Weekend in London - Days 1 and 2

Hello there - a couple of weeks ago my family and I had a weekend in London.  We travelled up in two separate parties - three of us went during the morning to go shopping in Oxford Street, whilst the other three were in school and at work and they travelled up later in the day.

 

Marble Arch

 

 

Selfridges

 

 

 

Oxford Street then head off down Regent Street

 

 

I couldn't resist a snap of these little beauties in Hamley's window

 

 

Then on to Liberty - WOW - WOW - WOW

 

 

 

The entrance ..... 

 

Come on inside and take a look round with me

 

 

 

look at the colours and the patterns

 

 

 

beautiful patchwork

 

 

 

 

 I spelt my name with pretty fabric letters

 

 

I love this wreath (but not as much as my Winter wreath)!!!

 

 

 

paper decorations

 

 

 

 

 

We travelled on buses and the underground to West Ham station which is where we were staying, checked into our hotel and then waited for the others to arrive

 

************

Saturday morning found myself and hubby catching the train from Stratford station just one stop down the line to Mile End for me to do my 9 am usual Saturday morning parkrun (hubby didn't run but came to keep me company) we were up bright and early and it was a lovely morning, so I did my 5k run around Mile End park which was two laps around and alongside the canal.  It was a lovely friendly atmosphere and a great start to my day.

 

Once I had showered and breakfasted we then went into London.  We had a show booked "The Play that Goes Wrong" at the Duchess Theatre near Covent Garden, so we headed there to collect our tickets and I was snapping bits that caught my eye as we strolled along in the sunshine

 

 

 

this sign really tickled me

 

 

our tickets were collected so on we went around Covent Garden

 

 

 

OOOOoohhh - a shop with my name on

 

 

 

How is he hanging there?

 

 

AND how did the do that???!!!

 

 

A Mr Bean lookalike - he was hilarious!

 

 

and so off to the show - which was brilliant - if ever you get the chance to go it will certainly put a smile on your face and it was great all round family fun

 

***  SO ONTO LEICESTER SQUARE  ***

 

 

OOOOoohhh we went in here for tea and no we didn't choose wisely!!

 

 

 

 

 

 

we had a wander up and down here and then we finally ended up here .....

 

 

where we met up with some friends and had a lovely meal

 

Thanks for popping by and I hope you enjoyed days one and two and will pop back another time for day three (which was the best day of all)

 

Xx Joy Xx

 

PS  In case you thought I hadn't done any knitting or crochet whilst we were away, of course I did, I took chunky wool and big fat needles as this wasn't too much to concentrate on whilst travelling. The following weekend was my youngest grandsons birthday and I made him these ....

 

 

he wears them lots too!!! (which is great for a 13 year old to do)

My Winter Wreath

Hello there - On the 15th January, Lucy at Attic24 posted on her blog that she was going to be making a Winter Wreath. Oh that sounded lovely - so I followed her posts with interest.  The Winter Wreath was to be Lucy's fifth wreath.  I have in the past made her Christmas Wreath - so I watched her blog daily for updates and patterns for this current project she was going to be working on.  She chose her colours, she sorted her flat backed 32cm polystyrene "half round" ring.  She made a crochet chain and then worked in stripy rows until her work would fit round the circumference of the polystyrene ring, leaving long dangly ends when she changed colours to be able to sew it into place with those long dangly ends to keep the back neat.

 

Well I was up with Lucy, as I already had this half round ring covered.  Lucy made the distinction between land and sky (I didn't as mine was already covered) - and over the next two months Lucy would make her bits and pieces of foliage, leaves, balls/berries, pine cones, snowflakes and she shared the patterns and what she was up to with us. 

 

Finally on the 9th March there was a Lucy Ta-dah moment and she shared her wreath with us

 

 

 

Now isn't that just absolutely gorgeous and are you as much in LOVE with it as I am!

 

and so

 

 

I started to assemble "my Winter wreath" with all the bits and bobs that Lucy had shown us how to make and I got this far and this is how it has stayed

 

 This has sat on my lounge floor since 12th March and finally on the 29th May (that's 11 weeks later) I decided that I didn't like it, that I wasn't going to finish it - I didn't really think about it for too long and decided quite quickly that the colours of the covered wreath that I so cleverly thought would be ok - JUST WEREN'T!!!

 

 

So that's it .... take everything off and pop them all into the box

 

 Right then the next plan was to see exactly what I had made so far and what I needed to make to finish it once and for all

 

 

ok - I had a polystyrene half flat ring which was not 32cm but 25 cm, so next find the right colours for land and sky

 

parma violet, storm, denim, cloud, meadow, mocha

 

 

 so off I go and start crocheting (in the proper colours) land and sky!

 

 

once I had reached the required length to fit round my ring, I started to sew my crochet into place using those long dangly ends to join it together and then you end up with a nice neat fitting woolly coat for your wreath base

 

 

Ooooohhh yes - that's better - land and sky

 

 

Lucy has 32 little leaves - I had 29 - perhaps I should make 1 more - see here

 

 

Lucy had 9 fern leaves - I had 4 - ok I should make some more of those then! - see here

 

 

Lucy had 4 Little Pine Cones - I had 3 - nah I'll stick with 3 - see here

 

 

weeny little balls x 18 - I had 13 - perhaps I should make five more - see here

 

 

Hellebore x 3 - and yeah I have 3 too - see here

 

 

Dangly bits x 3 hanging from the bottom - I have 2 - so I should make 1 more - these are made by crocheting a chain and then working two trebles into each chain and they will just curl around

 

* S N O W F L A K E S * SNOWFLAKES * S N O W F L A K E S *

 

Snowflakes x 9 - oh dear I don't have any - better get busy with those then - patterns from this book

 

 

ok I am getting there - some snowflakes (done) - more fern leaves (done)

 

 

you need to get one of these (to sew on the back of your woolly wreath to hang it up!!

 

and finally

  

 

One of these little fellas - oh I only have half of him done - so perhaps I should finish him

can you see what the "little fella" is???

 

 

Here he is nestling in the holly bush (I will need to bring him indoors)

pattern by Little Conkers available to purchase/download here

 

 

So this week my crochet hook has been out to finish up the bits that I was missing

robin, snowflakes, fern leaves, leaf and curly bit

 

 (remember my half flat ring isn't as big as Lucy's, so I don't need quite so many bits and bobs)

Lucy had 82 individual bits to make up her wreath

 

I have finished up with a total of 66 lovely woolly bits to assemble onto my wreath

 

 

Lucy also got some extra little sparkly bits to add - so here are mine

 

 

OOOOOhhhh - 3rd June and starting to pin my woolly lovelies into place

 

I am a bit nervous

 

 5th June all sewn on and ready to hang into place on my lounge door

 

and now here is Joy's Ta-dah moment!!

 

 

I  A B S O L U T E L Y  L O V E  J O Y ' S  W R E A T H

 

I hope you have liked my wreath journey and thanks for popping by

 

Xx Joy Xx

 

PS If you would like to see Lucy's other wreaths - then pop on over to Attic24 and take a peek!!

 

 

Joy's Christmas wreath

 

I LOVE  LOVE  LOVE my Winter Wreath more!!!