On the Sunday of Kerry’s weekend visit to Worcester we visited the cathedral for the morning sung Eucharist service which was beautiful. The choir sounded so amazing and it made a lovely start to the day. The cathedral is where Ellen graduated all those years ago so I have visited several times before. There is a lot of restoration work being done so opportunities for pictures of the nave and painted ceiling were limited but it looked stunning.

In the afternoon we went to Coughton Court, a Trust property that was involved in the Gunpowder Plot. I have visited before and was stunned to find that they have what is allegedly the nightshift that Mary Queen of Scots wore when she was executed. The house and the family that own it have a long history of involvement in the disputes between Catholics and the state that started in the Tudor era. The property was beautiful in the afternoon sun.

There was a very interesting talk about the plot in the small Catholic church on the property, built in the late 1800s when the Catholics were allowed to build churches once again. It is easy to forget that we have had religious persecution in the UK at many points in our history and that there are lots of things that people have forgotten about the whole story behind the Gunpowder Plot and why it happened.

The church had some gorgeous chairs with central needlepoint panels, there were about 40 of these so definitely a labour of love!

It has an extensive collection of family portraits, which I wrote about in my last post, which are such good illustrations of costume of the era, and some lovely little displays. I loved this little beauty case with the scissors and the little souvenir book.

There were also some of my favourite things to find, like this needlework case and the lace making tools.

There were clearly some dedicated needlewomen in the family as there were some very large projects, most of these were in one bedroom. I have been doing a lot of research for my first novel so have been thinking a lot about the role of needlework in women’s lives.

There are very few modern crafters who would take on projects of this size and the amount of hours that must have gone into these pieces is incredible.

Just looking at the thousands of tiny stitches in this seat cover below I can’t help but wonder about how made it, did they ever feel like giving up and how long did it take them? I did some needlepoint many years ago but have not returned to it due to how long it takes, so really admire the dedication of these needlewomen.

I have had a fairly quiet week, most of the crafting has been finished so I will be posting about that next. I have been spending the last few weeks before I return to Spain stocking up on things for the rest of the year that I can’t easily get there. I have more Liberty fabric arriving this week from a new supplier that I have found byLaurenRuth and have bought some more stitching threads. Next week will be mainly sorting and packing up ready to go to Ellen’s the following week, then back to Spain with my new machine and all of my goodies!

I hope that you have a good weekend and a nice week ahead, the weather forecast for the UK is very good so we will all be enjoying a glimpse of sun. What ever you are doing have fun, take care, stay safe and thanks for visiting.