Abbey Cwm Hir - Part 1

Today we had a day out at The Hall at Abbey Cwm Hir, a superb Victorian Gothic House which takes Christmas VERY seriously.  From the beginning of November until 6th January, the house is done up for Christmas, and every one of the 52 rooms has Christmas decorations and/or trees (I think there are 49 trees in all which are apparently stowed away beneath the huge Billiard Table during the summer months . . .)  We had a guided tour by the owner, and for a few minutes after our arrival, we thought we were going to be the only people there - and then (cue the music of "There's a Coach Comin' in"!!) a coach load of WI members arrived, so we had Company!

This was the Drawing Room, which had rag-rolled walls (it looked like wallpaper), and stunning gilded architrave.  Each room and Christmas tree has a different theme.  The theme in this room (for this year at least, as they change) was music.

As you can see, the room was very tastefully furnished and decorated.  The beautiful mirror behind the tree absolutely MADE the room for us.  I loved the decorated panels on the doors and they also had similar designs painted onto the wooden shutters.  We have wooden shutters in our Dining Room, and so I think I may be doing similar in the dark days of January.

This is the other end of the room.  The painting on the wall is of the house, as it might have been in its history - on this occasion it was the late 1950s and the family were holding a Ball for the young folk of the valley.  The artist is a local man and I think there are ten wonderful paintings which he has done of the house and Abbey in times gone by.  The owner's wife had made ALL the draperies herself.

The "blackamoor" in the window, and a slightly better view of the painted shutters.

Into the hallway, and one of 5 amazing tiled floors.  Sigh . . .

The mirror (another made in Indonesia) was draped with what strands of velvety green "rope".  It was very effective.

Another painting (in two separate halves) of Foxes and Pine Martins from the Valley.

A snow scene recreating the heavy snowfalls of 1895 and showing the Phillips family returning home from church.

This lovely cupboard full of crystal glasses was part of a job lot of furniture, designed by the owners, and made in Indonesia.  Many of these pieces have been dusted with gilding and look beautiful.

The chandelier was also hung with baubles and just look at that ceiling rose . . . .

I just had to take a photo of this display in the fireplace. All bits of fruit and sundries, painted with gold paint.

This was a very glamorous and dramatic room with a wonderful collection of Doulton's Flambe ceramics.  Keith was not impressed - not his style at all!!

They had replaced the original (lost) range in this room.

The centrepiece of the table, with the crackers made by the lady of the house (fabric enhanced with gold papers.   The runner had been made by her too.  The little crochet angels had been made by another lady who works in the house.

I took LOTS of photos, as you may imagine, so the next couple of days will have more posts in this vein.  If you get the chance, DO visit Abbey Cwm Hir (you may need to book though, and you will need to bring slippers or slipper socks as you have to take your shoes off inside the house).  Nearest town is Llandrindod Wells.

A busy week ahead

I am away to Southampton for a few days, back Wednesday afternoon, so I thought I had best do a blog post before I go.

Yesterday we bought a lovely little hand-crafted coffee table, made by a chap in Welshpool (sticker on bottom).  I love the adzed top, all ripply, and the carved supports which look like a truckle of cheese with a big bite taken out of them.  What you can't see is the crinkle-crankle bar underneath which joins the two legs together.  We had been using the really beautiful free form yew wood 1960s coffee table we have, but it is too long, so we will put that back out to sell in the Unit or the next big Fair.

This afternoon I baked the first Mince Pies of the season, using scrummy orange pastry (you add the zest of a large orange and enough juice to bind the pastry mix together.)  Home made mincemeat too of course.  They look very scorched in the photo but only a couple were in reality.  I will blame the food picture setting on my camera.

I just couldn't resist this issue of Landscape magazine.  It is one of my favourite magazines for the interesting articles on country living, and the beautiful photographs.  This didn't disappoint, and there is a little patchwork project I fancy making of an evening.  I will put up a photo when I've made it.

I wanted a book on making bags - this has loads of ideas, but probably most of them I won't attempt!  There are times when really, you need to see a book in the flesh and check it out before buying it.

This is what I am reading at the moment.  The first of her novels I've tried - rather gritty and she pulls no punches about the low-lifes she is writing about.  Not sure if I will read a second.  That said, she writes well - it is the subject matter which is a bit too gritty in places. 

Patchwork class today

Yesterday I did a little homework on my red and white lap quilt, as I have my class this afternoon (and I will miss next week's as I am away in Southampton for a couple of days).  There was one block left over, so I have made it up into a cushion front.  I need to get the back on today (just an envelope one, for speed). 

I also sewed on the last strip onto the top - here it is laid out across a bed.  I went in search of some backing material, and that resulted in a huge sort out in the Junk Room as I was fed up with my crafting stuff being not in one place (now all WIP's and recent material in one big container) and with tripping over stock in cardboard boxes, so I had a sort out of some of that too, but I need more heavyweight containers - we bought two on Monday, but need a few more, ideally, to get everything tidied away and stackable.

I woke early again today - the Tawny Owls in the paddock were calling to one another and saying where the best mice were to be found in the long grass.

On the seed feeders outside, the first of the Goldfinches has returned (to the front one in the apple tree) and the Chaffinches are back out of the woodland too.  I noticed a female Lesser Spotted Woodpecker on the Damson Tree feeder yesterday so I will try and get a photo.

Enjoy your day - I need to do some accounts now!

We've had a busy few days of things, with the local Fleamarket at the weekend and now I have a list of jobs to do as long as my arm.  It was fine here yesterday, so after doing the grocery shopping and banking, we set to on outside jobs.  First the guttering, as the strip down above the Old Dairy flat was blocked with leaves, and the front of house low guttering needed clearing too.  There is a piece of backboard behind the guttering on the corner of the bay window which needs replacing, so that is a job for the next dry day.

I had cooked a chicken at the weekend, so I got some Campbells Condensed Chicken Soup as the base for a pie, and topped it with cheese scones.  This is something I have cooked many times down the years.  However, a couple of years ago Campbells decided to have a "low fat" Cond. Chicken soup option - we tried it once and it was tasteless.  It disappeared from the market but now the only Cond. Chicken soup on offer appears to be made using that low fat and utterly tasteless recipe.  I am not a great one for complaining to companies about their products, but I have just sent them an e-mail to this effect.  On principal!  I bought two tins of it as well (price now £1 a can - I can remember when it cost half that, and not that long ago either).  I shall donate that to the food bank for charity in Tesco.

When we were at our patchwork class last week, our teacher had been given dozens of out-of-date material pattern books to use for projects.  They were very high end curtain fabrics (although most seem to have been made in India!)  We were given the chance of taking the ones which appealed to us, and there is going to be a bag-making session on the next wet day. 

I thought I would make a couple as gifts, and then start making shopping bags to sell on my stand in aid of the Pyramid Horses in Cairo charity I support, which is called Prince Fluffy Kareem.  If you have a moment, please go to their website and see what they do, although beware, some of the photos show animals that are bought to their premises are in a dreadful state with open wounds, gigantic abscesses, hugely overgrown and distorted hooves and sometimes broken limbs (although there is only one answer for these poor creatures, and the charity has to try and purchase the horse or donkey in order to give it a few hours of love and good food before the inevitable euthanasia).  If you could make a donation to them, I guarantee every penny would be wisely spent - these people work MIRACLES!  I have a standing order to make a monthly donation and send extra when I can.

Below: I have decided to "live for the day" bookwise, and these are two which have come my way in the last week.  The other sewing group I am a member of (organized by my friend Dawn) is making this wonderful Home Sweet Home sewing box (it has all sorts of home-made and embroidered little extras inside too).  We have a year to do it.

The Wild Dyer is a book that was mentioned in the Weekend Telegraph recently, and it is right up my street.  It is more practical for me to dye cloth than spin fleece to dye, as I am more likely to use the fabric.  This is a lovely book and I am reminded of my friend Kim, now in France, who will be doing the same with wool in her new life out there.

I still have a ton of apples here although I am giving them away as soon as I find victims!  I have several patchwork projects I'm working on, lace making, another Fair next weekend, and then I am off down to Southampton for a couple of days.  Yesterday, as it was dry, I carried on with the garden tidy up but there is SO much to do out there and I think I need cloning!  I definitely need a smaller easy to maintain garden when we do eventually move . . .

I need to get back to the redecorating, as my office is still awaiting the wallpaper, but since my sewing machine and a pile of material and cutting aids are all over the kitchen table, those will have to get moved first.

It has got colder - we changed the summer duvet to the winter one yesterday.  It is a feather and down duvet and SO snug.  It says 4 tog - HAH.  More like 40!!

Hay at Halloween

Yesterday we were in Hay.  Of course, I had my trusty camera with me, so here are a few of the photos taken on an amble round the town.  This creamy ginger cat was so friendly.

The short cut down behind the shop - originally an ironmongers - but now it stocks all sorts, including this selection of large wicker baskets for wood, and it has a fab kitchen shop inside too.

Our friend M's shop, The End.  It always has a wonderful collection of really unusual things inside.

Aren't those Nautilus shells lovely?  The window display had lots of Physalis (Chinese Lanterns) in it.

Upstairs, this taxidermy lion's head was wearing a pretty wreath of flowers.  M was telling me how she dares the children to put their hand in the lion's mouth!!

A stuffed Duck.  No home should be without one!

Pretty leaves in the pub wall, where most of the larger Virginia Creeper leaves had already blown away.

Above and below: at the shop which sells all sorts of wonderful crystals, were these little houses and duck pond, and there was a good selection of Green Man faces on the wall. I had a wonder round inside, but as always, got a bit overwhelmed by the room which is full of crystals - you are bombarded with energies!

Above and below:  the view across the car park to the beautiful hills beyond.

Coming back through the Backfold cut, and about to order lunch at the little Sandwich Cellar there, I stopped to take a photo of the display outside the Flower shop.

Above and below: Hay is still about Book Shops, and here is the window display in one of our favourite shops, opposite the Castle.

I just loved this Bookhouse!

Craft Work in progress and soon to be

Yesterday morning I set off to my friend Dawn's for another lace-making lesson.  I was finishing off the bottom of my first piece of Torchon lace, and starting on lesson No. 2.  She also loaned me a staple gun to fasten the material she had kindly given me to the lace making pillow her mother-in-law had kindly given me.

Lesson No. 2 is much harder as I have to learn to read from a pattern and how to split the work at the sides to just work the central diamond (isn't it lovely?).  The white thin perle thread I already had and the green perle was the darker of the two spools I bought at the Quilt Festival last Friday.

My first-ever attempt at lace-making, FULL of mistakes, but never mind, I learned a lot, especially where I had gone wrong.

This is wall one of a long-term project that Dawn has set up for a small group of  us to do.  It is a 3D cottage with sewing compartments inside.  I can't wait to get started but need to trace the pattern for this first, once I have cut out the various sides and roof panels from the linen we are using.

I am working on daughter Gabby's quilt again.  I bought some more material - the wine red in the design on the pinwheel patches DOES tie in with the red on the floral print blocks (which Gabby chose in preference to another material I had bought).  I've run out of the floral print now so need to get another couple of yards this week.

Now for my indulgences at the Quilt Fair on Friday.  I allowed myself one book, but it was so difficult to chose.  Even choosing between this book and it's sister title Stitches from the Garden was hard, but this is the one I plumped for, and I want to make just about everything in it!

I tried to stick to my list of what I needed rather than what I would have liked, and I know this nesting set of hexagon templates will be useful as I do lots of little pieces or bigger quilts using hexagons.

I bought some plain reddish fabric which I was hoping would match a project but doesn't, and forgot to take a photo.  This collection of 8 x 1/8th is beautiful and I am looking forward to using them.

Overprinted felt, variegated perle cotton, and two small spools of perle cotton (the latter for lace making).  I was going to make the girls covers for their mobile phones, to protect the screens, but thought I ought to pass the idea past Tam and she said not to bother as they like to just grab their phone out to use and not have to take its jacket off first!!

Right, this won't do.  I didn't sleep well, and we have had a long day as we accompanied our friend to Wotton auction as she had some items to be entered for the next sale, and she had never done this before, and didn't know where the auction house was.  We had lunch in the town (The End, as usual) and drove back across country as the motorway Westbound had been shut for hours beforehand, due to a bad accident.  We didn't know when it would be opened again.  It rained all day, but hey ho, we're in autumn now.

Tomorrow I have my patchwork class, so hope to be able to show you some results from that soon.

Visit to Malvern Autumn Quilt Festival

Above and below: some of the entries from the ladies of the WI, theme WW1 of course.  The one above was my favourite in this category.

This made me smile and the little quilt flapping on the line was 3-D.

Beautiful applique (there was plenty on show) and a nice combination with the traditional patchwork.

How pretty is this, and beautifully appliqued.

Points everywhere - very skilfully executed, though the border didn't do it for me.

Above and below: I particularly liked this little hanging, which was of the leaves of (Winter?) Heliotrope.  I liked the worded paper leaves, and the embroidered/embellished background material, and the leaves were hand-painted.   The words printed around the outside was also a clever idea.  My favourite piece in the show.  Cleverly planned and executed. 

LOVED the border on this quilt especially - how long did this take to make, as it was perfection . . .  Had a soft spot for the Pineapple Log Cabin block, since this is what I am working on at the moment.

A close up of the quilting on a whole-cloth quilt.  How perfectly even is THAT quilting?  I may as well give up now!!

LOVED this quilt too, especially for its floral bits.  Beautifully designed and worked.

Right, this won't do.  I am off to see my friend Dawn now, so back later . . .