A Couple of Finishes

 Well, small finishes! Two more Wings and Pretty things blocks are complete.

As usual not easy to photograph - the background fabric always comes out darker than it is and the applique lighter! Looking forward to moving onto the next blocks now.

Some gorgeous tulips have appeared in the half barrel that is planted up in our garden.

I had to use these in my sketchbook and these two pages are the result.

A long weekend here which means a car boot sale on the local playing field - I wonder what treasures we shall find! Which reminds me that I havn't shown you last times treasure yet - something for my next post!

Happy May Day

FNSI

 Good Friday and it's Friday Night Sew In which Wendy is extending to Easter Weekend Sew In. Click here to see who joined in and what they are getting up to. I thought I would start by posting my Friday work and will catch up later with anything else I work on over the weekend.

 During the afternoon I worked in my #31daysartjournal sketchbook, now well into 40+ days but I finally have a couple of pages I am calling finished.

I love Ranunculus flowers and this one flowered on my kitchen window sill for most of March and into April so deserved a two page spread.

Then during the evening I added two pink RSC Dresdens to my quilt, they had been finished for a few days so just needed pressing and appliqueing.

Not many more of these little ones to do then I must do four rainbow Dresdens for the corners.

On Thursday I finished these Winwick Mum Easy Lace socks from her book More Super Socks. The lace bit really is easy and I love her heel. Next to try I think is the pattern for Easy Cable Socks - its some time since I did a cable. Meanwhile I can crack on with the hat that I bought the yarn for last week.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend and Happy Easter!

A Grand Day Out

 But before we get to that, Bloglovin seems to have gone AWOL so if I have not been to visit you lately that will be the reason why. Hopefully I will soon catch up.

Now to my day out! On Saturday a couple of old friends invited me to join them on a trip to RHS Rosemoor for The Great Wool Weekend - and what a lovely day we had. A pleasant drive through the Devon countryside, up hill, down dale and through narrow lanes brought us to the delightful gardens at Rosemoor.

We headed straight for The Garden Room which was housing the wool weekend not knowing what to expect but were very pleasantly surprised. There were a good number of stalls there and the quality of the products on sale excellent. Much of the knitting wool was locally produced and it was all top quality - not a ball of acrylic anywhere! Lots of local makers, spinners, felters and a lovely lady weaving on a triangular frame which we had never come across before.

It was very busy so after a walk all the way around we decided to regroup over lunch and plan our buying strategy! Lunch from the restaurant was delicious and served very quickly, we were impressed. Having regained our strength we set off around the Garden Room again making our purchases. By this time the crowds had diminished and we had more of a chance to chat to the stallholders and browse properly. I was very restrained buying just a pair of socks and a skein of beautiful silk and merino yarn with which to knit a hat for next winter.

One of our party was tempted by a triangular loom which you can glimpse being demonstrated in the picture below.

At this point she was showing my friend how to set up the loom having just removed a completed triangle which you can see by her left hip. The completed triangles can be sewn or crocheted together to make scarves, shawls, blankets, ponchos etc and the frames come in a variety of sizes. My friend bought the next size up from the one on show which luckily fitted in to the car. She was duly christened Rosie after Rosemoor!

These cheeky three made appearances throughout the day.

A couple of views of the Garden Room towards the end of the day when it was nice and quiet.

We did manage an hour to look around the beautiful gardens but there is a lot to see and so definitely worth a return visit.

The beautiful statue of a soldier is almost dead centre in the picture below.

Couldn't resist these in the apple orchard!

And these were in the kitchen garden.

Returned home tired but happy after a Grand Day Out.

Last week

 Looking back through my photographs I realised that we crammed a lot in to last week!

We started out on Monday morning with a trip in to Taunton for some shopping and to see The Moon which was hanging in Taunton's new Minster, St Mary Magdalene church. 

Glad we went early as there were pictures in the press of huge queues waiting to go in. Well worth the visit as it was an amazing sight and the setting in the church was stunning.

We found time  for a couple of afternoon drives and it was good to be out and about again in the Somerset countryside. One afternoon we visited Fyne Court and enjoyed a short walk in the park. Spotted these trees with their roots growing above ground. Lots of interesting shapes in there.

It was a chilly afternoon - fortunately we missed the snow shower as we were in the book snug browsing the second hand books!

A second afternoon found us at Nettlecombe where we visited the interesting church. It's looking very picturesque in this picture which I snapped waiting for an enormous lorry to pass us - not what we had expected to find down a narrow Somerset lane!

I finished up two more Wings and Pretty Things blocks.

Earlier in the week we had to visit Wiveliscombe and I enjoyed a wander round this old town. I was attracted to these old house fronts with their lovely carvings.

The Jubilee Gardens, built for The Queens Silver Jubilee in 1977 had some interesting features. I loved these gates

and this totem erected in tribute to children and families of the First World War. I hope that you will be able to see some of the lovely details if you click on the pictures to enlarge them.

You will be pleased to hear that the bathroom renovations are well under way, that we now have a flushing toilet and will be allowed to use the new shower tomorrow evening!

Until next time.

Friday Night with Friends....

 ....has come around very quickly again and April is here. Whoops, did someone say April! We have woken up to clear skies and a very white frost this morning, not April weather in my book.

Friday was a chilly, windy day and my plans for FNWFs changed somewhat. We had our new bathroom delivered in the morning all ready for installation starting on Monday. This is just half of it - the rest is in the garage.

Then off to the hairdressers - new to me as it was my first cut in UK for many years. Anyway I do seem to have struck lucky and have a nice cut so no traumas there.

Anyway, back to FNWFs and the best laid plans! 1st of the month and there is a new colour for RSC, so after lunch I popped out to my fabric stash which currently resides in the garage. And yes, there it was all safe and inaccessible behind the other half of the new bathroom! So I spent a happy hour fiddling round in my sketchbooks before we decided to go out for a drive.

It is lovely exploring round the narrow lanes of Somerset and we ended up at Nettlecombe where we stopped to look around this attractive little church.

Having no sewing prepped for the evening I pulled out my knitting and cracked on with the second lacy sock which is progressing nicely.

I am thinking that I will knit a hat next - the chilly wind here over the last few days meant that I pulled out a boring purchased black hat which could be replaced with something more interesting for next winter.

Many thanks to Cheryll for hosting us again this month and I will be back soon with some sewing updates.