A weekend away from sewing

I know I spend far too much time indoors - like all of us real work and housework take up most of my waking hours.

So with an unfit husband and an overweight dog in tow I headed for the north Lincolnshire coast on Sunday.

Both Neil and I spent much of our childhood in and around Holbeach (although we never met...), and the flat countryside and sea marshes are familiar to us but neither of us have been there for many years.

Sunday took us beyond Holbeach St Matthew to an isolated part of The Wash SSSI (Site of Special Scientific Interest).
Although it was glorious day there was a heavy breeze but it was beautifully clear and we could see for miles.

This part of the marsh has a real operational role as a bombing range for the RAF.

Meet Sparky our Bichon Frise - I think he was asking to be taken home for a rest!

We enjoyed ourselves so much we went back today! This time we were slightly further east at Gedney Drove End. As you can see the coast was deserted - we only saw one other couple all the time we were there, who turned out to be neighbours of ours from some ten years ago that we haven't seen since we moved away - what a small world!

Another clear day (with no breeze at all) meant we could see the wind-farm that is offshore of Skegness, and across to Hunstanton, the only west facing resort on the east coast.

Neil is proud of this photo with the dark clouds casting a shadow over part of the sea bank,

And he thinks the clouds are atmospheric in this one.

I hope this might become a regular outing - we could all do with the exercise!

Festival Of Quilts

Yesterday I went The Festival Of Quilts. I apologise now because this is a picture heavy post, It's not all the pictures I took though!
I didn't go on my own I was with Neil, Pam her partner Rob and mum. We all had a great time.

The standard of the quilts was outstanding they were all beautiful.

Next year I think I may have to go and stay overnight as I would have liked to have spent longer looking at the quilts. We arrived before the doors opened and left about 4ish but it just wasn't long enough.
I can't put names to any of the pictures but I am sure will agree with me that they are wonderful.

The detail in this face is amazing. It must have taken the artist ages - it looks like a pencil drawing but as you get closer you start to see the stitches and you are left in awe at the artist's talent.

I hope you enjoyed the pictures.

A Lazy Sunday

Today we went to Tattershall Castle, we were keen to see the exhibition they are holding - The House Of Bling.
I really don't understand where that title came from and neither did a lot of the other visitors. It wasn't worth going to see, even the staff aren't impressed with it.
The castle however was worth going to see and always is. I love the castle for its architecture, the fireplaces are quite spectacular as well.



This picture shows the remains of the kitchen. I have to say that is my kind of kitchen - non existent!

After the dissappointment of Tattershall we went to the Hub at Sleaford to see the exhibition by the 62 Group (Bending the Line), and that was worth seeing.

Yesterday Linda Rudkin came to the shop to give a workshop on Flower Pounding. I hadn't met Linda before but she is a lovely lady and everyone enjoyed the workshop.

You can just see Linda in this picture standing at the far right.

Here are some pictures of the ladies working hard. They produced some beautiful work and all from a few flowers and weeds from the garden, or if you are Margaret you stop at the train crossing whilst the barriers are down, jump out of the car and scour the roadside for anything interesting.

You can see Margaret here laughing her head off, she does this a lot!

Here she is again, you wouldn't think she used to be deputy headmistress at a primary school. I bet she told all the children to pay attention in class.

Joking apart Margaret is lovely lady who likes to life to the full and who can blame her :-)

This week I have discovered that there are a few people who read my blog and don't leave comments. If you are one of these secret readers it would be nice to hear from you if only to let me know that I am not talking to myself. I do enough of that at home.

I hope you all enjoyed your weekend.

Where Did All The Time Go

I can't believe it's nearly three weeks since my last post, where has all the time gone?

As promised here is a picture of my finished quilt 'Courthouse Steps'. It's the first quilt I have ever made and finished. I have got another one waiting to be layered up and quilted, one nearly there and two more on the go. Does any of that sound familiar?
Unfortunately I don't know how to load the picture onto Blogger so that you can click on it to enlarge it.


These cats are part of my homework. Last term we were looking at Line and need to produce a piece of work that doesn't involve stitch. To start with I was really struggling with this and I had a total mental block (which doesn't take much) then when the dog was chasing next doors cat around the garden it came to me in a flash.
Do you remember the shooting galleries that you get at the fairground and they line up the ducks? Well I am lining up the cats! I have got the cats done and I am pleased with them ,now all I've got to do is make the gallery for them to stand on.

Here they are in close up.

Fun aren't they.

These buttons are made by a very talented lady who I have finally managed to talk into doing a workshop to make them. Sarah has managed to work out a way of sewing the beads straight onto the buttons. The picture really doesn't do them justice you might see a better picture on Sarah's blog and more examples of her lovely work.

We have also got Linda Rudkin at the shop on Saturday. She will be doing a workshop using real flowers, click on the link below to see Linda's fantastic work.
Linda Rudkin.