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Friday 30 September 2016

Lucky me!


The perfectly Pleasing Pincushion Parade is over but you can still go and look at all the beauties on parade here at My Sister Made Me Do It. Many thanks to Ida and friends for organising this great link and for putting together such a great list of prizes. I was very fortunate to win second prize! Which meant that this delightful Moda Jelly Roll - Amelie by Me and My Sister Designs - landed in my post box on Wednesday.


I have never owned a Jelly Roll before so for the moment it is sitting on my desk where I can admire it every time I walk past! Thank you Ida.

We have had a couple of days out this week. On Monday we went to Aulnay which is about 2 hours north west of here to meet some friends for lunch. The church is large and covered in very ornate and beautiful carvings.



Inside I spotted this wall hanging.


Poor photo - sorry - just wanted to give you an idea of size. It is much taller than me.


It's a very simple piece but I think very effective.

Anyway, the town itself is very unremarkable so I wondered why it had such a large Church until I found this tower

- the only remaining part of an enormous chateau which would have dominated the town and brought much wealth to the area.

Yesterday we went to the coast with friends and had a lovely picnic in the sunshine. Afterwards we went to visit another friend who gave us a guided tour of the Cognac house that she works for. These amazing stills are made entirely of copper - there are two. She says that soon they will be polished and gleaming ready for distilling this years crop of grapes.



The onion shape is evidently a legal requirement for all Cognac distilleries. Just a beautiful shape.
The tour was of course followed by a tasting of Pineau (a by product of Cognac) and the five different Cognacs that they sell.

A couple of pictures of the courageous little flowers that have been pushing their way through our dry soil.






I hope you all have a lovely weekend with lots of sewing time.


16 comments:

  1. That hanging shows just how effective simplicity can be!

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  2. Congratulations! I am very happy you won. I do that with the jelly roll I won too. I just can't undo that ribbon and open it up. Silly, right? The carving on the church is awesome. If that's the outside, the inside must be fabulous? Very interesting places you visited. Thanks for sharing. ;^)

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  3. Congrats on your win! Wonderful sight seeing pictures.

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  4. That cognac house is pretty amazing! Congratulations on your lovely jelly roll.

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  5. Hello Lin,

    Congratulations on your win of the jelly roll, yes admire and touch are the first things to do when getting new fabric. The craftsmen that were around years ago are amazing do much detail in the carvings. Thanks for sharing.

    Happy days.
    Bev.

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  6. Great win there Lin, enjoy your jelly roll!

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  7. Congrats on that lovely win. I enjoyed your outing....beautiful hanging too x

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  8. It sounds and looks like you had a wonderful trip. Congratulations on your win!

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  9. What a lovely post. Such interesting photos😊 Thanks so much for joining the parade and thanks for recognizing the friends who helped me put it together. One learns how close the blogging world becomes when we receive such great support!

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  10. Congratulations on your prize! And thank you for sharing your trip with us :-)
    xx

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  11. Amazing church and lovely applique hanging.
    The cognac distillery sounds like a great place to visit....I wouldn't be walking in a straight line after those tastings!

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  12. Congratulations on your win of a jelly roll! Thanks so much for sharing the interesting photos with us. I love seeing them. I hope that you get some of the rain that you need.
    Have a great weekend,
    Judy

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  13. You ARE a lucky girl! I have a jelly roll, too, and all I do is admire it! I'm not quite sure what to do with it, but I know if I look at it enough, I'll finally make a decision! Such a lovely ride you took. I love seeing pictures of such old places.

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  14. Congrats on your pretty jelly roll win and for sharing your interesting photos.

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  15. What interesting things you shared in this post! I don't think I've ever seen a cognac distillery before, or I'd have remembered the shape! The little flowers are beautiful. Life that survives the struggle is always very appealing to me. Congratulations on winning the jelly roll. Great fabrics in it.

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  16. Amazing pics there. I am now feeling rather sentimental as I was in Paris for a few days in June last year. Beautiful weather and fantastic places to visit. Also went to Carcassone. So much history.

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