Cornwall day 2

Again another lovely sunny day so we set off for Lanhydrock a National Trust property just north of where we are staying.

A buggy ride from the car park to the formal gardens and house was much appreciated.

The photos do not seem to be in the right order but it’s almost time for dinner so.....

A welcome cream tea after walking around the gardens and house.

The most amazing ceiling depicting stories from the bible.

This is when schools were schools!

I love my slow cooker, glad it does not take up this amount of room in my kitchen.

An amazing contraption, that works it’s self with heat and smoke from the fire. Glad I don’t have to clean it!

St Hydroc church in the grounds of the Manor House.

Above the altar an incredible carving of the Lords last supper

Formal gardens were well maintained

There are about 300 rooms to visit and a secret lift I was allowed to use as my knees have been playing me up so much.

Cornwall holiday

We arrived in Newquay Cornwall yesterday for a weeks holiday. New to us we booked with  Alfa holidays self drive, staying at the Eliot Hotel.

First impressions are very good, we have a nice room with walk in shower on the first floor.

With time to kill before we could get into our room we drove a short distance to a National Trust beach and walked to the sea in the sun shine.

After a very nice dinner we went for a short walk to The Slope, a steep access to the sea, fortunately there was a seat with a wonderful view half way down, where we stopped and breathed in the sea air.

View to the right

View to the left

Haddenham Village Fete

The day started gloomy and overcast but we set off to attend the village fete at Haddenham, stopping for a very nice lunch at Brewers Fayre in Bicester. As the day wore on the sun came out and by the time we arrived at the Fete it was a beautiful day and very hot.
Olivia, whom I had helped to start on the road to a sewing career, had arranged a wonderful display in the church with dresses from 1880 to 1980 complete with many interesting items from each era.

Her brother Jerome had arranged a vintage car and tractor display. There were also a number of wonderful open gardens plus of course all the fun of the fete.

A really nice afternoon, even though the ice cream queue was always so long we never did get one!

Part of the display in the church by Olivia

Pretty Christening gowns from long ago

Olivia in a dress she made standing with some of her exhibits

Old cars and open gardens

All the fun of the fete

Part of the display arranged by Jerome

Haddenham village pond

Sunday Best display by Olivia Flaxton

Busy June IAM day

What a great day with my friends in the Happy Room. Not sure there was a lot of craft work going on, but certainly lots of chatting and a great selection of "Show and Tell" after lunch.

Pauline had made a very pretty cushion

Another by Pauline

Christmas comes early with a Christmas stocking by Pauline

We all fell in love with Pauline's rabbit

Ann had made a baby blanket with the softest wool.

Jenny was busy with her doll making, any Brownie or ballet dancer would just adore these.

Shirley had completed her crochet blanket

Another by Shirley in beautiful colours

Pin cushion by Penny, too nice to put pins in!

Penny's Southwold quilt for her daughter 

Blue Blue and more blue

I seem to be going through a BLUE period, which is unusual for me as I am very much a RED person!

About a month ago I started knitting a Hill Top Shawl by Helen Stewart using a 4mm 100cm long circular needle. I love her patterns as every row is listed and also the number of stitches that should be on the needles each row. Starting with a cast on of only five stitches it quickly increased to 383!

I used 4ply yarn, (25% wool and 75% Polyacryl,) by Dy choice bought on sale for the princely sum of £2 it knitted up fairly well.

I have been having a problem with my hands and terrible cramp, this is under investigation by the Doctor and I await a series of blood tests. The weight of the knitting project probably did not help.
At one point I knitted two rows of garter stitch too many, 608 stitches, there was no way I was going to undo that many, so I adjusted the next set of garter stitches to match it... life is too short to go backwards!

Blocking the finished shawl, as soon as I completed the pinning I realised it was upside down, hey ho!

My Christmas Tree modelling the shawl in the sunshine

BLUE item number two... to give my hands a rest I started a new quilt, rail fence with diamonds.

Again I choose BLUE, a jelly roll this time with an accent yellow diamond.

It will probably be a charity quilt and I have not really decided on the size yet.

Using my EQ7 computer programme I have worked out quantities for a 39x51  or a 50x60  size quilt.

Joining three strips together and cutting into 6 1/2 squares

Adding a few diamonds and laying out a few blocks to see the effect.

Warwickshire/Worcestershire Fords

Set off early this morning to follow a Tulip map route Chris had collected from 2016. It took us one and half hours to reach the starting point outside a pub in the middle of nowhere!
The main attraction of this route were the many Fords to wade through, plus we had not travelled in this area before.

Armed with Tulip maps and Ordinance Survey maps!

This start of our Green Lane adventure is VERY green !
Need to keep the windows closed to stop the stinging nettles attacking me!

The first of many Fords looks a bit tame, cannot imagine it getting to the top of the height marker.

Chris stopped in the middle of this Ford to take a photo of the Pack bridge

Ah this one looks better... splish splash

For the sake of a photo I get out and walk across the footpath bridge

Gentle approach until you know how deep it is.

At this point I realised the walkway went off into a field and there did not look like a way to get back to the car!

Will I see you again?
A short walk through a field and a gate let me back onto the lane and rescue.

Lots of these signs everywhere

Even though there is a foot bridge I'm not getting out again to get lost in the brambles.

Looks like a couple of streams meet at this point

Another pretty bridge as we drive through the water

A really brilliant day out, sun was just bright enough but not too hot, the lanes were fun although some were extremely overgrown, Chris thought at one point he would have to get his saw out [always prepared] to get through the tangle of trees. We found a nice spot where only the birds could be heard to have our pack up lunch.

Seven hours after leaving home we arrived back for a  most welcome cuppa.

A walk in the sunshine

One of our favourite walks starts at Brampton Halt and is easy walking along the side of the heritage railway. There always seems to be something new to see and this time we were surprised at how much rolling stock seemed to be on the rails, some we had not seen before.

I know nothing about trains but liked this pretty blue one...

Funny how the steps soon count up when you are train spotting

Chris was impressed with this crane undergoing some restoration work.

Costco fun day

Here we are the last day of May, the time seems to be flying by.

This is half term week for my granddaughters and we were lucky enough to have them here for two days. Having taken them to Costco on a previous visit I asked if they would like to go again. They were so excited you would have thought I had given them a sweet shop!

Ipads were used to "shop" while we waited until it was time to leave, what fun choosing everything from a shed (£4500) for Grandad and a ring (£29000) for me. Then they added a sauna, Jacuzzi, 4.5kg of jellybeans ( dentist need afterwards) TV for about £2000, climbing frame, etc etc...

Eleanor decided she would just cross off the things on her list if she found them, thank goodness they would not fit in the trolley!

trying out the rocking, swivelling garden furniture

We decided to shop, I really did not need many things as I had been with a friend recently, and then eat at the cafe. The demonstrators were doing a roaring trade and Abigail and Chris tried everything, while Eleanor and I just went for a few tasters...

Eventually it was time to check out and go to the cafe, where we purchased four extremely large jacket potatoes, with cheese, chili and baked bean fillings and four drinks all for the pricely sum of £8.50.

Yummy lunch

Thank you Costco for all the fun we had, plus the bargains of course.