Our Christmas Day…..

A relaxed happy day, celebrating together.

Merry Christmas

I've been away and am back again (more on that later when I have time). We are just about ready for Christmas - the house is decorated, the girls are home :-) and all the food is prepared.

Merry Christmas everyone xx

The last stitch…..

…. and the quilt I have been making for my friends is finished!!!!

Just waiting to get a good light to take some decent photographs - its so dull here all day at the moment.

Lost…..

Panic call from C, she has lost her bobble hat. Not really a panic, but she really really loves her hat as it has quite a large bobble. She has searched all over, followed her tracks but cannot find it. I knitted it for her last year see here and here and C made the bobble!  She would like another one knitting exactly the same, blue then grey then red.

So, I have found the pattern (my filing system worked!) and have found some left over bits of wool. I had made another hat for a friend using the wool in a different combination - red, then grey and blue so was a little concerned I may not have enough blue but have managed to get hold of another ball.  I definitely have enough grey - but might be a bit pushed for the red!

So Chevy the Chevron cushion may go on hold for a bit.

Singing at Ripon Cathederal

My good friend A and I sing each year with a local school choral society. This year we were going to sing in Ripon Cathedral. We start rehearsals in September, just once a week through to the performance which was this last Saturday. It's so enjoyable to go each week and sing in a crowd - with a real mix of ages from younger pupils to older members of the community. Time just to just stop and concentrate on something new and make music. The society takes 'all comers' which is probably just as well as I'm not musically trained at all, but as I've been singing for quite a few years now I can sight read a bit, and learning new pieces is getting a little easier.

So, on Saturday afternoon we arrived at the Cathedral for a rehearsal before the performance in the evening. The Cathedral really is a magnificent building with beautiful carvings and stone masonry, and wonderful acoustics for music.
This years programme included three pieces, we sang Vivaldi 'Magnificat', Britten 'Rejoice in the Lamb' and my favourite this year Elgar 'The Snow'.

The Cathedral was packed for the performance, and it went well, just a few shaky places but we got through it. I love the performance as it feels like the countdown to Christmas has really started!

Quilt and Knitting update

I've been busy as a bee, and have now finished all the blocks for the red and white quilt. I did take a while to decide which fabrics to use and in the end came down with this mix, each block has mostly the same eight red fabrics, but in different positions - and just to mix it up a little I've just swapped a couple of different red fabrics in. All will be revealed when the top is complete!

 

I've never added sashing and cornerstones into a quilt before, so I've been on a bit of a learning curve. I found a really good tutorial here and it seems to have worked well for me.

 I've also taken time to do a little more knitting for my Chevy the Chevron cushion, which is slowly growing - hopefully it will be ready for Xmas!

View from my window - November

It has been a bit of a funny month weather wise this November. I think we have had just about everything!

Late evening sunshine,

 the first frost of the winter,

 rain storms with a lovely double rainbow,

 hail!

more frost,

 more sunshine - and the wood has been transformed into beautiful autumn colours…...

……then we had strong winds and almost overnight the lovely leaves have blown away.

 

Lots of cloudy dull days as well…..

….. but the month finished in sunshine.

 Only one more month to go and my record of the year will be complete.