UK TRIP 2019 - THORNTON-LE-DALE

As promised, although a little late, here is a look at the above village through an Aussie's eyes & camera lens.
Carrying on from my last UK trip post, we'd had a lovely lunch & headed toward Thornton-le-dale, to have a look at the Motor Museum, only to find it closed for a week after their auction.  We did see a few cars out the front & through the windows, but couldn't go inside to wander.
Parking the car in the large car park, we headed toward the main street & along the way saw all of these beautiful carvings & other photogenic bits.

An owl & a squirrel.

Some ducklings with Mum.

Ah, real ducks on the water.

Another owl.

Houses along the stream.

A small weir on the other side.

These were all taken between the car park & the main shopping area.  It was all so lovely.
Finally made it to the Museum, where I took my one & only photo of these cars for a friend in our Car Club who own a collection of Austins too.

We kept on exploring and came across another footpath along the stream & madly kept snapping.  You can tell I was quite captivated by this place.

Very artistic/

Tranquility plus.

Back along the road & more stopping to take photos.

The church.

A row of stone terrace houses.

Flowers on the wall.  I looooooooooove these.

Further along back on the bridge over the stream I took this photo, although I took a few of it from the footpath, I kept getting people in it.  This time I caught it people-less (is that a word?).   Most will know this cottage from calendars & possibly even biscuit tins & other memorabilia.  Why?

It is Beck Isle cottage. (I think that is what it is called).

Heading back into the car park & I noticed these.

Bug hotels.

Stunning golden rod.

That was an afternoon spent in a wonderful village, wandering to our heart's content.
About it from me for this post & future posts will have only positives and not how I might be feeling, but what we are doing to pass the time and lots of photos.
Take care all, stay safe and huggles from down under.
Susan.

SEWING ON SUNDAYS 4 & CHAT.

Another Sunday is here and the anxiety levels are high.  I've tried not reveal how I'm feeling, but hearing people talk about this being the new normal for our future is slightly scary.  I can't imagine never venturing further than our own suburb, not being able to talk to or even give someone a hug, let alone shopping by being counted into stores or on-line, only allowed out to get groceries or an important necessity, not having coffee & cake occasionally and maybe never seeing our children & grandchildren.  Maybe one day a type of normal will again come...................

LET'S SEW...... even though I don't only do this on Sundays.  It's just the day I post about it.

Last week we worked on getting the rows sewn together ready for borders.  I forgot to take photos, until I'd added the borders.  That was because I had a problem finding fabric to do 2 borders, so we've ended up with one in fabric that sort of goes, though not what I had in mind.  Photos following are of both the quilts I've done to show how I work with borders.

1. MEASURING.

Now that all the rows are sewn, I measure through the centre of the quilt both ways & each side & hopefully as this quilt is square, they are all the same.  Very close with 35" in length from the 2.5" strips, to be cut for the 4 borders, and we have cornerstones to add on 2 of them. 

2.  PINNING.

I folded both the border piece & quilt in half & placed a pin, then pinned together to each end & sewed to top & bottom.

3.  SEWING.

Then I sewed a cornerstone to each end of the other 2 borders & used the same method to pin and sew those to each side.

                                                                            Ready to go.

4.  DONE.

Here are the two quilts waiting to be quilted.  Notice they have both only one border & that was such a pa-lava finding something that suited as I can't go anywhere to purchase fabric. As they are both for fairly new babies, they don't need to be extra large.  I do suppose I'm lucky to have a "BIG" stash.😉
Sorry if I'm a bit out of whack today & the top photo is not good  with a bright light in the corner when I was trying to take photos yesterday  & didn't realise how bad it was.

OTHER BITS OF SEWING.
Over the last week I've quilted 2 quilts from the tub of shame.  One is bound & the other having it's binding hand stitched now.

Made in 1996 in a workshop at the local quilt shop in Nowra, N.S.W.

And what I used for the back, which is partly a spare block from leftover bits or maybe I'd made it wrong.
The other pieces are  leftover backing & pieces from the stash.

Made in 2001 from a book, but I can't remember which one.

The back, again leftover from other quilt backs.

Today, apart from a bit of housework, filling my slowcooker with tonight's dinner and generally faffing around, I put some time into starting the QAL, I'm participating in with Sandra from MMMquilts.
My first four blocks are shown below.

It's called Centered & I've decided to go a bit wacky with my fabric choice, again raiding the stash.  We get our next instalment on Friday, 1st May.  I'm enjoying & as it's not huge, it will come together quickly.
OK, that's my funny old lot from today & I'll try and get my next UK trip post done either Monday or Tuesday.  No walkies today as the weather has been quite foul, but the next two days look promising before we are hit with a severe cold front that will possibly bring snow to our alpine areas.  BRRR!!
Take care all, stay safe & huggles from Susan.

UK TRIP 2019 - WHARRAM PERCY.

Heading out from Scarborough one day while house-sitting for DD we decided to head south to Wharram Percy, a deserted medieval village I'd read about.  It sure didn't disappoint, being so peaceful & serene.  We weren't quite alone, but basically had it all to ourselves & lots of photos were taken.
Lets start............

I'm not going to bombard you with signboards, but will start with this one about the village.  Click on it to make larger to read.

 Looking towards the barn & some of the archaeological diggings they've been doing for many a                                                                                     year.

                                                                        The other side.

                                 Looking across to the church.  More digging in the foreground.
The next two boards I also found very interesting, so thought I'd pop them on anyway.

                                              Again you may need to click on them to read.

                                    I loved the old stonework & shapes of the mullein windows.
Wandering further on from the churchyard the path meandered down to the old mill ponds.

                                          Across a timber boardwalk and we came out here..............

                                            A beautiful still body of water with reflections.

Just pass the pond, we came across this sign.  Tempting to go walking, but we kept exploring around the village on another trail looking back across farmland.

Can't forget another tree photo. See where two main branches have joined forces again further up.  Sorry, but I love my trees.

                           The church ruins from the higher trail & the barn, photo below.

                                     Heading back to the car park, through a tunnel of trees.

                                                 Wild flowers with a beautiful butterfly.

           Just before you get to the car park, there are far reaching views across farmland to the hills.
This is somewhere I could visit many times and never tire of it.  After this we travelled on towards Thornton-le-Dale ( a post for next week), stopping on the A169 between Old Malton & Pickering, at a farmshop for our lunch.  Very nice.
OK, enough from me and although we are in lockdown, I don't seem to be able to settle into a routine, and seem to keep faffing around.  Doing an on-line shop takes me ages & does my head in.  I'd like to make more headway in the garden, but it seems to be either "very" windy, raining or inclement, threatening to rain.  We are managing a walk most days & exploring streets we've never walked before & as we live in a very hilly town, it's certainly be strenuous. 
OK, I;ll be back on Friday for the Scavenger Hunt, so stay safe, take care and huggles from Susan.

SEWING ON SUNDAY 3 + OTHER BITS.

First up is the SEWING.
I'm just a bit all over the place, so once we sewed the sashing to the larger squares & the smaller ones, it was time to sew them into rows.

 I forgot to take photos before I started sewing some of the rows together.  As you can see from above, they are sewn as separate rows, and the I've joined a sashing row to the larger block row.  I did this with each one, then started joining more together as below.  They are then joined together as a whole.

We'll leave it there for this week before we start on the border.
That threw up another problem, as I've been using from my stash and have had to compromise with only one small border due to trialing many fabrics and not liking anything.  I have a solution and that will have to do, as I want these 2 baby quilts finished shortly & hope to hand them over as soon as the restrictions are eased.
I have taken a snap of the other colour way I've come up with and am in the process of getting it together now.

                                                                                No. 2.

OTHER BITS 'N' BOBS.
Over the weekend, which has been very overcast with a few showers has seen us pottering around, doing this, that and the other.
Baking......

 I made a Coffee Streusel Slice & some Butter Biscuits in 2 shapes.

I also made some frozen citrus yoghurt from some plain that I found very bitey.  I've not tried it yet, but may have a little tonight.

RAKING.

 Lots of leaves keep falling and as it wasn't windy this afternoon, I raked the leaves out the front.

 I also found lots of these in our lawn.  We saw many on our walk this afternoon & that's when you realise Autumn is really here.

                                                                      That window again. 
Enough from me.  I'm struggling knowing what day it is, hence the strange post about all sorts.
I'm sorry if my sewing bit is out of context with last Sunday, but I think only one person has said they might follow along.  I'm always available by email for any questions.
Take care all, stay safe and virtual hugs.
Susan.
Oh, and BTW.   We are supposedly in for plenty of rain this week, so walking might be on the light side.