Strange weather and sewing.

 After all the unseasonable warm weather we have been enjoying, it has turned cold. The last couple of morning have been very cold and on Wednesday I had to de-ice the car before I could leave for work. Thursday was just as cold and when I got to work the snow started to fall. Needless to say, once I was indoors and warm I was excited to watch the snow. Although it wasn't settling it was causing problems for drivers on the motorway. I am really hoping we have some snow over the holiday period this year, it would be so nice.

On Friday, although I wasn't working I needed to catch up with some work items, so that took most of the morning. As soon as I'd finished it I set up my sewing machine and got on with the 16 patch blocks. By the end of the day I had made 48, using 6 colours and making 8 blocks of each colour.

I made the blocks by taking 4 strips of fabric two and a half inch wide and sewing them together.

 I then cut them across the 4 strips at two and a half inchs.

Finally I turned the 1st and 3rd strip around to give a chequer board effect and sewed them together

I'm not sure whether to make a rectangular quilt or a square. If I make one more block I could make a square one. I'll have to lay the blocks out and see how they look.

Yesterday John and I went on a bird watching trip. We are members of a local birdwatching group and go on the coach trips to various bird watching sites. Yesterday the trip was to Titchwell reserve. The day was cold and wet and that was how it remained all day. The reserve is on the Norfolk coast. John and I decided to walk down to the beach and it was very desolate. 

We saw a few birds on the sea and others on the beach. On the way back from the beach I got very cold and wet. The wind was bitter and blowing into our faces. The rain also got heavier. We did some bird watching in the hides but later in the afternoon I was feeling frozen so I went and sat in the cafe with hot tea and cake. John went off to watch the raptors as they came in to roost. The weather got worse as we headed home but at least the coach was warm. Once home I soaked for a while in a hot bath and then snuggled into bed. Birdwatching in the rain is not fun at all.

Today I got the Christmas quilt sandwiched and made a start on the quilting. I decided to do some stitch in the ditch around the blocks and then do straight stitches on the blocks using the walking foot. I want to be able to gift this quilt before 1st December so I need to get on and get it finished.

This afternoon Richard gave me an advent calendar.

This sounds like my kind of advent calendar.

It has the fabric, embroidery floss, hoop and instructions. I need to copy the design onto the fabric before 1st December. All the embroideries are small, so I should be able to keep up with one small embroidery a day. 

Tomorrow will be another busy day at work . I'm not sure how but I've got a little bit behind. It's not a problem as I only have one short meeting tomorrow and so I have lots of time to catch up over the day. With luck I should be able to do some quilting in the evening. This evening I must finish grandson's hat.

Take care

Lyndsey

A crochet weekend.

At some point earlier this year I booked a crochet colour work weekend away with my younger daughter, Lucy. She became interested in crochet some time ago and has made a crocheted blanket for her brother, a monkey as a present and is currently working on a large sized octopus. The blanket is made with squares, but not just the standard granny squares and she was eager to learn new techniques. Many years ago I used to do a lot of crochet, especially when working night duty on the wards as a student. It is so much easier to pick up and put down without losing stitches than knitting. In fact it seems to be quite a popular hobby with nurses in the UK. The blanket below was crocheted by Lucy for her brother.

This was the  crocheted granny squares I'd started during covid lockdown

This second blanket used up the left over blocks and I had to make some more to finish it off. I think I like this one better than the first on.  Although it uses the same pattern I love the randomness of the colours.

The weekend crochet workshop took place at Blunsdon House Hotel near Swindon. I forgot to take a photo so I have used one of their photos from their website. There was a lot of outside space but unfortunately we had wet weather on Saturday due to the tail end of storm Claudia. Today, the day started very foggy but had improved by lunchtime.

We shared a room with twin beds which were very comfortable. There was a seating area with a table and the room was very spacious. The shower was also easy to control.

There were 16 of us attending the weekend and we soon got chatting. I was surprised to find that many of the women worked for or had worked for the health service or social services. We all got on well with each other and so the weekend was a lot of fun. We shared jokes and stories but also helped each other as some of the patterns were difficult to grasp.

The theme was crochet colour work and Anna the tutor made it as easy as possible and was great fun to work with. She had a fabulous sense of humour. On Saturday morning we started by making a fair isle square. This managed to fox me completely, even with both Anna and Lucy's help. After lunch I had another try and managed to make the square. I have no idea why I found it so difficult. Anna also taught us to read a crochet pattern which is written as a picture. This is the Fair Isle pattern.

Next we worked on Overlay Mosaic squares. This clicked with me very easily and I enjoyed working on this square but I still need to finish it. There is a second overlay Mosaic pattern I want to complete as well.

Anna also taught us how to create this central double crochet Fair Isle square. Central double crochet is a stitch that is also known as waistcoat stitch or as knit stitch as it looks like knitted stocking stitch.

There were lots of hints and tips on starting squares and joining the rounds which I found very useful.

On Sunday morning we all tried to finish the squares we had worked on during Saturday and then we moved on to Mosaic crochet. We started with inset Mosaic crochet and also tried overlay mosaic crochet. I found the mosaic crochet much easier to learn or it could be my brain was more receptive on Sunday.

Whilst we were on our crochet weekend both Lucy and I treated ourselves to a spa treatment. The spa facilities were excellent and I really enjoyed my full body massage. Lucy enjoyed her full body wrap. During the evenings of our stay we were a little antisocial although we did join a few of the other participants for a drink in the bar. Once back in our room we watched some television whilst finishing our squares and chatting. Then we snuggled into our beds to read before settling down to sleep.

We finished the workshop at 4 on Sunday afternoon and on our way to the car I took a photo of a tree. The weather was closing in so it is a little difficult to see the two carved owls in the tree trunk and the large owl on the top.

Our journey home was uneventful and reasonably quick. There was quite a lot of traffic heading back to London at the end of the weekend but there were no hold ups or problems. Although I love going away on trips I do love it when I arrive back home. Our two dogs were very pleased to see us and made out that we had been away for months rather than a weekend. It took a while for them to calm down.

Having had such a good weekend we are planning to do another workshop next year. We haven't decided what we would like to try but there are a lot of things to chose from. I hope you've had as good a weekend as we've had.

Take care

Lyndsey

I started a new quilt

 Having finished the Happy Quilt it's the perfect time to start a new quilt. John asked me if I would make a lap quilt for a friend. She is disabled and uses an electric wheelchair to get around. She likes to go out and about visiting places but needs two able bodied helpers to go with her. John is very happy helping out and regularly organises outings. They usually travel by bus and there always has to be a cafe for tea and cake. Nearer Christmas their outing will be to go to see the Christmas lights on Regent street and Oxford street. 

Having finished work for the day I started pulling out fabrics. I decided that I would make the St Louis 16 patch block. I wanted to use two fabrics of the same colour but not pattern in each block. It was fun going through my fabric boxes. Soon I had a pile of suitable fabrics and it was time to start cutting. I want to make the quilt very colourful.

I got quite a few blocks made before dinner. I still have some strips yet to sew together and I need to cut more strips but here are the completed blocks so far.

I have a few blocks yet to sew.

I definitely need more blue fabric. Tomorrow I'll pull out the remaining fabric I need to make enough blocks for the quilt. I also want to make a new quilt for my brother. He has asked for a red quilt and I'm thinking of using this block. I have a lot of red fabric and also a lot of cream  which would make some great blocks. I'll start on my brothers quilt once I have got this quilt top finished.

I have ordered some more wadding for the Christmas quilt and I've been thinking out how I'm going to quilt it. It is such a colourful quilt I think I will keep the quilting very simple. If I have time tomorrow evening I will finish the advent calendar that I started at the weekend.

Tomorrow at work, I need to complete quite a few jobs as I'm away for the weekend with younger daughter and I have no intention of taking work with me.

It's getting late and I need to get some sleep.

Take care

Lyndsey

Catching up with some sewing.

The last seven days have been totally crazy! Far too much to do at work for one person, and home just as mad.  I've felt as if I've been on a conveyer belt, moving at speed, trying to complete one task after another with no respite. I think it has finally calmed down and I feel like I can breath again. The week has been an exercise in survival.  So how have I got through the week and kept a smile on my face. For me, this is when my sewing, knitting and other projects become extremely important. They help to keep me calm, give my brain time to reset and make me very happy. So let's focus on the fun activates this week.

Earlier this month I added the binding to the Happy quilt and slowly  over the week I managed to make time to get it all stitched down. I really like this quilt, it makes me smile. 

This quilt is staying home with us. None of us need a new quilt on our beds and we have quilts for snuggling when watching TV but you can't have too many quilts, can you? I really enjoyed stitching the binding down on the quilt it was so relaxing.

Having finished the Happy quilt I turned my attention to the Christmas quilt. This needed to be sandwiched and so I looked for a suitable backing fabric. In the end I had to join the backing fabric. I also pulled out my wadding but unfortunately even if I joined it I didn't have enough wadding for the quilt and so I've ordered some online.  I have a neat pile of quilt and backing fabric all ready for when the wadding arrives. The wadding I have will be used for smaller projects.

Since I couldn't get on with the Christmas quilt I pulled out a couple of quick projects to make.

At work, we needed an office advent calendar and this one will be perfect for the number of people in the office. The castle at the back of the photo is to make a dragon hanging caddy for grandson's pencils etc.  Over the day I got the pockets made for the advent calendar and made a start on the dragons.

I'd forgotten how long it takes to make the pockets for the advent calendars and had expected to complete it quite quickly. I'd also pulled out some fabric to make robins for Christmas and found the cat squares to make a cushion for my son and the duck squares to make my grandson a cushion for his room. 

I finished my sewing activities and then decided to make some stollen. It is delicious but I forgot to take a photo. Having had a delightful day sewing and cooking on Sunday I was well rested and ready to go back to work today. Monday is my admin day and I spent a couple of hours completing my yearly update training for cyber security and data protection. 

Here in London UK the weather is turning colder and we have rain forecast for the whole of this week.  We can't really complain as we have had a long run of dry and warm weather. The trees are slowly dropping their leaves and we are getting more birds visiting our bird feeders. When I take the dogs out for their morning walk at about 6:15 it is still fairly dark and it will be very dark in another week or two.

I hope everything is going well where you are. I'm sorry I haven't responded to comments recently due to pressure of work but I will be doing so this week.

Take care

Lyndsey

A weekend trip

On the weekend of 24 to 26 October John and I had a weekend away in Swanage. We were lucky with the weather which was warm and dry and we had a fun time. We had decided that we would stop at the tank museum on the way. The museum houses over 300 tanks from 28 nations. The world's first tank, Little Willie, is on display and the exhibition goes through to the current main battle tank of the British Army Challenger 2. There are 8 exhibitions to visit at the museum, we only visited the first one, the tank story 1915 to present day. There was so much to see! I had been asked by younger daughter and a couple of colleagues from work to take loads of photos which I did. I'm not going to show you all of them but I thought you may be interested to see a few. If not you can always scroll quickly down to our visit to Arne nature reserve.

Little Willie was the prototype of the first tank and it never saw service but the mark 1 did. Below is the Mark 2 tank. The side is cut away to show the limited space for the crew inside

This one is the Lanchester mark 2 armoured car

The early tanks were slow with many covering only 5 miles in an hour. This next one is the German Panzer 2. This was so small against the modern tanks. I got a little fascinated with the tracks as these had presented problems for the designers. The tracks help to spread the weight of the tank stopping it sinking into soft or wet earth as it would if it had ordinary wheels.

The German Tiger tank

and the Panther. Hitler ordered that the Russian T34 tank be copied and manufactured and so the Panther came into being. It was better made than the Russian tank but production was very slow and so there was never enough of them to make a difference to the fighting in the Soviet Union, Italy or North West Europe.

The Sherman Firefly was a British tank based on the American Sherman tank. It was fitted with a more powerful British 17 pounder gun.

and this photo is of the American Patten tank. This tank made me feel quite small. This became the main battle tank of America and it was used in Vietnam. One of the male visitors was American and he was excited to get his wife to take a photo of him by the tank

The final photo is of a UN armoured car. It really looked minute among all the large tanks.

I found the tanks fascinating and horrifying by turns. Fascinating because of their design and the fact that the crew fit into limited space sharing it with the ammunition. Horrifying due to the amount of damage and destruction they can cause.

When we got to our hotel in Swanage we took a walk to the town square along the sea front. It was windy but warm. After dinner we chatted and read in our room enjoying some delicious red wine before we settled to sleep. It had been a good day.

After breakfast on Saturday we headed out to the nature reserve at Arne. We had visited once before and this time we wanted follow a different trail. The leaves on the trees were changing to yellow and orange and there was still some heather in bloom.

The first part of the trail took us up hill and gave us a good view across country.

We then followed the path down towards the shore. Along the way we spent time watching various birds, little egrets, curlew, whimbrel and cormorants.  Once at the beach we followed the shoreline round to Poole harbour. The tide was on its way out.

I loved the play of the light on the water and so I took some photos.

This one looks like I took the photo at night.

The sea was so clear.

As we walked further along the shore we saw these little red flowers.

The cliff along here was liable to fall so we kept away. This site was good for seeing sand lizards but on this occasion we didn't see any.

Over the day we saw over 30 species of bird. A good day bird watching. In the evening we had fish and chips and sat on the beach to enjoy them, 

After breakfast on Sunday we took a walk to the town and enjoyed our walk back to the car. Several people were enjoying a swim in the sea. I haven't swam in the sea for several years. We travelled back home enjoying the country that we passed. 

We enjoyed our weekend away. Our next trip is in December.

Take care

Lyndsey

November already!

 I wish the year would slow down! October seems to have rushed by and now it's November. I realised I needed to start thinking about Christmas. There's a Christmas cake to make and presents to think about. When I opened my work emails this morning I had a flurry of invitations to Christmas events. No I'm not rushing my life away worrying about Christmas. I have a weekend away this month with my younger daughter Lucy and that will be fun. I'm hoping to do some walks with John and of course there are always the various projects I'm working on. So I'm changing down a gear and slowing the pace of my life down this month so I can enjoy my free time with my family and try to get everyone fit to enjoy the festive season. All family members seemed to have been unwell during October.

Over the last weekend of October, John and I had a weekend away in Dorset and we visited the  tank museum and also spent a lovely day walking at Arne nature reserve. I tell you about our weekend in my next post. I would do it now but I haven't downloaded the photos from my camera. Instead I'll tell you about this last weekend.

On Saturday we spent the day with older daughter and our grandson. We had a great time. When we arrived he was doing some painting so we both joined in. I managed to avoid getting paint all over my clothes. We then moved on to making pizza dough in preparation for lunch and then the fun of deciding what topping we wanted. In between grandson and I played hide and seek. After lunch John took over and played board games and memory games with him. and we ended the afternoon with stories. As we drove home I was very tired. Three year olds have endless energy and he kept going all day. 

Over last week I didn't get much time for any sewing or knitting. Yesterday I was determined to get the quilting on the happy quilt finished. That got done first. I'd kept the quilting simple with diagonals across the quilt in both directions. I like how it looks.

Next I went hunting for some fabric for the binding. I finally found a piece that  was big enough and looked good with the quilt.

Once the binding had been stitched on it was time to move on to the Christmas quilt. The binding will now be stitched down to the back over several evenings. I could have a finish by the end of the week. 

The first of the borders on the Christmas quilt had already been added but this meant the stars on the border were incomplete.

I added the second white borders so that the stars were complete and then added a slightly wider red border. I  had washed the red fabric a few days earlier as I was worried the colour would run the first time it was washed. I already knew that all the other fabrics in the quilt were colour fast.

The quilt top is now ready to be sandwiched and quilted. So far I have no idea how I'm going to quilt it. I have a little time to get this quilt finished but I want to gift it at the beginning of December. Now I need to check that I've got enough wadding and if I have any fabric suitable for the backing.

It's a good job these two quilts are almost finished. John has asked me to make a lap quilt for a lady that he organises walks for, in the local area. She is disabled and uses an electric wheel chair. I have fabric that I can use but I'm not sure I can make the quilt in time for Christmas. I've also promised my brother a new quilt.

Having finished knitting my grandson a scarf I am part way though making him a beanie hat which will have a large pompom. It should be finished this week. Older daughter has also asked me to knit a baby blanket for their second baby who is due in January.  I had started another cardigan for me when she asked me if I would knit the scarf. I'm not sure when the cardigan will get finished.

This week is much calmer so tomorrow I'll share the photos from our trip to Dorset.

Take care

Lyndsey