A Day Out

Today P and I are back to work and D is back at school and we've had some very wintry weather - high winds, heavy rain and snow, all in one day! But just for a little bit I'm going to take us back to half term last week, so grab a cup of tea and make yourself comfortable, and I'll tell you about our day trip.
 P had booked a couple of days off work, and we had planned to go to the coast, but when we saw the weather forecast we changed our minds about the location, and indeed the next morning we awoke to pouring rain. We decided to head for Lacock Abbey in Wiltshire which isn't too far away. D's boyfriend came too, and we arrived there mid-morning in heavy rain. However we were not disheartened and headed off for some hot drinks to warm up before we decided what to do first. Lacock is a very pretty and unspoilt village with a country house which was originally a nunnery 800 years ago.

There is also a photography exhibition there as William Henry Fox Talbot, one of the inventors of photography, lived in the Abbey. I enjoyed looking at these very early cameras.

I couldn't help comparing them to my own tiny, easy-to-use compact digital camera.

Despite the cold rain there were carpets of lovely spring flowers along the approach to the house - purple and yellow crocuses ...

... gorgeous yellow aconites

looking very drippy in the rain ...

...and drifts of snowdrops, pure white and delicate.

Lacock Abbey is an attractive, imposing house in a mixture of medieval and other styles.

I liked its quirky features, like this offset window.

The abbey has been a film location in several of the Harry Potter films, and this cloistered courtyard featured in the first film. Perhaps you recognise it? The vaulted ceilings are very beautiful indeed.

The stone window-frames open onto a very tranquil scene.

Here's the sacristry which was very cold on such a wet day. I do love medieval architecture with its sense of history and solidity.

This is the warming room (where the nuns would have gone to warm up), and this giant cauldron is hundreds of years old.

I'm always fascinated by the domestic side of large country houses, like these shelves which house copper pans and old irons,

and this range.My mum tells me stories of growing up with a smaller version in her house which had to be regularly covered with black grate polish. How lucky we are to have modern appliances!

Along the corridor we passed through some sweet bedrooms which were homely and old-fashioned.

The wallpaper designs seemed quite modern. You can just about see the pattern in this photo.

Here's a tiny and, I imagine, rather drafty bathroom.

I especially liked this wallpaper in the next bedroom, depicting flowers and birds.

I'm sure I've seen modern designs like this in magazines.

This sweet little room looks quite cosy with its trailing flowers on the walls.

On to the dining room, and I was impressed by the printed 'information' tablecloth and place settings - a really clever idea.

Finally we finished up in the great hall with its rather lovely Tudor stained glass windows. In fact Lacock Abbey currently has a starring role in 'Wolf Hall', the brilliant adaptation of Hilary Mantel's novels about Thomas Cromwell which is showing on tv at the moment. P and I are completely addicted to it and I can recommend it if you like period/historical dramas, or just like a cracking good story.

Outside we stopped to look at the Tudor courtyard, and then into the warm again for some lunch at the nearby National Trust tearooms.

After lunch we ventured outside again into the village itself. By now the rain had eased and so we didn't need our umbrellas as much.

Lacock village is mainly medieval, and is unbelievably picturesque. Like the abbey, it has featured in many film and tv productions including the Harry Potter films, Pride and Prejudice and Cranford.

I noticed that there are no street lights, tv aerials or satellite dishes - I wonder if it's a great inconvenience to the residents when the production companies descend on the village.

The half-timbered houses are very striking ...

... and the weathered stone is mellow and reassuringly aged.

These worn, and very chunky moss-covered tiles look very old indeed.

One of the guides told us that Harry Potter and Dumbledore walk along this street in one of the films,

and the house on the right stars as Professor Slughorn's house.

I love the way medieval houses overhang the street.



Some of them are quite wobbly-looking, and uneven.

The tearoom in front of the church is very quaint and pretty indeed. On a warm, sunny day the tea garden would be very appealing.

We had a lovely day out despite the cold and wet, and I enjoyed a fascinating slice of history. However, we all agreed that it was good to be back in a warm car, and as soon as we got indoors I put the kettle on for a warming cup of tea! I hope you've enjoyed this long post, and that we can all enjoy some more sunshine soon x

A Happy Half Term

It's been a lovely lazy, unwinding half term week here with not too much in the diary, and a chance to breathe out slowly and take things as they come, rather than trying to catch up with myself. I deliberately didn't make my customary list of 'to do' jobs, deciding that I would do whatever I could as well as prioritising some creative time. I hadn't realised how tired I'd become until I caught up with my sleep and regained a bit of energy! D spent a lot of time with friends this week, and so I was able to plan my own time. I did get a few housework-type things done, but I also sat and drank coffee, looked at lots of lovely blogs, watched some tv, crocheted and met up with friends. Just what I needed.

Best of all, I got back out into the garden again after months of winter neglect. To my delight lots is happening out there. Bulbs are coming up and the hellebores are flowering now too. I spent two very sunny afternoons on my hands and knees clearing away dead leaves and weeding. I also planted some plants which had spent the winter in pots. To be down at ground level, smelling the earth and digging the soil was absolute bliss. It felt like crumbly fruit cake, rich and moist and everywhere buds and shoots were just starting to emerge. At the end of both days I went indoors with very muddy knees and hands, but I didn't mind. I felt that familiar excited anticipation of warm days spent outside growing things, and thought about seeds, compost and flowerpots. How wonderful to think that the end of the winter is in sight now - I even saw my first bumblebee this week, huge, furry and clumsily buzzing around the plants in the sunshine.

We had a lovely day trip which I'll tell you about in my next post, as well as going to Bristol this weekend for some shopping. While we were there we walked down to the Harbourside which is always a lively, interesting place and headed for Pero's Bridge which has been in the local news lately. This is because an artist has transformed the bridge into a Fog Bridge using 'fog as sculptural medium'. Yes, I know it sounds odd, but the bridge has lots of little high-pressured vents along its sides which send out a fine mist at intervals which engulfs those who are walking across it.



It was a rather disorientating experience, like walking through the middle of a cloud: quite damp, and impossible to see very much. I didn't get my camera out because I was worried about all that water!



It was very striking and strangely compelling to watch.

The bridge itself is very interesting, named after a Caribbean slave who was brought to Bristol in the 18th century, and the two horn sculptures are counterweights which lift the middle section to allow boats through. A recent custom is for lovers to attach an engraved padlock to the bridge's sides and throw the key into the water. Quite a lot of padlocks have accumulated there lately.



Before we left I took a photo of this city-centre hotel which has blue glass sides. I'm not overly fond of these towering buildings, but the different shades of blue which were reflected in its windows were very attractive against the blue-grey sky. It made me think of possible designs for crochet blankets or patchwork quilts.

It really has been a good week, relaxed and with enough time to stop and appreciate what's around me. Hope you have a good weekend, with a bit of breathing time too x

Good Morning!

Good morning! And a lovely one it is here at The House With The Blue Door - frosty and bright, just calling me to go outside. It's taken a few days for me to recharge my batteries, now that we're in half term, but I've got a bit more energy now and even managed to crochet a whole thing yesterday! Yes, I actually completed something, albeit a small thing. I'm a bit late coming to manadalas I know, but decided that my dining table could do with a little round mat to put under my jug of flowers, so experimented a bit and came up with a very simple one in my favourite cotton yarn.

 The pastel colours go well with the pink tulips which are looking like they've seen better days, and I'm now thinking I'll make another to go with daffodils too. I could have a whole collection in different hues to match whatever flowers are in the jug! Hmmm - perhaps I'm getting a bit carried away here.

After a morning of rain yesterday it's wonderful to see the sun today and a luxury to be able to plan the day ahead. Today is Pancake Day here, or Shrove Tuesday, so we are ready to make pancakes for tea. I've bought some maple syrup (my favourite) and we'll have the traditional lemon juice and sugar too. D likes Nutella on hers so we'll have to make sure that we buy some more today.

The end is in sight now on J's blanket as I've joined all the granny squares together and am now darning in ends, a dull but necessary task. Once I'm on the border, I'll be nearly there - hurrah!

 We're quite busy making some changes here at the moment, as we're having some damp-proofing work done soon and then a new kitchen in coming months. We've also been moving furniture around and generally tidying, sorting and catching up with jobs. I can see that life will be a bit topsy-turvy for a while, but it'll be very worth it, and I think that small creative projects are better for me for the time being. Before I go I have a few more flowers to share with you. These are the lovely variegated red and yellow roses that P gave me for St Valentine's Day.

And here in the garden is a little, hidden-away clump of pale purple crocuses about to bloom. (Looking at this photo I can see some weeding needs to be done!).

Finally I thought I'd show you these shy hellebores, one in bud and the other in bloom but, as always, with a drooping head. They are members of the buttercup family and seed themselves freely in our garden. As a result we have quite a few of them dotted around mostly in varying shades of mauve and deep pink, but a couple of white ones too. 

How wonderful it is to have some flowers to look at again in the garden! I do so miss them in the winter months. Right, I can't stay indoors a moment longer in this glorious sunshine!

See you soon x

This Week

Hello! What a cold week it's been! Still no snow, but very chilly. Thank you, everyone, who commented on my last post. It was so nice to read all of your kind comments about my hand-made books. I shall definitely make a little tutorial when I make my next one. 

I've done very little crocheting lately as we're coming to the end of term here and I'm feeling a bit frazzled and lacklustre. I've even frogged my pale blue scarf because I wasn't happy with how it was looking. I don't think the combination of garter and moss stitch was working, so I started again in blackberry stitch which went a bit wrong and am now trying double moss stitch. See what I mean? I've been a bit restless, and am looking forward to re-charging my batteries in half term next week. As a result I haven't got anything much to show for my efforts recently, so I've been trying to just go with the flow and enjoy the things around me.

Indoors on the windowsill my amaryllis has flowered and is quite a beauty, rich red and multi-flowered. I'm always amazed that the stem is strong enough to hold the flowers up, they are so enormous. 

There's even a second stem emerging which I hope will bring a second set of blooms.

As the evenings are lengthening noticeably now, I've been going outside for a breath of fresh air in the garden after work. There's a fair bit of tidying up to do out there, but I'm doing my best to ignore it and look for flowers. I was delighted to find that one of our hellebore plants is blooming away in the corner of the garden, and I hadn't noticed. Hellebore flowers tend to droop and hang their heads, so I always put them in a dish of water to appreciate their stunning patterns of dark speckles and pale stamens.

At the end of last week I decided to make cakes for my work colleagues to celebrate the fact that it was Friday. I made orange and almond cupcakes from this recipe, and they weren't in the least bit healthy but very delicious. They went down well with our coffees at morning break. I kept these back at home too for the three of us to enjoy.

Just outside the back door the winter-flowering honeysuckle is covered in tiny blooms, and smells so sweet that I picked some stems and brought them indoors. They're not the most spectacular flower so I added a hellebore for a bit of interest. They made a pretty little winter posy.

So there we go, some lovely things that I've been enjoying recently.

(Before I go, I must mention the fact that I recently discovered that I'm a 'no-replies blogger', and I had no idea! I just want to say that I like to be friendly and do love to hear from you all, so apologies if you've ever tried to contact me by e-mail and not been able to. I'm pretty sure I'm contactable now and have sorted it out. I still have the odd blip with the technological side of blogging, but am learning fast!)

Hand-Made Books

Hello! I thought I'd share with you some little books which I've made. I first learnt to make them a few years ago at a craft workshop on Japanese book binding, which is a very simple way to make a book from paper, card and thread or ribbon. If you'd like to have a go, there are some excellent tutorials on how to do this on You Tube, and next time I make one I shall take photographs and show you how I do it.



I've made a good few, and like to cover them in hand-made paper, especially the kind which has pressed petals and leaves in it.

 To start with I filled them with random collections of things which caught my fancy: pictures, scraps of fabric, pieces of text. I used them to record and collect pictures and things which I find inspiring, a mix of scrapbook and mood-board. However, I wanted to organise them better, so I decided to make a year book with several pages for each month of the year. Here it is.

These are the January pages. I included sequins, yarn, sparkly thread, bits of Christmas cards and buttons.

I also stuck in poems, skeleton leaves, bits of calendars, ribbon, and the stickers from scented candles.

I quickly filled up my year book - I was going to need more pages! So I made four more books, one for each season. Here's my winter one, covered in embroidered paper. I added some sequins to give it some wintry sparkle.

Let's take a look inside. This is my New Year and January page, which includes a poem, cuttings from magazines and old calendars, a bookmark, bits of Christmas cards and tags, and a couple of stickers from candles.

There's lots of white and silver sparkle and pictures of snow contrasting with those of cosy blankets, hot water bottles and candles.

I cut up greetings cards and wrapping paper, as well as packaging such as perfume boxes, wine and jam labels, packets of tea ...anything which appeals to me. These pages show lots of ice and frost, and winter flowers.

Here are frosty gardens and textiles in shades of pale blue, grey and green. These are cuttings from old calendars and catalogues.

Sometimes there's no rhyme or reason to why I put things where I do - they just seem to fit, and it's a very personal collection. On this page I've stuck in some fabric and lace.

I find collecting and curating items for these books very relaxing and therapeutic and it's ongoing, so I only do it once in a while when I've got a little stock pile. Sticking in and arranging can be absorbing too, and when I've finished, I can peruse my books and use them as a source of inspiration and ideas for other projects. I'll show you some more of my pages as the months go by.

Have a lovely weekend x

Welcoming February

A quick post today to say 'Hello and welcome' to February, a month that can often feel quite spring-like (and is always tricky to spell). Although I try to embrace January and enjoy it's distinctive mid-winter personality after Christmas, I so often feel rather lethargic and low in spirits during this month. This means that when February arrives I'm always very pleased to see it. I also like the fact that it's got two celebrations in it: Valentine's Day and Shrove Tuesday - hooray!

Here's the February page on my calendar, with a focus on skies and flowers. 

As things have been busy around here, I've managed to squeeze a little bit of knitting in this weekend, as well a some more work on J's blanket. The knitting will be a cowl, and it consists of alternated sections of garter stitch and moss stitch. Quite simple, but a nice variation in texture.

I haven't shown you this mug before, have I? It's one of my favourites, bought last year and sporting a lovely button design. It's so very cheerful to drink from, and I love the fact that there's a button on the inside too! I drink tea from it, and must admit to keeping some of my favourite mugs for tea, and others for coffee - they just seem to suit different hot drinks. Is it just me, or does anyone else do that?

The weather is pretty cold at the moment, with frosts in the mornings and sleety showers, so I feel very cheered when there's a bit of sunshine, however fleeting. We have pink glass candlesticks on the mantelpiece in the living room, and I was very taken by the pretty shadows made when the sun shone through one this weekend.

It reminds me of the patterns made by water reflected on the underneath of stone bridges. I think the candlestick's shadow looks quite amusing when photographed on its own.

Well, that was a rather random post, I know. Life can be a bit random sometimes, can't it? Hope you can enjoy some sunshiny moments in the next few days, and can squeeze in a bit of creativity, no matter how small.

See you soon x

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PS  Before I go, I just want to say a big thank you for all your lovely comments about my flower paintings in the last post. After doing two courses a few years ago, I took a break in flower-painting when I started to work full-time, and since then never seem to have large enough chunks of time in which to paint. Nowadays I tend to either make small projects or large ones which I can pick up and put down easily, like crochet. Your encouraging comments inspire me to try to find some time soon to get my brushes out, especially with the prospect of spring flowers on the horizon!

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