West Wales Wool Show

I was very lucky to be visiting Narberth, Pembrokeshire in Wales during the school Autumn holidays and by pure chance, as I only discovered this the day before the event, there was going to be a wool show on the day after we arrived! Oh my! What an amazing stroke of luck I've never been to a wool show before so had no idea what to expect and I was rather excited. We decided to visit as a family and for various reasons didn't make it to the show till very late on in the day so some of the stalls were looking a bit sparse by the time we got round to them but still plenty of goodies to see!
On arriving we could see Narberth had been yarn bombed. It was very busy so I could only snap pics of a few pieces but take it from me those yarn bombers had struck everywhere.

The show was split over two vennues and due to an oversight on the expedition leaders part (i.e. me) we very nearly missed the second one. Both venues were small and very busy with lots of people so I didn't get a chance to take pics to share with you. You will just have to take my word for it there was some amazing stalls selling all sorts of wool and woolly accessories some produced locally. The first hall we visited was selling mostly fibre art stuff and clothing which was lovely to look at but not really my cup of tea although I did rather fall for some yarn bowls made by Ebbsworth pots which can even be personalised how cool is that?
The other venue was more up my street as there was wool galore and lots of buttons.

I bought these from Glynn-Coch Studios and I fell in love with all the gorgeous wares from this lady Stone Hens Ceramics. Oh my I could have spent a fortune here I just loved all her wares but restrained myself to a few buttons these are embossed with lace and are so pretty!

and the most gorgeous brooch.

I think I may have been inspired by my shawlette which I took with me.

Amazingly I didn't buy any yarn however I was sorely tempted by the yarn from Sue Ullrich I loved the grey yarn in particular.
All in a good hours wander round and a few yummy purchases made.
We had a great time in Wales and visited lots of castles, there are so many of them all within a stones throw of each other it seems. The weather was lovely it didn't rain once on our holiday which is always a bonus when holidaying in the uk.
We stayed Saundersfoot and I took this snap on the very steep walk down to the town from the car park. We did a lot of walking down and then back up hills on this holiday!

And this was the same headland from the cove round the corner in Tenby.

Tenby is much bigger than Saundersfoot and I just loved these colourful houses round the harbour.

While in Tenby we visited the Tudor Merchants House which is owned by the National Trust. It is half way up the hill.

My cheeky monkeys sniggering at their dad doing things behind my back *sheesh* families!

I was so glad there was an explanation about what these were used for  they look rather like some sort of torture implement. 

I know this is a modern piece of needlwork but I loved the frame. 

I love seeing how the building has hardly changed over the years that 30's perambulator had me smiling. 

This was hanging on the wall in the bedchamber and was stitched by a group in the 90's 

The view from the bedchamber window we were 3 floors up at this point. 

I thought the  mix of old windows was intersting.  

The house had a tiny herb garden out the back and it really was tiny.

Oh course I couldn't go on holiday without taking some form of needlwork to occupy my evenings and these were the chosen projects.

This was where I had got to on my nieces birth sampler before we went on holiday. The design is Sweet and Sugar by the Snowflower Diaries. 

This is the House sampler by the Historical Sampler Company, it's been in my sash for a good few years now and as it was already to go I thought it was time to crack on with it.

If you have made it this far well done and thank you, I will share the progress pics in the next post but right now I need a cup of tea. 

A little Sunshine and progress

I have been continuing my morning walks which last week had been in glorious sunshine....sorry this is going to be photo heavy.

 At the start of the woods

Walking alongside the railway line.

The old disused railway buildings.

The Lomond Hills in the background.

Swans in a water filled disused quarry.

I just loved the look of these brambles against the lichen encrusted wall.

Common Elder berries they just looked so pretty against the green.

This is the river Eden that runs through my village I have to cross this little bridge on my walk.

Doesn't the red of these geraniums look great in the sun?

Looking across the fields nearly home now. 

I love how these wild flowers are growing against the wall of this cottage. 

This is how my morning walks have been looking, lovely sunshine, most unlike weather for this time of year here. I've even been venturing out in t-shirts *gasp* it's October and Scotland for goodness sake...unheard of lol. Sorry to bore you all with these snaps but I wanted a wee reminder for the grey days ahead.

I do have some stitchy stuff to share with you. I ordered this gorgeous bit of Halloween fabric to back my La D Da piece I love the fun characters and I also ordered a piece of this black velvet ric rac it is soo tactile I can't stop feeling it!

I've also finally got round to blocking my settlers shawl just waiting for it to dry now.

Spooky! and a freebie

I thought as we are now into October and All Hallows' Eve is just round the corner I would share with you some pictures of a crumbling ruin that I sometimes pass on my walks.

This is Crawford Priory once the home to the Earls of Crawford and now belongs to the Cochrane family, a neo gothic style mansion that fell into disuse then ruin after the death of the 2nd Baron Cochrane of Cults in 1968. It has subsequently suffered from fire damage and now sadly is way beyond repair and is slowly being reclaimed by the local landscape. I've never been in it but my sister and some of her friends dared each other to spend the night in it long before it suffered fire damage when it had floors and part of a roof and says they never managed it as they were all scared witless by a strange light and noises... ghosts? or imaginations in overdrive ;0) The house is reputedly haunted by Lady Mary Crawford but I've never met any ghosts....yet!

This is a memorial to the Earls favourite deer! There is not much left to read but I can make out 'died age seven years the favourite deer of George Earl of Crawford Lord Lindsay fed daily 1842'

Look at the cobwebs on those windows I wander if anyone was watching me pass?

Anyway my needle has been busy stitching this La D Da piece, Something Wicked.

I don't normally do much round Halloween apart from supplying the local children with tooth rotting fodder. However whilst recently rummaging through my stash I uncovered some linens I inherited from my gran (I used a piece in the Madame Chantilly design) but the rest are peculiar colours like this bright orange or pastel shades. I am guessing they were purchased sometime during the sixties/ seventies? certainly the orange reminds me of an ercol suite my grandparents had. I never thought I would use this particular piece as it is quite garish and is only 24 count but I stumbled on the La D Da piece and loved the Shakeaspeare quote and thought it might look rather nifty on the orange and it does, if a bit bright. I stitched using 1 over 1 otherwise it would have been huge. I am thinking of making this into a little hanging piece.
Now for the freebie part, there is rather a lot of the orange left and I thought someone else might like a piece of this rather garish orange to be creative with :0) So I am offering a piece measuring approx 19 3/4" by 14" to someone who would like it, no strings attached just leave a message stating that you
would like it and I am going to be cheeky and ask that you might mention what you might do with it but that's not compulsory lol. If more than one person wants it I will get my kids to draw a name from a hat and if no one wants it frankly I won't be surprised or offended lol! That still leaves me with a large piece which I will put back into storage till something inspires me again. I dearly wish I knew what my gran had planned to do with this linen. If there is any interest I will try and get this sorted out before Halloween. Thank you for popping by.

Time...

..moves slowly but passes quickly! Oh how true. Summer crept in so quietly that we were barely aware it was here and now Autumn is just around the corner I can feel it in the cooler nip in the air and can see it in the turning colours of the leaves. I love Autumn it is probably my most favourite season of the year I am looking forward to crisp morning walks and swishing through the fallen leaves (I've never grown too old for that and hope I never do). I am looking forward to making warming meals and to seeing the back of salads and to not feeling guilty about spending evenings crafting or reading books. I've been doing a lot of reading lately the books are piling up, I think I am making up for lost reading time over the last two years. No job yet so Iam trying not to feel guilty about spending my time doing the things I enjoy. I have started and completed a couple of projects.

This was a quick project that I just fancied stitching on the spur of the moment I suspect I was feeling the need to get a bit of summer in somehow! It is a design by Madame Chantilly called On the Beach. I wanted to use stuff from stash rather than buy new for this project so some of the thread colours differ slightly from the suggested threads in the chart and the linen was cut from a large piece that I inherited from my grandmother. I have been spending *cough* a fair bit on professional framing lately so thought as I was was being frugal with this piece I'd try my hand at diy framing. Ordered a made to fit frame on line but it's too much a solid white Iam thinking of  getting the sandpaper out. Overall Iam ok with this piece but I am not sure I will be doing too much diy framing in the future as the quality of this frame is not great and considering the quality not that much cheaper. Ah well lesson learnt!

While I was looking out the bits and bobs for the Madame Chantilly piece I uncovered a couple of finished pieces from quite a while back that were needing framed. I just got this one back from the framers and I really like the colours. 

Sorry about the reflection and yes that is me on the floor. Not sure where I am going to hang it. Sorry  I can't remember much about this other than it was a kit based on a Scottish Sampler, usually I keep patterns but this has obviously gotten lost / misplaced over the years. If anyone recognises it please let me know and I will amend this post accordingly.

I love the different stitches that have been used and yes spot the mistake that I only noticed after I got it back from the framers, probably why it had been stuffed in the back of the box.

I have also been doing a little knitting I found a lovely scarf type shawl pattern on Ravelry called  Settler Shawl. I had purchased a couple of skeins of yarn from Nina's Threads and I've just noticed a similarity to the colours in my Scottish Sampler wow how weird!

 This is a lace weight yarn in the fabulously named Blueberry Yoghurt colourway.

This is Winterberry a fingering weight yarn and the one I used for my scarf/shawl. 

This is where my Settlers Shawl is currently at. Just waiting for my blocking wires to be delivered I am soo excited oven ever blocked a piece of knitting properly before!

Thank you for stopping by.