I have created this blog to share my interest in all forms of stitching, quilting, sewing, knitting, medieval re-enactment and costume making – particularly my love of historical embroidery. I also love travelling,especially when it also involves any of my other interests.
We always really look forward to June as we have two family birthdays – Jake’s first followed by one of our favourite events then my birthday at the end of June.
Jake was fifteen last week – luckily the scanner is not connected to this PC since I had my switch round so he is spared the embarrassment of a baby photo ( he was very cute!) but here he is looking very grown up with some of his pressies.
My very lovely (and very tall!) son
We went to Tatton Hall near Manchester this last weekend – this is a really good venue for an event, there is a very nice 15th C Old Hall and we camp near a copse of trees in the deer park with beautiful views of the parkland. It is also the nearest event we do which is a bonus!
It was a little bit wet on Sat and for our pack up – tent hanging in the garage drying again – but not too bad and it stayed fine for the battle both days. Here are the boys in our camp all ready for battle on the Sat.
The boys from OFK and Team Falchion ready for battle
These are our friends Stan, Denise and Carl from Companions of the Crow looking very scary.
The Crows
Lady Bardolph was again looking very lovely in a cream and blue outfit.
Lord and Lady Bardolph
Me and the kids stayed over till Monday and had a nice evening on Sun relaxing in the camp, playing cards and watching the sun go down…
This weekend we were camping again but here in Yorkshire. Some friends, Jane and Patch, who live locally have a beautiful barn conversion which used to be an old mill complete with large mill pond – see pic below.
The mill pond
They host a little gathering every year where we all go and camp, bbq, have a bit of a sing song round the campfire etc. in the field attached to their house. This year we were entertained as well by friends who have band called Stringfellows.
Stringfellows bandEllie and Jake chilling out to the band
We had a really lovely time and it was nice to catch up with a few people I have not seen recently.
Our little weekend away tent
Last year I downsized a bit and bought a smaller tent that I could take more easily on the train – the pic above shows us in it this weekend. It is a Vango 500 and is a great tent for a couple of nights away with plenty of space for sleeping, kit storage and cooking if the weather is not good. It has its first outing in on a clifftop in Cornwall last year when we did the Tintagel event and survived a very windy pitching and a few heavy rainstorms which is a very good test of any tent.
We still have the very large tunnel tent (nicknamed the aircraft hangar) which I will use again when I get a car, two small two man tents (one of which is Ellie’s) and a medieval tent. I love tents – could quite happily own loads and loads and love spending time when camping going round and looking at other people’s tents!
The weather was fab – apart from a short but heavy shower about 10pm Sat night there was sunshine all round. It has been really hot today as well so after we got home and cleaned, sorted and re-packed the tent ready for the event next weekend (hurrah more camping!!!) I did a bit of a garden tidy up.
I have also finally put together the new bike I bought myself a while ago – it was a winter sale bargain but it has been in its box waiting to be fettled. Being a well trained girlie I was able to put it together with a bit of help from Ellie keeping it steady as I sorted the brake calipers. Just need to get a new bike pump and I can be off!
My new pink bike!
Had another bbq for tea tonight – must be the 7th one so far which is a bit of a record for this time of year – weather has just been so nice we need to make the most of it and I love cooking outdoors.
Have had a busy week costume making – have completed a new peasant dress for Ellie and three pairs of brais (trousers) for Jake and two of the boys in the group. Am off tomorrow to a goldwork day workshop at my Embroiderers’ Guild so am really looking forward to that. Will post some pics of what I do later.
Saturday was my very last day of teaching for this year and Ellie has now finished all her A level exams so we are looking forward to a very mellow summer of camping, stitching and generally chilling out. Life is very good!!!
It has cooled down a bit in the last few days sadly but we have been having some really fab weather here recently! Apologies for the lack of posts but what with work and general busyness have not had time to do much. However today was the last teaching session of the year so apart from the huge piles of marking I have to do things will be a little quieter from now till Sept!
We had a wonderful show at Ashby de La Zouche Castle the last May Bank Holiday. Traditionally this is a very wet event which we packed lots of warm gear for but it was so sunny that lots of us got burnt on the Sunday (it was actually a little bit warm for being in armour but can’t complain!). A brill weekend and I have some pics to share with you of the event.
Our little medieval tent in the evening sunshineJake relaxing in the evening Round the fire with our lovely friend KeithOur headress display
I finally managed to give the girls their scissor keeps which they were all very pleased with – this is a pic of them displaying their gifts!
The scissor keeps with their owners
Over the years I have made them various blackwork and needlepoint gifts for them and Tracy and Bev had some of theirs with them so I got a chance to take some pics as pre-blogging I didn’t keep a record of my stitching.
Decorated initial in needlepoint as a pin box made for Tracy in one of her earlier medieval rolesBev's pin box - a decorated M
Bev also had the blackwork pin box I had made for her as the start of the set – last year I made needlebooks – of which there are pictures in the Finishes 2007 link above if you are interested. Bev’s motif is an oak leaf so I have used this or acorns in all her gifts.
Bev's blackwork pin box
We have had wonderful weather here at home – last weekend was gorgeous which was lucky as I have had miles of hedges to cut and lawn and general garden stuff to do. We had 3 barbecues in four days which was lovely and ate outside for all our other meals as well – it was fab!
Jake waiting for his sausages to be cookedEllie revising in the sun
There now follows a whole string of event and holiday weekends, only got a couple where we are not busy between now and September so lets hope for more lovely weather! Are off camping at a friends’ place this weekend so more prawns on the barbie and beers in the cooler – it is a very nice life indeed!!!
A couple of weeks ago I went to the official dedication of the new building that we built at the scout campsite as part of the Project Nepal experience. It was really lovely to see everyone again and I will post some further pics of the building on my Project Nepal web page. The main structure is finished but it still needs work on the interior and landscaping.
This is a pic of me next to the stone in the building that I carved my initials on. You can’t see them but they are there honest!
My bit of the wall!
We had a lovely evening with a fab meal and talk by Doug Scott, the mountaineer who set up Community Action Nepal the charity we worked with , who showed us some of his pics of mountains. We also saw the videos that were made of both the build in the UK – over the 12 months of the project- and the build in Nepal – over the 2 weeks we were in the village. That was just brilliant to see and brought back so many memories. It was a very emotional moment. I am very glad that I was able to go given all that happened last summer and it was such an amazing experience. It was so good in so many ways – re-affirming my faith in myself and my restored health, the fact that I managed all the very hard physical work given the state of my mobility a few years ago, and just brilliant fun as well.
There is another project planned which will start later this year – I would love to be involved in some way but don’t know if I would be able to go to Nepal with them again. Lots of things are still very up in the air with job and future plans so can’t really make any definite arrangements for Oct 2010 at this point but hopefully I can help with the project anyway.
As well as the success of the project in terms of the building we did there were some lovely outcomes that no-one expected. We were saying at the evening that there definitely must have been something in the water out there in Nepal as three romances came out of the project , two between project participants and one between one of the project members and one of the Nepalese team who looked after us out there. Kim went back to Nepal in Feb and married Bijou and she is now waiting for his visa to be sorted so he can come to the UK.
There were also two weddings, one just before and one soon after (and that couple now have a baby on the way!) I think that the reason why all of this happened is that when you are halfway round the world away from all the people you love you realise what is important in your life and what you want to hang on to. It is lovely that there was so much happiness from the project.
Things have been busy at work but my full time students have finished – they bought me some lovely presents which was very kind of them.
They know me very well and bought me some very nice wine and the most enormous glasses to drink it from.
The box with the very large glasses!The very lovely red wine
We are away this weekend at Ashby de La Zouche Castle with the re-enactment group – I am nearly done with the packing for this and we will be there till Monday evening. Hopefully we will have some good weather as it has rained really badly most of the week here!
The battles at this event took place on Sunday and Monday and were fairly small by event standards as this is not a large venue – only probably about 100 people on the battlefield including some very fine archers who did a great job of firing at the English. We were on the Welsh side and Ellie and I water carried on the Sunday (she did that alone on Monday while I packed up the tent so that we could get the early train home!).
Before the battle - lining up with the flags
This picture shows the Welsh troops just before the battle began – our lot are at the back of that somewhere!
Lots of pointy sticks!
Since it was not a recreation of a particular battle but a scripted event there were lots of different weapons – these are pikes on the left with a bardiche (large silver blade) on the right of the picture with some swords in the background.
So lots of shiny armour everywhere and as it was one of the very first events of the season there were lots of people with very new kit. This man Gaius ,of the Medieval Combat Society , was camped opposite us and he kindly let me take some pics of his very new and very shiny armour!
Look at the detail on that!
These are his shiny new arms …..
More shiny things!
and shiny new legs!
It was great to catch up with all our friends, have a drink or two.
Richard was there with his partner, my good friend Kat who is the very talented costume and headdress maker that I have mentioned in earlier posts. They were out for the day with Isabella their daughter who has just turned 1 years old. Look at this for an adorable re-enactment family!
The main events of the weekend took place on Sunday and Monday with a mix of fight displays, archery, manorial court and a battle each day – Welsh against English of course!
We were camped in an ordinary tent in the field out of the way of the public but there was a large display of tents in the Living History section where the rest of Team Falchion were.
This pic shows us in camp ready to have lunch on Sunday.
The Falchion camp
I am in the middle of this pic in a blue dress and pale blue coif (headgear) and my daughter Ellie and son Jake are next to me in dark cloaks.
I did spend part of the day dressed as a lady but it was a bit cold!
Me in my gold dress and torque headdress
We took a wander round the Living History camp and came across the Knights of Longshanks who had a lovely display of weaving of all different forms. One of the group – Alice Fitton – was creating a sampler of tablet weaving patterns as shown in the pics below.
Alice with her samplerA close up of the sampler
This is what I love about re-enactment. As well as the general fun and the beer tent and the friends there are so many people who are into all of the stuff that I am and I am constantly meeting people who are interested in stitching and costume. I could have stayed talking to Alice for ages but the rest of the family were getting a bit bored!
The day ended with a beautiful sunny evening. Thanks to Shirley , our camp cook, for an excellent beef and ale stew and then Darryl ,the group’s minstrel, did a bit of musical improvisation with the kids round the campfire before we all headed off for the beer barn again! It’s a hard life …….
Smoke gets in your eyes .... Darryl with his lute and Ellie on tambourineJake trying out the lute
I have so many pics that I want to post from our recent event at Cosmeston Medieval Village in South Wales that I have split it into a few posts. Apologies for not posting these sooner – we did not get back till 11pm on Bank Holiday Monday evening and what with working all week and being away at Stefon’s all weekend have had no time at all.
We had really good weather all weekend – it rained a bit when we arrived on Fri while we were pitching the tent (typical!) but then was really nice Sat and Sun with cooler weather on Monday.
Saturday we did not have a show so went for a walk on the beach – walked about 3 miles on an amazing rocky beach at Lavernock Point then ended up at a very nice pub for lunch.
Here are me and the kids in a very album cover type shot.
Us at Lavernock Point
Got back to camp about 4pm and then later into the beer tent (or beer barn in this case as the Tithe Barn in the village is used for events!) for a few more ciders and some mead. Ellie was able to buy her first pint at an event!
Darryl, Shirley and Darren at the beer barn!
I have included some pics of the village so that you can see what it is like – it is a wonderful place – a recreation of a 14th century village that died out in the plague. For a re-enactor this is heaven – authentic dark, smoky cottages, chickens running around, pigs in the piggery and lots of mud when it rains. It has an amazing atmosphere and I love going there.
Part of the village with the archers' encampmentClose up of one of the village housesInside one of the cottagesA weaving loom inside one of the cottagesClose up of the weavingThe Cosmeston pigs asleep - they are huge!
Will post some more pics of the actual event later in the week.
As I mentioned in my last post we had our first show at Bolsover last weekend so I thought I would share some pics of that with you.
Bev in peasant dress
Here is Bev looking very lovely all dressed up for her morning role as a peasant – in this role she does calligraphy and takes part in the manorial court and the archery display – involving being ‘rescued’ by Robin Hood!
Ellen at Bolsover
This is wonderful daughter Ellie all dressed up as Lady Rose – this pic was taken early in the morning by the kitchen awning where we cook and eat – you can see what a lovely day it was, really bright and sunny.
Neville looking very dashing
John Neville (in real life Mark) is one of our newest fighters and here he is in his lovely new surcoat and mantle (covering on top of the helmet).
Willian de Bouen faces Despencer
This photo shows on the left our other new fighter William de Bouen (in real life Paul Martin) who has done a great job of painting the heraldry on his surcoat.
My new nun's outfit
I managed to finish a new outfit just in time for the show – nothing radical but the old one was very faded and had shrunk – I was showing my ankles which is very frowned upon for a C14 nun!
The very scary dragon being shot by Pete and Bev
Since it was a St George’s Day show we had the dragon – very well played by Luke who is being shot here during the archery display – he is very well padded!
My role during the tournament, which is the last part of the show is to make sure that all the knights have water, to keep an eye on the crowd in general to be alert for any issues and to make sure they all shout very loudly for their favourite knight!
We have another event coming up this weekend in South Wales at the Cosmeston Medieval Village which I am very excited about – check the Events 2009 page for details of that.
Tomorrow evening I am going to Bradley Wood Scout Camp site for the official opening of the building that I helped build as part of Project Nepal. Have not been able to get down to the site in recent months due to work and general family stuff so I am really looking forward to seeing everyone I went to Nepal with again.
Will post pics of both events some time next week.
We have had a lovely start to the new re-enactment season with our first show at Bolsover Castle. The weather was really good – we have all come back glowing with red noses – not bad for April! We had about 800 people attend today which is very good so thank you to everyone who came including my friend Ange and her partner Paul.
It was brilliant to be round the camp fire last night . It was a bit chilly last night but only to be expected this early in the year and I had the joy of cooking the first lot of bacon and sausage butties outdoors of the year. I absolutely love camping!!!!!!
My good friend Lady Bardolph was there (also known as Lyn) and I was really pleased to see her as she has been in hospital for a major operation so it was lovely to see her looking so well. She has a new medieval tent which she had made all the hangings and bed covers for and also had the most beautiful heraldic embroidery that she had done over winter.
This is Lady Bardolph in all her finery.
Lady Bardolph at Bolsover Castle
She is wearing a blue brocade underdress and a red velvet surcoat over that. Her head dress is a red velvet torque which you can see in detail below.
The torque showing the braiding and beading detail
Below are pictures of hers and her husband’s heraldry in embroidery . These have been stitched on linen using mainly satin stitch – the detail is wonderful! These hang in her new tent.
Lord Bardolph's heraldryDetail of the griffon at the top of the crestLady Bardolph's heraldryDetail of the swan on the crest
Am off to bed very soon as am very pleasantly tired but very happy – have a busy week ahead at work and then we are off again on Friday to South Wales for another event over the Bank Holiday weekend. Have just put up my Events 2009 page – not complete yet but it does gives details of the Wales event and the next May Bank Holiday one so do visit and remember to come and say hello if you visit one of our shows!
I was lucky enough to go for a day to the recent EG conference in Sheffield. My lovely children paid for this as a Mothers’ Day present and I had a wonderful day out listening to talks about embroidery and having a visit to a Sheffield branch of the EG and to the Sheffield Cathedral. Sadly I forgot to take my camera but took a few pics using my phone which Ellie was kind enough to transfer for me.
The first talk was an illustrated lecture by Anthea Godfrey on embroidery as used in haute couture and had the most beautiful images of all sorts of techniques used on the catwalk. She teaches embroidery at the London College of Fashion Arts – I would love to be able to study there but will have to content myself at the moment with my local guild meetings and some day workshops!
After lunch we went to one of the local Sheffield Guilds for a talk by Diane Grant about ecclesiastical embroidery and the work of Beryl Dean. I have read a couple of Beryl’s books before and it was a very good talk illustrated with Beryl’s work throughout her lifetime. Below is an example from the 1950s, this piece is in the V and A museum and features a stylised disciple or maybe Jesus with a fish and net.
Beryl Dean's panel
The guild members had also put on a small display of their work which was brilliant – one particular member called Marjorie Holford had done some Elizabethan sweetbags which I really liked – she had larger display of those at the main conference hall.
After that we went to Sheffield Cathedral which was treat in itself as I love visiting any church and had a special display of their ecclesiastical textiles which were very lovely. Most of the priest’s robes were quite modern but there were also some older pieces which I really love and I have put some pics of these below.
Image from an altar frontal at Sheffield CathdralGoldwork on the priests' scarfA banner which had been restored by the church embroiderers
I must go back with my camera one day and get some shots of the cathedral.
I have been busy stitching a few gifts recently and have a couple of finishes to show. The first one is a blackwork scissor keep that I have been working on for a friend – I am making five of these in total.
Blackwork scissor keep
The design is a motif from one of my Lesley Wilkins blackwork books.
I have the rest of the scissor keeps to finish but need to get on with sewing up a new nun’s outfit that I have cut out as we have our first re-enactment event this weekend. It is at Bolsover Castle in Derbyshire on Sunday from 10 – 4pm so if you are in the area do come along and say hello. I will be easy to spot being the only nun in the place! I am very excited that the season is starting again – nights under canvas and sitting round a real fire – bliss! Hopefully the weather will be as nice as it has been this past week.
