Over on Wild Daffodil there’s a photo challenge each month on the theme of windows. I wasn’t sure at first about having the same topic all year, but I’m enjoying looking out for windows on my walks.
Last week my walking buddy and I completed the Welcome Way with a walk from Baildon to Otley. We passed through the village of Esholt, a pretty village most well known as being the original set for the TV programme Emmerdale.
Walking through I spotted a lovely row of cottages above a little green and I recognised the name, Bunkers Row. When I was doing my family history research which morphed into a full one name study of my maiden name, Bickerdike, I discovered two of these cottages were lived in by Bickerdikes, back in the 1800’s I think. I love the arched windows in the middle cottage.
On Monday we walked from Grassington to Kettlewell over the moors, it was another section of the Lady Anne Way. On the tops, in a particularly lonely spot, we passed ‘Bare House’, an old farmhouse which is now just been used as a barn. The shutters were blowing in the wind.
It was an amazing place, though I wasn’t sure about the bathing arrangements!
We carried on down to Kettlewell, a little village near the top of Wharfedale. We were approaching by Parkrash, a steep road up and over to Coverdale. Our height gave us an interesting perspective over the village. This little corner looked fascinating. The arched windows are clearly a converted chapel, the windows on the white painted cottage almost look like weavers windows, especially having more windows at the side upstairs. Weavers windows are a style used in little cottages from the days when they would weave on a loom at home. They needed as much light as possible so upstairs there would be a long row of windows. They are seen a lot in the old textile areas of Yorkshire.
I’m finishing this post with a little glimpse of a machine embroidery I’ve just stitched for a travelling sketchbook n the subject of windows, more of this later!
I’m finishing this post with a little glimpse of a machine embroidery I’ve just stitched for a travelling sketchbook n the subject of windows, more of this later!
This year I’ve been trying to have a seasonal display of cross-stitch smalls on display, so on the 1st of the month we have a change-over.
I was thinking of a flowery theme this month, but when I pulled out the Snowflower Diary small for June it had a bear and a hive of honey, so I changed my mind and went for bees instead!
A few years ago (2015) I stitched a beautiful bee pincushion by Natalie from Le Jardin Privee, I still love it, the bees are just gorgeous!
A new bee small is the one I finished just a week or so back of a lavender pot and some bees buzzing round it. This was a free design by Lesley Teare.
The little box on the back hasn’t got any bees on it but it is a summer themed box, it’s a design by Nutmeg Designs, they do a lot of 3D cross-stitch.
Right at the front is a lavender bag I made for my mum last year as a birthday present, it went on a padded coat hanger. It hasn’t got any bees on it but it does have a pretty butterfly! This one is a Faby Reilly design, I stitched the card to go with it too and a little scissor fob.
I’m hoping to add another bee small to the display soon as I’ve almost finished another bumble bee cross-stitch, I loved the one I made for my mum this year so much I’m making my self one!
It’s about three or four weeks since I last showed you my Zoe box, it’s a stitch-a-long by Faby Reilly and the patterns are released every two weeks. This is usually plenty of time to stitch a section…unless you have 101 other things to do! This is where I was last time I showed you, I’d just finished the first side of the box with the cute little robin on it…
I got a bit behind, like I’d pretty much only just started the next section when another pattern was released. I cracked on and just kept going, finishing both parts in a few days.
The first lot of stitching was all the cross-stitch, this was my progress just as I started the next pattern with back-stitched stems…
The second part was all the back-stitch and embellishments. The stems are stitched with all six strands of DMC thread, Faby has a good tutorial on her website with lots of tips on how to make it neat with six strands. I’m using satin sequins, I’m rarely comfortable with the shininess of sequins, they’re a bit too blingy, these are a nice compromise. I love the little ladybird, I realised when I was back-stitching that I had omitted the two darker stitches that make his spots, and the head was the wrong colour too, this is one disadvantage of not having a colour printer,some patterns aren’t too clear in black and white. I resolved it by just overstitching with the darker brown!
I’m really enjoying stitching this design, each side is going to be a different season, though I haven’t worked out yet why it’s called Zoe!
I had a good weeding session in the garden yesterday, I tackled the deep raised bed by the patio. It’s about 6′ deep, 20′ long and 2-3′ high! I started with the areas I could reach from the patio, wiggling around the planters before I climbed up by the black sambuscus in the corner. This bit does look much better though I still haven’t decided if the thing with the strappy leaves at the front is a weed or one to keep. I convinced myself it was a weed, started to pull it out but the roots were different so it’s got a stay of execution until it shows it’s true colours…
The problem I have with this bed is that by mid May it is so full of foliage that I struggle to move round it. It’s usually pretty much left to it’s own devices and then every few years I have a big sort out, I think we might be heading for that next year! Yesterday I wiggled from the sambuscus, behind the choisya and in between the prickly osmanthus and the thorny rose and along by the back wall past the chicken. I then came to a halt! I needed to walk along the front wall to get to the end but I couldn’t even see it! I ended up having to call for help to my OH! He used a broom handle to lift the geraniums off the wall and helped me down!!
Things seem to be moving fast in the garden at the moment, the big blue irises are still in flower by the conservatory but there’s now a large clump of beautiful deep purple ones up in the Amber & Amethyst garden, they’re a gorgeous velvety deep purple, almost black.
Today when I saw my friends garden I was merrily telling her how my peonies weren’t in flower, no foxgloves or roses yet either (apart from the scottish one in the front which doesn’t count!) we sat in my garden later having tea and found that since yesterday a gorgeous peony has flowered, it’s in the autumn garden which is next to the A&A garden, it’s a beautiful pink colour…
My first roses have appeared on the arch, right at the top! This one is called Teasing Georgia…
…and a few floxgloves have started to flower, this one is self seeded in the side of the wall next to the conservatory door. It makes quite a nice little shady bed with the alchemilla mollis and an astrantia.
At the top of the drive is a golden philadelphus, otherwise known as a mock orange blossom. The leaves when young are a lovely yellow-lime green and at the moment it’s covered with heavily scented blossom which fills the top of the drive.
The pond bed is still probably the best bit of the garden at the moment, the rhododendron is flowering, I think it’s reverting to the common form, I probably should cut out those bits but I quite like the effect and I’ve never looked hard enough to see if it’s just one big branch that’s gone back to purple. The beady eyed amongst you will have noticed a childs windmill in the bed! This was Hetty and Daisy’s suggestion to ward off moles as apparently they don’t like the vibrations! It’s not easy to buy windmills if you don’t live by the seaside!! I found some eventually and even managed three tasteful purple and green ones, they did cause amusement as they poked out of my wicker shopping basket!
The hostas are still amazing, with just one or two small holes, there’s obviously a very happy frog in the pond whose eating any slug that goes near! He’s equally making me very happy!
The weeds are coming up thick and fast, especially the dreaded mares tail. I’m trying to spray it regularly but trying to avoid windy days and days when it’s about to rain! My OH is desperate to pull it up, but that just encourages it!
I love watching the birds in my garden and at the moment every evening a blackbird sits on the tree outside my sewing room and sings his little heart out, they have a beautiful song, it makes my evening!
Last Saturday I met up with a group of ladies in Steeton to make quilts for young people who are leaving the care system.I do feel quite strongly that these young people have had a pretty poor childhood and then when they are 18 years old they are pretty much abandoned and expected to be independent. They’re unlikely to have had a decent role model in running a home yet even if they are still at school they are expected to be independent in their own flat. I feel we’re setting them up to fail instead of giving them the support they need even until their mid twenties.
Lemn Sessay is the UK’s Poet Laureate at the moment, he spent a lot of time in care and he has set up a charity to give those leaving care a special Christmas, to give them some good memories to work on. He mentioned once that at times all he wanted was a hug, a special lady called Maggie Howell heard him and immediately had the idea of making them all their own quilt, a quilty hug. It was only last autumn when she put feelers out, but they managed to make about 200 quilts.
This year we’re aiming for a lot more. There are several groups across the country meeting up to make quilts. We met in Steeton a couple of months ago and another lady, called Julie, brought a part made quilt, she no longer liked it and was happy for someone else to do something with it. All the strips of blocks were already made and by the end of the day I’d pieced the strips together, adding a few extras to even things out, we’d even sandwiched it, all I had to do was quilt it.
Of course I left it until the last minute to start!
Have you ever had a quilt that’s fought you all the way!! Well this one did! My machine thread kept snapping, I tried several different types of needles, two of them snapped as I was sewing! I eventually found an embroidery needle worked! I stitched about 18″ square with the tension loopy underneath, a bit of the backing folded underneath…I don’t think I’ve ever unpicked a quilt as much as this one!! Finally it was quilted, I just did my usual meandering to a point sort of design, a few flowers, a few leaves and lots of general abstract! I used a variegated gutermann thread in warm earthy tones which worked well, when it wasn’t snapping! When I finally finished the quilting I was pretty pleased with it.
I stitched the binding on and started hand-stitching it down, hoping to arrive on Saturday with a finished quilt. I ran out of time. The photo above shows how near I was to finishing! So I sat for the first few minutes and finished the hand sewing. My first quilt for care-leavers was complete.
I’d taken with me some fat quarters from Aldi which were nice and cheerful, I also had the instructions for Pat Sloans free pattern Oh My Stars. I’d read it was a very simple and quick quilt to make, it was…
Having probably started about 10.30/11am-ish, I cut out the squares, worked out my colour placement and stitched them together by about 3.30 when we decided it was home time. All I had to do that evening was the border. The free pattern is for a baby sized quilt, but with the extra 5″ square border and a white border to finish it, it was plenty big enough for the care-leavers. I’ve got some feather fabric is just the same colours for the backing and I’ll probably do a scrappy border.
It’s now on my to do pile, I’m hoping I won’t leave it quite so last minute this time!
I did two walks in quick succession a couple of weeks ago. I went up to Halton Gill with forty colleagues from work for the weekend, staying in a lovely bunk barn. The aim on the Saturday was to walk the Yorkshire Three Peaks. This is a popular challenge for fund-raising as it’s 24 miles long, to be walked in less than 12 hours, climbing Pen-y-ghent, Whernside and Ingleborough. I didn’t take my camera this time so the photos are from last month, add hundreds of people for a more accurate picture!! I must admit I hadn’t realised just how popular it is…
The walk starts at Horton in Ribblesdale, we arrived at about 7am and the carparks were already pretty full. I can understand now why the villagers are getting pretty fed up of it, there was a steady stream of people making their way through the village to the path up to Pen-y-ghent. If this happens every Saturday and Sunday from spring to autumn, I can understand the villagers frustration.
I said from the start that I would only be doing one peak, I know my limits! Luckily two other girls wanted to just do one, so we would walk down together. The path up is steep and unrelenting with some scrambling over rocks in places, I was gradually getting further behind my group, which didn’t bother me as there were so many people on the path, but it did panic the others when there was confusion as to whether I was in front or behind!
I’ve never had to queue to get up a mountain before, it was that busy! If I stood aside to let someone pass, another 20 or 30 passed before I could get back in again! It wasn’t my idea of fell walking! It also made me appreciate even more my usual walking buddy, we know each others limitations, we walk at the slower ones pace (usually me!) we stop when we want a breather, we have a good system with drinks in passing each others water bottles, we have regular breaks, we joke that we have a sausage roll break, a sticky bun break, a coffee break, a sandwich break, a banana break….we graze and we take our time to enjoy the walk.
I was on the top of Pen-y-ghent by 9am, they all gave me a cheer (relief I think that I wasn’t lost!!) when I arrived, I was actually only about 15 minutes behind them. Those of us just doing one peak descended Pen-y-ghent and then walked along the contours of the fell over to Littondale, about 8.5 miles at a guestimate. It was lovely and quiet along that path!
I think most of the group managed to walk all three peaks, we’ve raised over £1000. One of our party was Noah, the son of one of our radiographers, he is 6 years old and he walked it all in about 10 hours. We think he’s broken the record of the youngest person to walk it! He was amazing!
Boy did I ache the next day!! I must have used my arms so much with my walking poles as both my arms and legs hurt! I’d arranged to walk with my usual walking buddy on the Monday, I was still aching a lot but I pushed my self and actually it was the best thing I could have done as it seemed to loosen everything off.
Last year we started the Welcome Way as a practice walk. Walkers Are Welcome is an organisation which encourages towns and villages to welcome walkers, they have local walks booklets, cafes and pubs that don’t mind muddy boots etc, Otley is a WAW town and they linked up with three nearby WAW towns to make a circular walk. The Welcome Way starts in Otley, walks over to Burley in Wharfedale, over the moors to Baildon and back through Guiseley to Otley. 28 miles in total.
Last year we walked from Otley to Denton bridge one day, and then over Ilkley moor to Baildon another day. We’d never got round to finishing it…
From Baildon we walked along old lanes, past golf courses and posh hotels! This are is really just outside the edge of Bradford, but it’s surprising how much countryside there still is.
We walked along side a dam, watched the moorhens and their chicks…
The path decends down to the village of Esholt. Followers of the TV programme Emmerdale may recognise the pub. This is the original Woolpack, the programme used to be filmed in the village up to about 10-15 years ago when they built a purpose built set village near Harewood.
From Esholt we walked up through woods to Guiseley, this took a little longer than it should as we ended up walking round in a circle, too much chatting!! Woods are notorious for this, there aren’t enough landmarks if you do take a wrong turn!
We skirted round the edge of Guiseley before walking up to the Chevin, I thought this would be quite a pull up a hill, knowing what the other side of the Chevin is like, in fact it was quite a gentle meander up through fields to the Royalty pub on the top of the Chevin. Up in the Chevin carpark the stone walls are lovely, there’s a ‘school of stone-walling’ up there so they practise on some of the walls up there.
From the top of the Chevin there’s good views over Otley (and right over to York Minster and the White Horse on a clear day!) It’s called Surprise View!
We meandered down through the woods, past the White House and down into Otley for the finish at the Butter Cross. As we both felt fine we then walked the 1.5 miles back to my house for tea and cake in the garden. It was just under 10 miles altogether.
So that’s another walk ticked off! If anyone fancies doing it, during Otley Walking Festival I think it’s part of the scheduled walks.
About three months ago I met up with an old friend and during the evening we got onto the subject of books. She knows I love walking, she loves Scotland, she recommended a book called Between the Sunset and the Sea by Simon Ingram. When my daughter asked me the following week what I would like for Mothers Day, I had just the answer!
It’s a beautiful book, a new type of writing for me, Simon describes various walks he has done, but it isn’t a route book, it’s about the feelings and experiences you have walking through the mountains. It’s that mixture of excitement, fear, awe and exhilaration! It’s very much what I would call a slow read, it’s so beautifully written that you have to read every word – not skim through like I often do! He finishes the book with a lovely poem by Geoffrey Winthrop Young;
Only a hill: earth set a little higher
Above the face of the earth: a larger view
Of little fields and roads: a little nigher
To clouds and silence: what is that to you?
Only a hill: but all of life to me,
Up There, between the sunset and the sea.
This book was my bedtime reading – the writing is too small to read on the move!! It started me off on other similar walking / nature books;
The Old Ways by Robert Macfarlane is a fascinating book, again it is just beautifully written. He describes lots of different walks using old roads and lanes such as an old drovers lane, or holloways. He walks across the sands off the Kent coast, he sails an old boat across shipping lanes in Scotland. The most poignant to me was a walk he did across the Cairngorms to his Grandfathers funeral, he collected some flowers and foliage along the way to place on his coffin. He describes the history and the ways of nature he sees along the way.
The Salt Path is by Raynor Winn. Three days after losing their home and livelihood, Ray and her husband of 32 years, Moth, discovered he was terminally ill with a degenerative brain condition. With nothing left they decided to walk the 630 mile South West Coast path which goes from Somerset, round Dorset and Devon and finally to Cornwall. It’s a story of the other side of homelessness, of human strength and endurance, and love.
Common Ground by Rob Cowan is set not far from here on the outskirts of Harrogate. Rob moved up from London, yearning for open space he started to explore some nearby ‘edge-land’, a mixture of wood, field, hedge and river which was pretty much abandoned. He discovers all the different layers of the area, the birds, animals, insects and plants, the history of the area too. As he watches the seasons change he is also waiting for the birth of his first child. It’s a very thoughtful book.
In Hidden Nature by Alys Fowler, Alys sets out to explore the Birmingham canal network by kayak, discovering the little-used waterways where pike skulk and kingfishers dart. Intertwined with this is Alys’s emotional journey as she comes out as a gay woman.As the blurb on the back cover says, it’s all about losing and finding, exploring familiar places and discovering unknown horizons.
Finally, another book by Robert MacFarlane, called The Wild Places. Robert tries to discover truly wild places in Britain, he explores shingle beaches, holloways, woods, mountains. Again it’s his beautiful writing that makes this a wonderful book.
I’ve two more Robert Macfarlane books to read and a few more ‘nature’ books I’ve heard about and added to my list!
I’m rather partial to things with bees on, we used to keep bees and my mum has this theory (which I think i a load of twaddle!!) that my maiden name, Bickerdike, means beekeepers by the dyke! I made her a little bee pincushion a couple of months ago for her birthday. I love it that much I’m actually stitching it again for myself…
In the meantime I found another bee cross-stitch. This one is by Lesley Teare, she generously gives it for free on her website. It didn’t take long to stitch, I had the lovely purple linen left over from a previous project. I think the bees are a little cartoonish compared to the lavender but I still think it’s rather cute….
Last night I decided to make it up. I had a perusal through my scrap box and found a strip of fabrics left over from ny Down the Rabbit Hole quilt. The two fabrics went beautifully with the cross-stitch but I felt it needed something else inbetween. I found a lovely soft plainish purple which was big enough for the back as well.
I then had a route through my trimmings drawers, this is where my cutting out table gets messy! After much deliberating I used some ric-rac and some pompom trim.
I embroidered a line of feather stitch down the plain fabric, I was thinking of adding tiny buttons to the squares but I think it’s busy enough.
I stitched the front and back together, leaving the left hand side open, at the last minute I decided to stitch a row of pom-poms as I went a long, it just finishes it nicely.
I took it outside for the photos and found a bed of purple sage with erysimum flowers overhanging it.
A few years ago I bought a length a broderie anglais on my first visit to Goldhawk Road, I seem to recall it was only about £2.50 a metre and 60″ wide, so a bargain.I bought about 2.5m, a good length but never quite enough! It’s also quite a stiff fabric, so a flowy skirt wasn’t going to work.
Last summer I decided I’d try getting a dress out of it, I was about 50cm short. I had a mad idea that maybe if I opened the fabric out full width, I’d be able to wiggle the pieces closer together and get it out. The downside was that I couldn’t lay it all out to check…the bigger downside was that I still didn’t have enough fabric and had now cut several large pieces out of it! It has sat on the side looking reproachfully ever since!
Yesterday I decided to make a top out of it, I reasoned that from all the large pieces I should be able to get a top out. As it happened the was a fair sized piece obviously left from the end when I realised the last big piece wouldn’t fit. Perfect!
I chose an old Butterick pattern I’ve had for years, 3037, it’s got a mixture of tops and skirts and I realised I’d made the waistcoat style top before in a pansy linen a few years ago, I still wear it a lot and more importantly it still fits me!
The fabric has two stripes of embroidery, one in a heavy paisley design and the other in a much lighter lattice pattern. I decided to have the lighter pattern on seams and things like the centre front wherever I could, just to help reduce bulk at the seams.
It went together really quickly, it’s fully lined, I used a light weight quilting cotton as I happened to have it in my stash, I also thought it would be cooler than the usual synthetic lining. I started cutting out after tea and by bed time I really just had the buttonholes and a little bit of finishing to do. It helped that I new the method of making a lined waistcoat and how to turn it through the side seams, so I didn’t need to follow the instructions, I could just get on and sew it.
Today I popped over to Hobbycraft to buy some buttons, typically I have a button box full of buttons and nothing to use! Hobbycraft don’t have a huge selection but I found some pretty mother of pearl flower ones.
I’m really pleased with my top, the stiffness of the fabric works well with the waistcoat style of the top. Here’s also a sneak preview of a pair of culottes I made a couple of weeks ago, I can’t share them properly until July when they go on the Minerva website but I love them, they’re really comfortable and I like their floatiness! I think I’ll be making another pair soon.
Weather has been a bit mixed this last week, when I’ve been working (in a windowless department!) it’s been glorious sunshine but when I’ve been free to garden it’s been windy and raining! I’ve managed a few minutes weeding and that’s been it, so they’re shooting up along with the plants!
The star plant of the week is definitely a huge iris next to our conservatory, it’s at least two foot tall and a most beautiful shade of blue. My mum came for tea on Saturday and immediately wanted one to draw! What makes me laugh though is that if you look carefully you can just see a tiny dark purple iris right next door to it – I think that one needs moving!
Several shrubs are flowering at the moment. This photo is from the patio looking up towards the fence, the choisya is flowering and you can just see a deutsia at the top with it’s pale pink blooms. The sambuscus on the right has come into leaf over the last few days too, it’s a lovely purple leaved version, it can be a bit of a thug so I keep it well pruned.
At the side of the drive I have a large rose bush, I seem to remember it was called a Scottish rose, it’s very spiny and just has this one early, stunning flush of flowers. I’ve never pruned it, I’ve never found any information on how to prune these ones. Just below it is another Choisya, this one is called Sundance, it’s also just flowering at the moment.
From the top of the drive the view from the gate is over the patio, it’s filling up nicely with geraniums, aquilegias and the occasional poppy foliage. I have high hopes for my standard rose as it’s from David Austins, it will have beautiful, scented white roses hopefully.
The pond garden is still looking good, some of the hostas are seriously big now, I’m hoping the toad I saw in the pond a couple of weeks ago has a good appetite for slugs! The little plant at the front just starting to shoot up is a rogersia, I’d forgotton what I planted there until I saw it’s leaves. I’ve still a fair bit of weed killing to do as you can see here!
There’s quite a few clematis in flower at the moment, this is one I planted last year to help cover the back fence, it looks quite pretty round the bird box.I’m quite disappointed with the birds this year, we usually have one or two families of blue tits or great tits in the nest boxes. Last year I put up four more boxes, both tit size and open ones for robins. What have they done, only gone and nested in nextdoors garden with their plastic grass and paving!!! I’m wondering if it is actually too busy with birds coming in and out to feed for them to nest as well. They take my food…
I do feel sorry for the little boy next door, he was playing with his new drone when it sailed over the fence into our garden, well it’s like looking for a needle in a haystack! It’s only the size of a tennis ball, we’re keeping our eyes open but I can see if it hasn’t flown on past our garden, it may well be autumn before it’s found! You can see from the evening shot of the garden below taken an hour ago how much the garden has filled out. I just need to keep up with it now!
thecraftycreek 