on foot and left it on the beach. Days later she drove to the beach, not expecting to find it again, but it had been tossed far enough by the waves to keep it dry and shore bound. Here it is, dressed for Christmas in her sitting room. Fantastic!

Our granddaughter has been designing her own Christmas cards since a few months before her fifth birthday. The one above was her first and below is this years card. She creates them while staying over the October half-term holiday, and it is my great pleasure to print them.

And here is one of several quilted Christmas hangings I have made over the years. Each of the trees is decorated with beads and sequins. Happy Christmas, everyone.

Getting Knitted Now

I first caught the sock bug because of Jennifer who attends the same Healthy Back Class that Imogen and I go to. She was wearing a great pair of socks, and after I had admired them she told me she had knitted them herself.

Chris, my husband, is a great fan of hand-knitted woollen socks, having had innumerable pairs knitted for him in the past by his step-mother. Although she died at least five years ago, the socks live on!

I found an amazing shop called Get Knitted near Bristol, and came home with a selection of yarns and a set of 5 needles.

I didn't realise that you could get yarn that would 'self-stripe' so my first socks were, as in the picture below, knitted using seperate colours. This was my third pair from these three balls of yarn, and there is probably enough left for another two pairs.

'Self Striping' yarns make life a lot easier, so I started to make some for Chris, as he wears a size 12 shoe I discovered that one ball was not quite enough to make a complete pair, so I knit the top of the cuffs in a matching plain colour. I've thoroughly enjoyed knitting them, the work is so portable and can be quickly finished.

Also in this photo is my first felted bag, I've now knitted and felted three bags in different patterns, and am always on the lookout for more. This pattern, found on a web site is entitled French Market Bag.

A Trip to the Baltic

Chris and I took our first ever cruise this summer. We absolutely loved the ports we called at but found the actual cruising experience rather limiting. If we do it again, perhaps when we are less fit and energetic, we would choose a larger ship with more opportunities for exercise.

I nearly didn't include this photo on the blog, as every one knows The Little Mermaid. The one below is Nyhavn, also in Copenhagen.

These next two photos are details of images from the Viegland Sculpture Park in Oslo. We took scores of photographs here. There are over 130 sculptures in a large park dedicated to Viegland, who we understood from our tour guide was not a particularly pleasant man. However, his work is exquisite, and the sculptures progress through from childhood to old age.

The site walks you round the park and museum, and Viegland's biography mirrors the conception of the park as 'Man's journey from cradle to grave, through happiness and grief, through fantasy, hope and wishes of eternity'. Viegland made a Mephistophelean pact with the city of Oslo in 1921. He traded all his sculptures, drawings, woodcuts and models for a studio to be converted into a museum after his death.

We took several hundred photographs altogether on this trip, and had to spend ages when we got home sorting through to find the best ones.



St. Petersburg was the high spot of the trip. On the left of the image above is The Church of the Spilled Blood, so called because of the murder of Alexander II, whose blood was spilled here at the time of his assassination. We did not have time to go inside, but are told it is full of mosaics. St Petersburg is one of the places on our list to return to, we were totally surprised by it.

The Winter Palace was the home of the Russian Emperors until 1917, and today is part of the world famous Hermitage Museum. The museum has fascinating and extensive collections of works of art and was still collecting them in the 1950's, much to the incomprehension of Ray, the egalitarian Australian on our tour.

On the second day of our stay in St. Petersburg we visited Peterhof. We understood this to be the Summer Palace of the Imperial Family, a favourite residence of Peter I, after whom it was named. The parkland covers over 1000 hectares, and as well as being splendid inside, has numerous fountains in its grounds. Chris and I got thoroughly soaked by one!

Stockholm's Gramla Stan,(above) in the Medieval part of the city was beautiful, we encountered our only rain of the two weeks away while we were here. We also had a bit of a panic while in Stockholm, as we had set off on our own and got a bit lost trying to find our way back to the ship. Being built on several islands we crossed the wrong bridge and found ourselves on the wrong side of the city, we did make it however with half an hour to spare before sailing time. Chris' usually unerring sense of direction had let us down, and as we were in Sweden we had left our passports on board. Until we realised that we were consoling ourselves that we could fly to the next port if need be.

The photos above and below are Tallin, Estonia

Before we came back to the UK via the Kiel Canal we stopped at Wernemunde, where among other things we took a trip on the Molli train to the site of the last but one (I think, when Blair was still in control) of the G8 summits. We were in the former DDR and were reminded frequently of the restrictions that these people were living under not so very long ago at all.

The Molli being a steam train, virtually every man was wielding his camera!! And it was a 4 am rising to see our entrance into the Kiel Canal the next morning, although I have to admit that when it got light enough to see, it was extremely interesting.