Hello there 

Apologies for the lack of posts in the last week or so – we have been away for the Bank Holiday weekend doing a re-enactment event at Ashby de la Zouche Castle and with that and the general busyness lately have been very slack at blogging. 

I have however been doing quite a lot of stitching and knitting and have some things to share with you. The first pic is of the scissor keep that I made to send to Tracy at Cupcakes at Home – she is having a raffle to raise money for her rescue sheep so do go and visit her and buy tickets. 

I stitched this on my favourite 28 count sparkly evenweave again with Silk Mill  Lilac thread – the design is an adaptation of one called Quaker Tree from The Workbasket  but I just stitched the top of the design. 

 Last week I went on a day trip to London to visit the Victoria and Albert Museum – the reason for the visit was to see an exhibition of quilts but I also got to visit the Textiles collection and drool over all the wonderful stuff that I have seen in books. Have loads of pics from that but will have to spend some time sorting them out. 

While I was there I went to John Lewis as I have read lots of people’s posts about visiting there (also popped into Liberty). Did not buy anything in Liberty but in John Lewis I did buy two of these gorgeous tea light holders for my garden. 

 I also picked up one of their garden furniture mags all full of pics of the good life with the loveliest furniture and knick knacks. I really liked this pic so have stuck it on the wall in my utility room – I wish I could spend my life having afternoon tea in the garden like this! 

 But we have been indulging in the good life here as well as we have had our second BBQ at home this year – which gave me a chance to use my newest Jamie at Home  purchase – my bamboo food covers – aren’t they pretty! 

 I will leave you with some pics of my lovely children – we had a very nice weekend at Ashby and the weather was very kind to us – it was very wet as we were travelling down on Sat but stayed dry all weekend if a bit cold and windy on Sunday. But we did have lots of people come to see us and a couple of very nice evenings round the camp fire – the good life indeed! 

I hope that you all had a lovely weekend – see you back here soon and thanks for visiting.

I had hoped to have pics of a completed bear to show you but though I have been hard at work on her today she is not quite ready. I have sewn together all body parts (the head has turned out very well thankfully!) but I think the arms are too big. So I have left it for tonight as I will have to take them off then unravel an inch or so which needs much concentration. 

I do hope that you have had a lovely weekend – I have after a very busy week at work. I travelled to Leeds on Friday for work and wandered around a bit after – with camera this time – as I had some things I wanted to do. 

Leeds is a very beautiful city with some amazing architecture – particularly the ironwork in the arcades and the terracotta buildings. The picture below shows the lovely roof of the Leeds City Market which is well worth a visit for a real old traditional market. 

While I was wandering round I found this lovely fabric in the remnants bin of one of the stalls – looks very much like blackwork so it had to come home to be part of my stash! 

I also bought these very cute cupcake cases …. 

Then wandered through Victoria Quarter where all the very expensive shop are – Harvey Nichols, Vivienne Westwood etc. 

 The shops in this arcade have the most wonderful window displays like this one from The White Company. 

One of the reasons for wandering was to go and visit the University of Leeds Textile Archive (ULITA) which I have been meaning to do for a while now. My inspiration for going this week was that they had a small Embroiderers’ Guild exhibition from the Leeds branch on – unfortunately I was not able to take any pics but there was some nice stitching there. As well as that exhibition there was a selection of the Textile Archives on display with the theme of Natural Fibres. 

You can go and look at the thousands of things they have in archive via this link  and find info on visiting the collection at the ULITA Wiki – I hope that they do not mind that I have used a couple of pics from there to show you what sort of things they have. 

My favourite pics in their digital archive come from the Louisa Pesel Collection. Louisa was the first President of the Embroiderers’ Guild and collected embroidery from around the world. There are some lovely examples here. 

Will probably not be posting again for a while (unless I make great progress on the bear in the next couple of days) as we are off on a holiday (hurrah!) at the end of the week. My Mum arrives from Spain tomorrow and we are off later in the week to Marrakesh! I am very excited – have been reading my guide book and am really, really looking forward to seeing the wonderful architecture, gardens and markets – I may feel the need to purchase textiles – you just never know! 

Have a good week – thanks for visiting.