Beginning of July

 

We have been away for part of the first week of July to Chatham, Kent.  Quite a long journey going across the south of England from Dorset.  David and I have wanted to visit the historic dockyard there for quite sometime.  Another day and we visited nearby Gillingham for the Royal Engineers museum, which was far bigger than it looked and took a long time to get around.

Is that ship’s propeller big enough?

A dockyard crane built by Stothard and Pitt of Bath. We remember passing the factory many times when driving from Bristol to Bath years back.

One of the lifeboats displayed there. This one was named Queen Elizabeth II.

A battleship, HMS Cavalier

And a monument outside the ship

The prow of HMS Gannet

Another lifeboat, Grace Darling. This was at an exhibition of 200 years of the RNLI.

And a Morris Minor advertising the Call the Midwife walking tour. Some of the scenes are filmed at Chatham but we didn’t take the tour. You could walk miles around this place. We managed to dodge the hefty showers that day.

It didn’t rain the next day but it was very windy.  The Royal Engineers Museum was mostly indoors and arranged in a route that told the history from the English Civil War up to the present day.

Some crocheted/knitted poppies and cushions near the World War I memorial.

As you can see from the description above, a biscuit that was posted!

Embroidered postcards soldiers sent to their loved ones during World War 1.

A quilted coat worn under armour. 

Sunday we returned home but en route we met up with my son and his family at Arundel Castle, home of the Duke of Norfolk in Sussex. We’ve passed this place a few times but never stopped before. I was immediately taken with the windows, different designs and glasses (must be to do with quilting).

The sky looks lovely out there, but earlier when parking the car there was almost torrential rain.  It stayed dry afterwards.  After exploring the house we went out into the gardens, which were just lovely.

A lovely place, we may be visiting again.  

End of June

 What an eventful month it has been. With an injured knee (still recovering but a lot better), Covid, family hospital visits last weekend (all is well now) and granddaughter’s birthday party it’s been a busy month.  It’s amazing I got a finished quilt (mainly due to being at home a lot) but a lot of little bits have been made.  Here’s the purple quilt.

The front

And the back.  I wrote more about the quilt here.  It doesn’t have a home yet.

Also being at home I got on with making a cover for my stitch book, which is to be more of a wrap.  I had a lot of low volume fabric hexagons, to which I added more until I got the size I wanted. I added narrow strips of fabric top and bottom so I didn’t have those awkward bits to cut off. With wadding and lining I quilted with big running stitches of perle thread.  So that’s another little finish.

The outside 

The inside

Wrapped around the book.

I follow a You Tube Mousiemakes and enjoy seeing Helen’s work and she invited people to make a mouse, so I made a very basic one in amigurumi crochet with instructions from another You Tuber Yarnhild, who had several crochet tutorials.  I made this little mouse from some Ricorumi cotton I have in my stash.

Another quick and easy project is this washcloth which is a dishcloth pattern from Garlene of the Kitchen SinkWorkshop as part of her Year of Dishcloths this month. Using the King Cole Cottonsoft yarn with little pops of colour it makes a lovely delicate and soft cloth, lovely to wash oneself with rather than washing the dishes. It was a handy project to take to the knit and natter group this week.

And I must be in the mood for finishing things off as the past couple of  days I’ve been working on an embroidery design by EmBeaRoidery (her shop is on Etsy) of my star sign, Sagittarius.  I had left it for a while but decided to pick it up again to sew the little stars and moons inside the arrow.  I’ll now have to think how I frame it, but it was a lovely design to work on.  This was a pdf pattern that I purchased and used fabric and thread that I had already but she also sells kits.

I’ve made three cards (one I’ve sent already to my daughter in law before I took a photo), below is a swing cards by cutting part of a rectangle one one side of the cards and another of the other side. Easier to show than explain!  This was with the Hotchpotch craft group.

Then with the TG internet group I made another card 

Finally this is my ATC for this month ‘My Favourite Holiday” so I chose the Netherlands and used pictures from Keukenhof  alon with a windmill.

I nearly forgot.  This month some weight disappeared.  Each time I go to my local Slimming World I think I haven’t lost much but I have been losing quite a bit, 2lbs in each of the last 2 weeks.  Week before last I received Slimmer of the Week award, which totally surprised me. Then this week I received my 1stone (14lbs) certificate.  I hope to lose at least another stone, but it’s going well so far.

So that was June.  In July we’re going away for a few days next week to Kent so will share that in another post.

Joining in with Mini Archie’s June Furtle Around the Blogosphere here

On the Up

 Covid has at last gone, but I still have the dodgy knee which may take some time to heal. I’m doing some daily exercise but still on the Ibuprofen, but is more flexible now.  After 4 weeks I took my car for a short drive and all seems to be well apart from the getting in and out. But if I sit in the seat and swing my legs round that will help. So I’m on the up, things are getting better.

I am on the home straight with David’s cardigan and started to sew together today in order than I can start picking up stitches for the front button/buttonhold bands.  It’s good to see the end in sight.

I’ve been hand sewing a hexagon panel which will be a wrap for my stitch book. After the hexagons were sewn on I layered up with scrap wadding piece and some white print fabric underneath. Now I must do some stitching in my stitch book, which has been neglected of late.

As you will know I do not make cards, but recently I made 2 last week and another this week.  One of them is wining its way to my daughter in law, whose birthday is on Wednesday.  So it’s a pic of the second one here. It’s called a swing card and by cutting the rectangle and folding, there’s space to put greeting on the front and message on the back. It does need a bit more decoration though.

Through TG I join the creative crafters Zoom meeting and made a gate fold card with panels in the middle and on the outside. The demonstrator, Jan, used Christmas themed papers, but I’m not ready to embrace Christmas yet.  So I used some floral papers from a small pad from The Works. the butterfly stamp was an addition. That came from a recent magazine. 

I’ve also made the ATC for this month o the theme of favourite holiday.  I used the image of Keukenhof from our recent river cruise brochure together with a windmill from a KLM serviette decoupaged on the bottom left corner.  We’ve enjoyed previous visits to the Netherlands over the years, going to Maastricht, Venlo and Amsterdam.  We’re thinking of going back to the area around Enkhuizen, which we visited briefly while we were on the cruise.  So The Netherlands came to mind for this subject.

Last weekend we managed a trip out to the East Somerset Railway, mainly for the drive, but we did get a train ride, David got to see the signal box (which hasn’t got the levers in yet) and the engine shed, while I too, in the sunshine and fresh air.  After Covid and other stuff it was good to get out for the day.

Cranmore is a pretty station, but the journey just goes to the middle of nowhere and back again. It was really pleasant, nonetheless. 

So on the up and looking forward to a few days away at the beginning of July.

Hello 👋 I’m still here!

 June has been a trying month so far.  Further to my last post when I was diagnosed with Bursitis it turns out I have osteoarthritis in my left knee following a fall.  If that wasn’t enough I had a dose of Coronavirus early last week which is taking its time leaving nearly 2 weeks later. 

 Enough of that though, I am plodding along with David’s cardigan and have completed back, 2 fronts, one sleeve with a second one in progress. This was started back in November and I want to get those of the needles as soon as. You know when you’ve had enough of something just to want to get it out of the way. 

 But I have a finished item - yay!!  I have finished the purple quilt as you go quilt.  End of last week I sewed the binding on and yesterday spent time sewing in ends.  So glad that that I’ve finally finished this after starting over 10 years ago. Here it is with my quilt-holder-upper (David)

And the back

I made the binding before I became ill which were leftover strips of the fabrics used in the quilt.  I sewed the binding onto the quilt on Monday as my machine has an on/off button so I didn’t use the pedal. Yesterday I spent the time sewing ends of the quilted blocks.  I don’t have a home for this quilt yet, so it’s staying on the spare bed for the moment.

I’ve had a surprise today as I received a postcard from my Instagram friend Barbara.  She wasn’t sure of the house number on my address, so after being returned to the Royal Mail (as there was a torn off red sticker on it) it seemed to have been  delivered to another house down the road and the people there kindly popped it through the letter box.  It has really cheered me up.

Hoping for a good weekend and things try to get better.

June! And Goodbye to May

 

Well May went quickly and it’s now 1st June, so about time I had a round up of what I’ve done in May, which won’t take long as I’ve only got a little bit of a finish and a big bit of progress.

This week I have been suffering with leg pain which turned out to be bursitis. The Bursa is a sac of fluid behind the joint, in my case the left knee, which has become inflamed. My leg became swollen and feels like a tree trunk! It was made worse by half term holiday trips out to Wimborne Model Town and another to The Tank Museum. Although I took opportunities to sit down there was a fair bit of walking. So now rest, Paracetamol and Ibuprofen for the next few days.  And I guess reading, knitting, watching You Tubes and a bit of sewing might get done. 

Anyway the finishes last month are a pair of socks and fingerless gloves for me.  The Cuddlebums yarn, called Happy Ending, which I purchased at Yarndale the year before last had its time,  I took the socks with me on holiday to the Netherlands in April so it’s been well travelled. The patterns I’ve used were the Hobbity socks as reference for the heels and toes by Kay Jones and is a patron pattern.  The gloves were the Fingerless or Not by Snapper Knits, which I’ve used several times before.

A second item in progress, which I hope to have finished, but half term and now the poorly knee had put paid to that for a little while is my purple quilt. Below is the front sewn together

It’s shown pinned at the back but all the pieces have been sewn together now, so just the binding to do.

There’s more about he quilt on my previous post.

With the TG (Townswomen’s Guild) online group I made a card . Some how I cut a couple of pieces short and got a bookmark too.

ATC for this month is about TG so I cut a newsletter up as background and added he bold type for the activities that my local group does,

And At Hotchpotch craft group I had a go at macrame feathers, which was quite enjoyable.

Another start was this bag of flowers (which will be made into a pouch eventually.  I haven’t sewn any more of the flowers.

This is a sample of what of the finished article.

So May has been busier than I thought. See what June brings.