Welcome to June.

Welcome to June and a little later in the month we'll be celebrating the first day of summer. Last week was very hot here in London but today was a lot cooler but still warm. Unfortunately it wasn't that warm in the office. I asked for the air con in our office to be turned down a little but it took about an hour before it felt a comfortable temperature. I dislike the first day back at work after a holiday as it seems to take a while to get back into the swing of things. Being back at work meant I had to get up earlier so I could fit walking Missy and Twiglet into the morning routine. Having walked them a little later in the morning whilst on holiday they weren't impressed with the earlier start to the day.

I was interested to find out what number was called for the chookshed challenge this month. It is number 7 and my number 7 is to try some gold work. As part of my Christmas present John bought me a gold work kit.

I did some gold work many years ago, too many to remember, and I really enjoyed learning how to do it. However that is the only time in my life I have done any and I now need to get my head back into how to work it. Fortunately I have a good book that goes through the whole process so I'll let you know how I get on.

Before I can start I need to find the right size embroidery hoop and also trace out the pattern. I'll do that tomorrow evening, tonight I just want to chill out.

I uploaded a photo of Little Moreton Hall to my last post. This is a National Trust property in Cheshire. not only is it a tudor half timbered manor house, that has a moat and a knot garden but it is deliciously wonky.

The main reason for the hall to be so wonky is said to be due to the weight of the Long Gallery on the top floor. Causes such as being built on marshy ground have been shown to be wrong. Another culpret could be the settlement of the building following the addition of the Long gallery. Wonky or not it has stood for more than 500 years.

The house was owned by the Moretons, who were a wealthy family. The family bought up significant amounts of land following the black death. The building was started by William Moreton in 1504 and was built in stages and completed a hundred years later. 

The house is built around the courtyard. One of the guides, dressed in character was happy to pose in front of the house.

The Great Hall of the building, was used for entertaining.

The bay windows had beautiful patterns created by the lead work and some of the panes had coloured glass.

The next room is the Parlour, known as the Little Parlour in surviving 17th-century documents. The Great Hall, the Parlour and  Withdrawing Room are structurally part of the original building. The wooden panelling is a later addition to the rooms and behind them the original painted panelling was discovered in 1976. The decoration consists of painted imitations of marble and inlay but also Biblical scenes, some of which were painted directly onto the plaster and others on paper that was then pasted to the wall. The paintings tell the story of Susanna and the Elders from the Apocrypha.

The chimney piece was rather fanciful with the arms of Elizabeth 1

In places in the house there was evidence of marks made by burning to ward off evil spirits. These were made with a candle or tapers. 

There is a small chapel for the family.

We climbed the spiral staircase up to the long gallery. This would have provided space to exercise on wet or bad weather days. As you can see the floor is very uneven. The far end of the long gallery had a large window,

and at the other end there was this pretty plaster work.

Just off the long gallery there was a small quiet room to one side with another large chimney piece.

We made our way down one floor to the bedroom. This had a reconstruction bed and cradle. To one side there was an indoor privy which dropped straight into the moat.

I was quite relieved when we finally made our way back downstairs. The spiral staircase and wonky steps in places were a little too precarious for my liking.

Having investigated the house, we made our way to the tea room to have coffee and cake before our drive back to London. We would have liked to have walked around the moat and garden but we needed to be home within a time frame, so this house and garden will be on our list to revisit the next time we are in the area.

The journey home was good and we didn't get too held up by the major road works as we drove around Birmingham. 

I think May has been our best month so far this year for visits and activities. We haven't got a lot booked for June but we are away one of the weekends. 

I now have half an hour before I need to head to bed so I'm going to do a little stitching on my tablecloth.

Take care

Lyndsey