Thursday 30 July 2009

Swashing Buckles and the like!


Draw, Benvolio; beat down their weapons.
Gentlemen, for shame, forbear this outrage!
Tybalt, Mercutio, the prince expressly hath
Forbidden bandying in Verona streets:
Hold, Tybalt! good Mercutio!


Oooh but bandying there was - at The Royal Armouries Museum in Leeds. We certainly arrived on the right day as it was Tudors all the way! First a display of falconry (Where fans of the League of Gentlemen will have smirked that the Kestrel was named Mr Chinery!), then a demonstration of Tudor horsemanship - all thundering hooves and lances held aloft (enough to set women fanning themselves!) Then - as if that wasn't enough, two sauve guys in big open necked shirts and thigh high boots swashed it out with swords whilst reenacting the fight scenes from Romeo and Juliet! *Thud* Beshrew me my Lord, I hath fallen into a swoon!


Paula x

Sunday 26 July 2009

Mmmmm Muffins


The outcome of yesterday's bilberry picking - I had to share. OK this is the worst photo ever but I didn't know that until I uploaded it and I've eaten all the muffins now! At least you can see my 'new' Hornsea Tea/Coffee/Sugar jars in the background! (I'm pleased with those too!)
There are still bilberries left for pancakes too! eeeeeeeh!


pxxxx

Saturday 25 July 2009

Vintage Goodness, Inspiration and Lots of Free Stuff!

Ok, so we haven't blogged for a loooong time! The stress of remodelling my house took its toll and I have been in a bit of a creative slump for a couple of months. Today I have had such a fabulous day I just can't keep it in so it seemed like a good time to come back! Today I went to a vintage bazaar in Ilkley to see the lovely Emma of Cakewalk, drop off some work for her shop and have a browse around.

I met lots of stallholders that I had seen at the last vintage event organised by The House of Rose and Brown and lots of pieces on their stalls I had coveted on that occasion and didn't buy. However, on that day I did buy some cute J&G Meakin cups and a jug to match a teapot I have. I saw the same stall today and the lovely lady running it was delighted to tell me that she had found some saucers to match the cups at a carboot and had saved two for me as a gift! This is my very pleasing little tea-for-two set all united!





Acts of random kindness always set you up for the day but it just kept getting better. On the same stall I found a thing, a curious thing that I was fairly sure that I recognised as a homemade device for making Tenerife lace. It is basically a cardboard or wooden circle covered in cloth and with evenly spaced pins all around it's edge. I recognised it because in my long absence from doing anything really constructive I have been investigating using flowers made on vintage flower looms in my corsages. knittingand on flickr is an avid collector of these things and has a fantastic collection of photos of them and all her other sewing and knitting gadgets.

Tenerife lace, or calado canario in Spanish is needlewoven lace made by inserting the pins into wood in various patterns (sometimes using a paper template) - especially circular ones, winding threads around them to make the spokes of a wheel and then weaving various designs into the spokes with a needle. I have a bag of vintage silk threads that Lesley bought me from Birmingham's market a while ago that I can't wait to try out on it. For now though, this is the piece of work that is on the thing right now along with a finished one that came with it - all for 50p!

My brilliant day still not over, I spent a gorgeous hour picking bilberries in the sun on Ilkley Moor on the way home (which I fully intend to tranform into muffins for breakfast tomorrow!) and then got home and acquired a bag of free fabric pieces from a freecycler.

So I end my day not entirely suprised that it is Lou Reed and NOT Simon Le Bon singing 'Perfect Day' in my head tonight - may there be many more like it!

Paula x