What Am I Thinking Of…..

 Hexagons.  I’ve got a lot of them. I have some loose ones in a small bowl (bottom left) and two more collections of them sewn up.  The colourful ones are sewn with flat bases and the cream ones are sewn on point. So what have I just decided to do? To take part in 100 hexagons 100 days Instagram challenge on Instagram from 1st August, that’s what! 

To add to that it’s crochet Granny Square Day on 15th August and I’ve seen a hexagon Granny block which I’ll be making for that.

If you want to follow me on Instagram I’m @suewilduk. The challenge is #100hexagons100days2023 .

So I think next month’s posts will feature a lot of hexagons!

July Catch Up

 

It’s racing towards the end of July, but as you will find on my earlier posts I have been writing about the Scottish touring holiday that David and I undertook last month. July has been a bit of a catch up month after coming back. 

A few days after returning my friend Brenda and I went on a trip with Canford Heath Townswomen’s Guild to Sidmouth.  The weather started cloudy and it got considerably worse! All those months of planning and it was the only bad day of the week! First stop was at the Donkey Sanctuary.where we had a couple of hours for refreshments and to see the donkeys.  I’ve never been there before and surprised how big the place was. The pictures below was in one of the barns, where they were waiting to have their hooves inspected and trimmed.

Outside the yard there’s a lovely little memorial garden, a nice place to sit. That was a donkey figure, not a real one.

As the weather was worsening, some took shelter under the trees.

As we left it started to rain and when we were at Sidmouth town it rained and rained…

I don’t think the toys in the beach toy library got much of an outing.

I might like to go back and visit again, but when the day is nicer to appreciate more.

At the end of the week another trip out, but I drove myself and friends from Bourne Quilters to Romsey and the exhibition at Romsey Abbey.  Romsey Quilters had a Fabric Fiesta with traders and the local quilt shop Green Hill Patchwork and Quilting opened their doors too (they don’t open on Sundays). 

I wasn’t going to buy fabric (no, I’ve got enough of my own!) but as there was a heavy discount on a pack of fat quarters I did succumb! The pack was called Bookworm, by Lewis and Irene fabrics. I later went into Green Hill shop and bought 3 fat quarters of fabric there. 

Outside the street bollards we’re yarn bombed

It really did brighten up the town’s streets.

On to Romsey Abbey. I always think it’s a lovely setting for the quilts and these are just a few of the pictures that I took.

The last picture are of cushions made by Year 5 pupils at a local school (9 - 10 year olds) of a local school. Fabrics were provided by Lewis and Irene (the design company is local to the town) and some of the Romsey Quilters helped the pupils.

I have been making progress on some things and hope to have a finish for the end of the month and possibly a new start too. 

Scottish Holiday (part 5) (the end now!)

 We’ve been back 3 weeks now and like any holiday it seemed a long time ago.  I finished off the last post by being back in England and our penultimate stay before returning home was in Wigan. Our overnight stop there was to visit Quarry Bank Mill not far from Manchester Airport, to the south of Manchester.

This is a National Trust property which shows not only the mill building but also the buildings for the child apprentices and one of the workers cottages.  There is also a school building, which is the current local school and people live in the rows of cottages (other the the one used for tours) so Styal village inhabited.  We had a timed tour of the Apprentices cottage where children as young as 8 from workhouses and orphanages were employed  the mill. The pictures below are in the wrong order as the the general room where the apprentices ate, had lessons and (if there was time after their long working day or on Sunday) recreation.

Simple dolls the girls made clothes for and below basic knitting and darning.

The apprentice’s house and below a box of their possessions and cloak (worn on Sunday to go to church)

The House Supervisors’ room. As you can see not as basic are their charges living conditions

Above is a wage cup, which has the employee’s number. below is the mill building.

Inside the cottage with the range fireplace. Below the row of cottages.

The cotton spinning machines

The bale of cotton

The weather suddenly broke towards the end of our visit there and we got absolutely soaked! Our last stop was a stay in Birmingham before making our way home.

Looking forward to another break away, which I’m sure won’t be too long in coming. Since we’ve been home a holiday in Holland next year has been booked.

A craft post will be coming soon.

Scottish Holiday in June (part 4)

 From Oban and heading further south to Dumbarton, just outside Glasgow.  We found our first view of Highland cattle, we hadn’t seen any before as the east of Scotland tended towards crop growing. Along with a ruined castle these cattle were almost lost in the long grass. This was near Loch Awe.

We drove alongside Loch Lomond, but the areas where we could stop didn’t have the views the other lochs had.  When we reached Dumbarton, we were wondering what to see there and found the Scottish Maritime Museum, which contains the Denny Ship Model Experimental Tank, which tested ship hull models.  A fascinating place which had been used since Victorian times up until 1990’s and was in the heart of the Clyde shipbuilding area. Surprisingly there was a quilt. Part of a project involving the local community, called Skylark.

In the former offices, were all sorts of items for calculations, technical drawings, a machine for making graph paper as well as organised storage for reference drawings.  I couldn’t resist this picture of an enormous calculator.  Just to think that nowadays you can just us an app on your phone! 

We stayed a few days so we could go to Glasgow but it wasn’t quite how we planned.  David wanted to visit the transport museum at the Riverside and also The Burrell Collection.  We first of all found that public transport didn’t go to the Riverside, only the sightseeing buses. Parking was available by either cash or app, not contactless card (why?), so that restricted us on staying for one and not going to the other.

But while in the city centre we later took a loooong walk to Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum (when we could have taken the bus (which we did going back to the city. Before then we ended up in the Willow Tea Rooms, designed by Charles Rennie Mackintosh. 

We didn’t have a reservation but there was a table for 2 and we were lucky as it was heading towards lunchtime and there was a queue.

We also went to Glasgow Central station just to look at the building, not catch a train.

Kelvingrove was an amazing place with people standing in the entrance to listen to the pipe organ.  I think it must be the only place where you can see an elephant and a Spitfire plane together.

And look at all those heads, all different expressions 

The cover for the heating system (yes, it was that ornate)

And himself photobombed me taking this photo of an Arts and Crafts mirror.

There was a small collection called Make Do and Mend and I could not resist taking a photo of what is now called visible mending, this is a darning sampler.

So that was our day in Glasgow, and return visit to what was the docks area for the Riverisde, home of the Transport Museum. Our woes continued with not only the parking, but also on Friday the museum opens an hour later so we didn’t have as much as wanted. It is a modern building and a lot crammed in with cars being on a ‘car wall’ and bicycles displayed on a suspended plinth right way up and upside down!!

I like the way this Indian inspired Daihatsu van was decorated 

This Ford Anglia was, like David and me, born in 1955.

Above and below, part of a street scene.

In the pawn shop, there was a much prized and beautifully decorated pin cushion.

One of the Glasgow buses.

The ceremonial scissors used to cut ribbon to launch a ship - I thought they were surprisingly small - I expected something a bit bigger than that.

A model of the Queen Mary

The first Hillman Imp car made in the 1960’s at Linwood, west of Glasgow.

The first car designed for women by Dorothee Pullinger.

On a conveyor belt of ships, this is the Royal Yacht Britannia.

So that was our stay in Dumbarton.  We would travel further south into England. On last venture before leaving Scotland was to Gretna Green, but it was to visit the Devil’s Porridge Museum.  Gretna Green, before it was a place for people to elope and get married, was a community built around the First World War to produce armaments.  The ‘porridge’ was Cordite, made from cotton mixed with explosive for bombs and bullets. Women were mainly employed for this work as it paid more money but it came with a lot of danger to their lives.  Production was such that there was a village built, but there’s not much of that original village left now.

Back in England and a stop along the M6 at Tebay services.

At the restaurant looking over a lake with 3 sleeping ducks on a small pontoon

While we had scones and tea.

An overnight stop in Wigan before we headed homewards, one more stop to go!