A visit to Winchester.

John and I had planned a visit to Winchester earlier in July but had to cancel it. I can't remember why we cancelled but on Monday we decided it was a perfect day for our trip. Winchester is a cathedral city in Hampshire in the south of England. It sits on the western end of the South Downs National Park and is only 60 miles southwest of London, making it a perfect venue for a day out. Winchester developed from a Roman town but there was an iron age settlement on the site before the romans came to the area. The area around Winchester has three iron age forts and as well as visiting the cathedral we also wanted to walk to the top of St Catherine's Hill. At the summit of the hill there are earthworks of the Iron Age fort, buried ruins of the Norman chapel that gives the site its name, and also a copse of beech trees. St Catherine's Hill is also a nature reserve.

The day was perfect for visiting, a good temperature but not too hot. We planned to visit the Cathedral in the morning and then do the walk after lunch. The best laid plans can be derailed. There have been road works on the A3 at it's junction with the M3 for some time whilst they widen the intersection to improve traffic flow. The road works didn't delay us but the 'incident' did. We were held up for quite some time and so we arrived in Winchester around lunch time. We had already planned our parking so headed straight there. I took a photo of the Cathedral from the car park. As you can see it doesn't have a spire and from this angel looks quite small.

In reality Winchester Cathedral is the 6th largest cathedral in the UK and is among the largest of its kind in Northern Europe. The cathedral was built from 1079 to 1532 and is dedicated to several saints with St Swithun of Winchester being one of them. Here is a photo from the front.

The cathedral has a very long and wide nave and is built in the perpendicular gothic style. The overall length of the cathedral is 558 feet (170 m), which makes it the longest medieval cathedral in the world.  When I took the photo I wasn't at the end of the nave, so it gives you some idea of the size of the space.

As always I'm on the lookout for textiles. I liked the textile art in the nave. It added a lot of colour to the area. This altar front was beautiful.

as is this one that I found in one of the side chapels.

In the epiphany chapel there was this beautiful altar front. The cathedral has its own embroidery team and this was designed for the cathedral and stitched by their own staff.

As we came out of the chapel the facilities team was just returning an altar front to the storage box. What I could see of it was beautiful but I couldn't get much of a photo. I had a very interesting chat with the two men doing the job and they spoke with great respect about the embroidery and the team involved.

I found two banners, one for the Mother's union,

and one for the cathedral.

In the choir stalls I spotted these needlepoint cushions. 

Behind the high Altar there is this amazing screen.

The floor tiles are also very beautiful. It gave me lots of ideas for quilts and quilt blocks

It wasn't just the floor tiles that were decorated, the ceilings were very interesting as well.

The cathedral has an exhibition called Kings and Scribes. This YouTube video gives you an introduction to the exhibition

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One part of the exhibition looked at how the Winchester bible was written. It is believed that only one person scribed the bible, since all the lettering is in the same style and size. You are not allowed to take photo of the bible, even without flash, in order to protect it.

These are the items the scribe would have used and below is some information about each item.

The bible is beautifully illustrated and the information below tells you about the colours used and where they came from.

As we headed back to the main doors of the cathedral we passed an art project completed by children who would be leaving year 6 at Church of England primary schools in the diocese of Winchester

This was a very interesting and imaginative project. The children certainly demonstrated their artistic and creative talents.

Jane Austen is buried in Winchester Cathedral. She died in Winchester in 1817 and was buried in the north aisle of the cathedral's nave. Her grave is marked by a memorial stone, and visitors can leave flowers and letters near the plaque. If you like Jane Austen's writing you can't walk past without stopping to read the inscription.

By this time both John and I needed a rest and we were also hungry since we hadn't eaten since breakfast and it was now 3 p.m. We decided to eat at the cathedral cafe and the food was very tasty and well presented. We wanted to take a walk to St Catherine's Hill after lunch but we knew our parking was only paid for until 4:30 so we changed out itinerary and decided to visit the ruins of Wolvesey castle. I'll tell you about that in my next post. Today is Saturday and I have a date with my sewing machine!

Take care

Lyndsey

stitching and a quilt top.

This morning I dropped my daughter at work and once home I settled down with a coffee by my side to finish the second piece of sashiko. The house was quiet as John was still asleep and the two dogs had also decided they needed more sleep. It is very pleasant to be stitching , sipping coffee and planning in my head. I identified the projects I want to finish as soon as possible, and made plans for projects I want to start. The time past slowly, which is unusual, the house was peaceful and quiet and I completed my stitching. Some of my stitches could have been smaller and more even but I'm happy with it.

Later I'll prep some more stitching on this piece. Next I did some reading. I'd nearly finished the book I've been reading so I decided this was a perfect time to just chill out and read. Most enjoyable.

I then went back to the trip around the world blocks. I had several blocks I needed to make. So I set about turning this pile of strips into finished blocks.

Over the afternoon I joined the 12 blocks together and by the end I had a completed top.

When I look at this photo the pattern looks wrong but three people have checked it for me and it is right. It was fun making scrappy trip around the world blocks. Tomorrow I'll look for a backing for the top and make the quilt sandwich.

I was going to use my light box and draw out the first bird pattern but I've run out of energy and time. I'll get that done tomorrow and I'll make a start on the stitching. For now I'm off to bed, I might read a chapter of my book but I think I'm too tired to read, 

Take care

Lyndsey

Some scrap management

Today we were going to visit Winchester but we had a change of plan. Never mind, that will happen in the near future. First I had an appointment that took a couple of hours but once home again the day was mine to play with my sewing machine. I love it when a change of plan means I get to do some sewing. I have some projects in my sewing cupboard that have been started but really haven't got very far. Earlier in the year I pulled out some churn blocks I'd made as part of the rainbow scrap challenge, not sure what year, but I needed to move them along to give me space for my current projects. They turned into a donation quilt and I was pleased with the result.

Another foray into the cupboard turned up these blocks which I made into the happy quilt. Most of the blocked had been pieced but some needed to be finished. This quilt is waiting to be quilted, I've just got to finish the quilting on the dinosaur quilt before this one gets its turn. 

So today my search turned up three trip around the world blocks. Not sure why I started them but they are fun. I decided to make another donation quilt which would use some left over pieces from a jelly roll and other scraps. These are the blocks from the cupboard. I need to fix the block on the right as the pink needs to be across the middle.

I made three more blocks.

and have 6 more blocks to finish.

I'm having another sewing day tomorrow so I hope to get these blocks finished and sewn together. If it is a little cooler I'll also do some quilting on the dinosaur quilt. It's rather too big and heavy to play with in hot weather.

I stitched the small sashiko pattern on the Japanese inspired quilt. This pattern was really quick to do. I've started the box pattern but it will take me a little longer.

I have to be up early tomorrow as I promised to drop younger daughter at work, so I'm heading off to bed, although I may read a few pages of my book. I got a little behind with my reading challenge and I'm desperately trying to catch up. Unfortunately there just aren't enough hours in the day.

Take care

Lyndsey

Getting started on the July Chookshed challenge

My Chookshed challenge for July was to start the bird stitcheries. I bought this book at the festival of quilts in August 2024.

At the end of 2024 I decided to put these stitcheries on my list for this years challenge. I put them at number 9 and so this month I need to make a start on them. I decided to increase the side of the patterns to 120%. I printed out several patterns ready to transfer to the fabric.

I went through my stash to find some suitable fabric. 

and this is the one I'll be using. 

The first bird I'm going to be stitching is the green woodpecker.

Tomorrow I'll copy the pattern onto the fabric and get started. I going to be using DMC embroidery threads from my collection. I have a lot of thread I want to use up and I think I have all the colours I'll need for all the stitcheries. I'm looking forward to starting this project but I always get a little nervous. Although Kantha is all about running stitches I am worried I won't be able to make the stitches similar lengths or stitch them neatly. Isn't it interesting how starting a new project is exciting but can also make you nervous at the same time!

This evening I also drew two more sashiko patterns onto the Japanese quilt. These will be fun to stitch. I'm going to stitch this one tomorrow during my lunch break.

This one will take a little longer to do as what you see is just the top half of the pattern.

On Friday John and I will be going to Winchester to visit the Cathedral and also to have a walk to St Catherine's Hill. It should be a good day out. Saturday is my sewing day and I'm hoping to get a lot of quilting done on the dinosaur quilt.

Having got my slow stitching organised I'm off to bed as I have a busy day tomorrow at work. However busy it is I must remember to book some annual leave. Our leave runs from the beginning of September to the end of August and I have quite a lot of leave to take. I'll carry a week over to next year and try to fit the rest in.

Take care

Lyndsey

Getting on with some sewing.

This morning I spent a little time looking for the missing doll house doll. I'd taken the armatures, doll fabric and stuffing with me when we went away last month. I'd unpacked the folder I had the parts in but the doll I'd been working on wasn't there. This morning I had time to try and find her. I looked everywhere and then it struck me. Had I looked in the bag I'd taken my stitching and reading book in? Finally I found her at the bottom of the bag. She isn't very neatly sewn and it was a real pain when it came to putting the stuffing in. That being said I'm happy with the way she looks. I obviously need to add her face and hair and there is still some stitching to do to give the ankles, knees, elbows and wrists shape. This is the first of the dolls with the armature in them that I've made. I'll work on the man doll next. It may be a little easier as he is slightly bigger.  If I decide I'm not happy with them I have enough fabric to make another set. Second time around I'll be aware of all the mistakes I made.

After taking Missy and Twiglet for a walk I set up my machine and pulled out the apple core quilt. I was making this to use up scraps but also to practice sewing curves. I made and added two rows to the quilt.

I also cut some more apple cores as I want the quilt to be a lot bigger. Before I packed it away I pulled the apple cores I was going to use on the next row. I still need to cut more blocks.

I spent time this afternoon going through the bird pattern book which is this months Chookshed Challenge.

I want to make a quilt from the bird blocks but I had promised myself that I wouldn't start another quilt until I'd finished one. It must be OK to start another quilt if it's for a challenge so I've already started planning. The first bird I want to stitch is the green woodpecker. We sometimes see them when we go for a walk round the local cemetery.

I'm going to increase the size of the patterns slightly. There are twenty two patterns in the book so I need to decide on the number I want to do and also what background fabric do I want to use for the stitched blocks. I do love the planning stage of a new quilt but then I enjoy all the stages, even sewing on the binding.

Tomorrow I'm in work because we have an open day for prospective students. It's only 10 am to 3 pm but still cuts into sewing time. Fortunately I don't have any major plans for Sunday.  I want to plan out which projects I'm going to work on this month and work out some time slots in my diary to set aside for sewing. Hand sewing is easy as I always have something with me that I can work on but machine sewing generally has to be a little more planned. For now it's nearly bedtime and I'm going to do some slow stitching on the frog block for half an hour.

Take care

Lyndsey