Sunshine

Hello all.

Hope you're making the best of the weather.  It's amazing to have good weather again on a Bank Holiday weekend.

So here are a couple of pictures from the garden.

 

 I am sewing - and will have some things to show you soon.

Ryton Organic Gardens

Hello All.

I had a morning out today to Ryton Organic Gardens.

I was lucky as it was a bright sunny morning. Here are some photos of my visit.

And I also wanted to let you know about an exhibition by the Living Threads Group next year called 'Visual Delights'. It's on from 3 - 12 April 2013 at Trent College in Long Eaton.  This group exhibits every other year and I really enjoyed their last exhibition.  Do make a note of the dates and try to go.  I can assure you it's worth the effort.

Hello

Hello all.

Hope you're all well and have been making the most of the great weather.

I was off on Thursday and went to watch a stage of the Tour of Britain. I did take some photos - but they aren't great.  I think you either need to watch something as fast as a cycle race or concentrate on taking photos.  I watched the race as I wanted to make sure I got a glimpse of Bradley Wiggins and Mark Cavendish.  Easy to spot as they were both near the front of the main group.

This isn't Mark Cavendish.  He was riding a bike.  But I thought it looked funny.  

This is the main group - as I said I was watching the race...

I've also been doing some gardening as the weather has been so nice.  I've sown some sweet peas as I keep hearing that sewing in the autumn gets better results.  I've also dug out and planted up some foxgloves and aquilegia. 

So when I've made a bit more progress I'll show you how it's going.

Not much progress on the sewing front at the mo - but I will get on with some this weekend.

Take care.

Poppies

Hello.

I hope you're enjoying the improved weather at the mo.  It's great to see some sunshine.

I thought you might like to see some of the poppies that have overtaken our garden.  We had a bit of a ruthless clear out last night and if it was horizontal it went in the green bin.  Don't worry there are lots left and I'm sure the birds enjoyed all the slugs and snails we exposed.

I ordered some plants and I'm hoping they'll arrive soon so they can fill these gaps.

Anyway. Take care and hope to hear from you soon.

Lovely sewing day

Yesterday I had a lovely time with the Leamington Spa Embroiderers Guild.  The idea was that we would develop our hand embroidery skills by picking a card with 3 stitches listed on.  My first three were Thorn stitch, Van Dyke stitch and Basque knot.  My head really hurt by the end of the day, but it's a really good idea and make you look at things differently.  It's also good to try the stitches with different threads.  I really enjoyed spending time with such a lovely group of ladies.

We all bring a dish along for a faith lunch.  I made Summer Vegetable Couscous.  It was yummy - and healthy too.

It's a beautiful day today. It's not raining YAY. I took a photo of the poppies.  Although they're flowering nicely, you can see the relentless rain has battered them.

Now DH has a bit of an issue with one of our garden visitors.

He's rather persistent and loud!  He doesn't seem to get a sore throat or tired!

So - enjoy the day and I'll post again soon.

Oh the rain...

Well.  It's still raining.  I can't think of a word that conveys the amount of rain we've had. Lots doesn't seem to describe it well enough.

Anyway, it did stop on Monday (for a while) so I took some photos in the garden.  I'm pleased that the lupins and foxgloves seem to like the rain.

Hope you're all ok - and at least dry

Garden update & finally my Malvern purchases

Here's the poppy before it blooms...
And here it is in full bloom

And another with half the pod still on it. I hope you can tell these were taken on a sunny day - very unlike today, it's wet, windy and cool.

Here is my first batch of Malvern purchases - yes it's purple

And here's the yellow.

They will both be ending up in a quilt - together. I promise I'll show you what it looks like.

Here are 3 more I needed to complete the requirements for another quilt. We've received our requirement lists for our sewing camp week - so that's what I'm getting ready for.

Hope you're all had a relaxing Bank Holiday weekend. I certainly need one after last weekend with a class at the Bramble Patch and then a day out at Malvern - I was shattered by the time Wednesday came around.

Spring has sprung

Spring has sprung here. This weekend the weather has been amazing - bright and sunny. And the plants are starting to get going now. As you'll see in the next few photos, narcisii, snowdrop (next to Buddha) and a crocus. They're looking a bit lonely at the mo but I'm sure lots of other things will start appearing very soon.

And here are some of my attempts at the creativity thing. The idea is that you change the scale of the shapes you've cut out and see how they work in a realtionship. As DH often says I'm so happy with some pictures, a glue stick and a sketchbook.

And finally here is another little look at part of my Bosworth Water Tower piece. I think I've finished the quilting now - but I might change my mind at the next class... LOL

I've alos sent in my entry form for Trentham, Stoke-on-Trent - so has the rest of the group. So now we're all committed - if you know what I mean.

Hope you've all had a great weekend. Hopefully England are winning at Rugby and then we're off to the pub for a coffee.

PS -please excuse my spelling - the spellchecker on Blogger seems to have given up. Is anyone else having the same problem?

Sunny weather

Honestly - we've had sun for a day and a half now. This means everyone has dashed out to mow their lawn - if they were anything like ours it was 2 foot long in places. As you can see from the photo above the garden is very wild. For those of you who've been watching the Tour de France from London you too will have seen that we've had sunshine. You can't believe how wet it's been - when it's rained it has rained for hours at a time and really heavily - there were even hailstones in some places. We have another show in the village and it had to be cancelled as the ground was so wet and it was thought too many vehicles (lots of horse boxes) would get stuck. Hope you're all having the right weather for the season you're in.

Anyway I have been crafting. I've made another raggy cushion. This one is for a demo I'm giving at our sewing retreat at the end of the month. I've still go to write the instructions but I don't think that'll take too long.

I'm also STILL hand quilting my rather large quilt - but the end is in sight. I'm on the final border now. My aim is to have finished the quilting by the time I go to sewing retreat and then to put the binding on whilst I'm there. I made the binding up last time I was there with scraps - and I've just measured it and it's 1.5 inches wide - ohhhh I think it's going to be tight but I'm sure it'll be fine.

I'm still amazed by the number of red dots on my map and the number of hits on my page - I'd love to hear from you all.

Humid days

Well - we're on about our third unbearable humid day. It's really hot, close and cloudy. However the plants don't seem to mind; although I think they could use some rain. Above are the geraniums in our front garden and below are my fantastic poppies - the are big and blousey.


And this lunch time in the village the garden of Michaelmas House was open - it's beautiful; very cottage garden. They also have a studio at the bottom of the garden where they display sculpture and paintings during the summer. The shop is great - a really good range of items and something to suit everones pocket.


Thanks again to those of you who are sending comments - it's so nice to hear from you all out there.