Pasties and Holidays

Another month has flown by! Em made Ham and Cheese pasties, delicious! But the dairy free homemade pastry was a disaster so she had to make them with bought pastry that she couldn't eat. Em also made a salad which had to be high in protein and vitamins; she used lettuce, anchovies, sundried tomatoes, smoked salmon, cashew nuts, raisins and olives with a dressing of olive oil and balsamic vinegar. We had it with new potaoes for our evening meal and it was delicious (just a bit on the salty side). With the Rangers/Girl Guides we went to visit our local RSPB reserve and spent the evening pond dipping and looking at moths. With the pond dipping each team of four had to see how many species they could find. In our tray there are 16 species! This week was half term which we spent in the Cotwolds. We stayed in a National Trust property on the edge of the Lodge Park & Sherborne Estate. It was a very peaceful place to stay, we had a comfortable two bedroom lodge cottage with beautiful views across open countryside in front of the property. Blue Tits were nesting in the cottage wall, chaffinches, greenfinches and blackbirds nesting in the hedges and deer walking in the fields down to the woods. We visited The Cotswold Wildlife Park which was brilliant, Cheltenham, Upton House and Gardens (N.T.), Burford, Bourton on the Water, Stow in the Wold, Cirencester and Bibury. Bibury is very picturesque, like Stow and Bourton, with a stream full of trout and a row of beautiful stone cottages and busy with tourists during the day but peaceful and lovely in the evening which was when we visited. The lanes back to the cottage were festooned with blossom and the occasional baby rabbit dashed away into the long grass. We also saw a pair of Partridge (Mr & Mrs) crossing the lane. Back to school on Monday! I hope you have a good week. Jane x

Holidays and Stitching

We've had a lovely break, We stayed in a cottage on the National Trust Estate of Coleton Fishacre - Kingswear, Devon. It was lovely as there was a bottle of milk, tea bags/coffee and biscuits for you to have a drink on arrival, it was so quiet too. Greenway was close by in Dartmouth which was the holiday home of Agatha Christie, it is now owned by the National Trust. You have to pre-book parking if going by car but it was a fascinating house to visit. We crossed the river Dart by the historic ferry and wandered the streets of Dartmouth. We lunched in the station restaurant and on our walk along the sea front stopped to watch the children crab fishing. Babbacombe model village was a very interesting place to visit, they have even created the 2012 London Olympics construction site amongst all the other dioramas. On our final day we visited Brixham and stopped for lunch at Tiffany's. Al is an Audrey Hepburn fan so was delighted to have "Breakfast at Tiffanys"

My Holiday Stitching

I have stitched a gift for a friend who is leaving work to study to become a Vicar in the Church of England. I chose the prayer by Saint Francis of Assisi - Make Me A Channel Of Your Peace as the verse with other motifs of family and trains. I also stitched the two sides of a stork scissor Biscornu from a pattern by xstitch happy I haven't found time yet to sew it together. Then I moved on to a biscornu pattern I had saved from The world of Cross Stitching Magazine, that is also awaiting stitching up. Finally I designed a biscornu as a gift for one of Em's Guiders as she got married in July and Em together with five other guides formed a Guard of Honour with arches of ivy as the Bride and Groom came out of church. I used Jo Verso's hearts for the centre but the rest of the designs were mine. (I have blanked out the surnames to protect their privacy) The reverse will have the girls names and the ivy clad arches that they held. Finally I have started to stitch Mary Wigham Quaker Sampler from Ackworth School, Yorkshire. The pattern and SAL can be found on the Needleprint Blog.

"Dorset is beautiful where ever you go" Part 2

Our trips out this week have included, Athelhampton house and Gardens which are beautiful and have many echos of Montacute and Barrington Court, but Athelhampton is privately owned. Lulworth Castle which was fantastic, it was destroyed in 1929 by fire. It was then rescued and roofed and stabilised, so you can see three floors from the ground floor. One of the towers has a steel stair case to the battlements which give 360 views of the castle lands. Later the same day we visited Lulworth Cove, we even tackled part of the coastal path to Durdle Door. The views were stunning.

We also visited Barrington Court for an Easter Egg Hunt then on Easter Saturday we went to Corfe Castle and later the same day we boarded the steam train to Swannage which was brilliant. I love steam trains despite being born after Dr Beeching wielded his axe on the railway. We visited a wonderful chocolate shop which hand makes all sorts of chocolate including the dairy-free variety. So Em did very well this Easter despite her dairy allergy. I bought the dairy-free bunnies as substitues for the Cadbury's egg she won on the Easter Egg hunt. Easter Sunday we went to Lytes Cary Manor and Easter Monday we visited Coldharbour Mill, Uffculme. The mill has some beautiful wool. Today we came home to Sussex with Ali. I hope you have a lovely week Jane x

"Dorset is beautiful where ever you go"

The title of this post is a line from a song sung by the Yetties and pefectly sums up the County of Dorset. Sunday afternoon we visited Tintinhull Gardens N.T. The gardens were beautiful, the tulips and magnolias were in bloom. Em took her sketch book with her to practise single line drawing of organic shapes. They will be doing more in art lessons at school after Easter. The pond in the photo was full of fish and lots of tiny tadpoles hiding in the clumps of iris. On Monday we went to Bath, to the Jane Austen Museum. It has a display of costumes of the period and tells the life story of Jane Austen, which was fascinating. We walked around the Royal Crescent and down the shopping streets. Tuesday - we visited Athelhampton House, it is a beautiful house and gardens, which we enjoyed discovering. I hope you have a good week. Jane

Our Holiday

This week we have visited Hinton Ampner, a National Trust house near Winchester. The house is lovely with beautifully restored rooms following a fire in the 1960's. The gardens were quite large with many paths winding around the borders. It also has a walled garden for vegetables and flowers.

Our next day trip was to London to visit Docklands Museum which tells the story of the Port of London from Roman times through to the present day covering slavery, world trade, the Second World War and todays regeneration. It was a fascinating visit which filled most of our day. Later we went for a ride on the Docklands Light Railway (Em and I hadn't been before but Tony uses DLR for work)

Tuesday afternoon we all went to see Wall. E. which we all enjoyed.
Wednesday we travelled up to London again, this time to visit Tower Bridge exhibition which took us up to the walkways above the bridge. We were able to look out across London and spot the places we knew, for Tony and Em it was a first visit but I had visited when I was the same age as Em is now with my Dad and a couple of friends. This time we went up in a lift but on my first visit we had to walk up a staircase that seemed to go on and on for ever. Later we also saw the engine room with the steam engine that used to lift the bridge until 1976 when it was replaced. We walked along the banks of the River Thames past City Hall and on to Hayes Galleria which gave us protection from a deluge of rain and provided a shopping opportunity.

Thursday we stayed at home. On Friday we went to Polesdon Lacey (National Trust) in Surrey which is the former home of Mrs Greville, a well known Edwardian hostess who entertained royalty including King George VI and Queen Elizabeth. Yesterday and today have been full of odd jobs and house work.

Awards and holidays

Gina and Willow have both given awards out to their readers/commenters of which I am one. Thank you ladies, the rules are: Post the logo, link to the sender, and pass it on to five/seven other blogs. I have decided to give it to everyone who reads and comments on my blog, because I in turn read and enjoy your blogs. Thank you.

Em and I went down to Dorset to visit my parents, our days out included Weymouth beach on the day that it was featured on BBC1's The One Show and the film crew took a shot of our sand castle, we were very excited but sadly our castle didn't make it onto the show.

We also spent time visiting Clevedon Court, Bristol (NT) and Old Sherborne castle which is a ruin from the Civil War and the recently restored Castleton Water Wheel. The weather was beautiful with blue skies and sunshine.

We also went to see two films: Mamma Mia! which was just brilliant and we'd love to see again, then we also went to see Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging which was another good film.

Sadly during the week we heard from the owner of the house we were going to stay in Brugges in a couple of weeks time. During restoration to the house next door the builders have found problem with the water supply which affects both houses. We have been to Brugges before but were looking forward to visiting all our favourite places again. We can have a full refund but now will be staying at home for the week.

Tomorrow Em is off to Guide camp for the week and is very excited about it all. Quite by accident we have discovered that Em is dairy intolerant so have stopped her eating all dairy products. Immediately she recovered from the illness that has plagued her for weeks. Still no Biopsy results, but the blood test came back negative. So, she may not be coeliac after all but for the moment, to give her tummy time to recover, she is to stay wheat and dairy free. After Guide holiday we may try wheat food and see if she is ok or not. Happy weekend Jane x

Easter

We spent Easter weekend in Dorset visiting my parents. Alice was home from Uni and is enjoying her Easter holidays at the moment. We have our school Easter break from the 4th April for two weeks. Despite the weather we had a lovely weekend and managed a couple of egg hunts with the National Trust at Lytes Cary Manor and Barrington Court, both near Yeovil. The weather was so cold and wet that I didn't take my camera so I took these photos with my mobile phone. (Sorry for the poor quality) Over the weekend I planned to knit myself a pair of socks but I changed my mind when I saw a pattern for a Leprechaun in a magazine. It was a perfect gift for my friend Debbie. Debbie had given me an Easter egg. On the previous Monday a couple of the 6th formers had come to school dressed as Leprechauns because the theme for St Patricks day was green clothing. However we all teased her that she was seeing things. I made him (Seamus) a speech bubble introducing himself and left him on her desk this morning. Seamus was a big hit with Debbie and he even brought Debbie to lunch to meet the other staff.

I am delighted that my Bunny, which I made for the Bunny Hop Bunny Swap which Lucy organised, has now arrived in Holland at Heleen's home. I can now show you a couple of photos I took of bunny before I sent her to Heleen, but I think Heleen's pictures are much better so pop over to her blog and have a look.