I did have a small new stitching start with Barb and the parlour ladies last Wednesday at Needlecraft Haven. As regular readers will know, for this SAL you can stitch any design by LHN, CCN or the Sampler Girl and this year I am stitching the ornaments by CCN and LHN from past JCS ornament editions. Quite a few have been stitched so far and last Wednesday my new start was Peace by CCN. This one is in the 2007 edition.
I've been knitting as well. The charity knitting group have been asked to make 10 full sets for local prem babies in the baby unit at present.
Here's a full set I've done ...
and I've put the tiddly mitts and boots next to a 6" ruler so you see just how tiny they are ...
Using up oddments there are also 4 hats and one of the special triangles (new readers can read all about the triangles in an earlier post here) to hand over on Friday.
I've been doing quite a bit of blog reading in short bursts and am finally all caught up. You have all been busy making wonderful things, lots of lovely stitching, quilting, crochet and beading happening. {{hugs}} to those who are going through stressful times and sad times, I have read sad news on a few blogs and some are experiencing health issues. Sending get well wishes to you. Happy news too, new mothers with babies who are growing well and new pets arriving with some people. Lots of happy times ahead for those.
I did say I would share some holiday snaps so here are a few (perhaps a lot) from our recent week away in Cardigan Bay.
We stayed at Tywyn, which is a seaside resort on the Cardigan Bay coast of southern Gwynedd in Wales on the very edge of Snowdonia National Park.
We visited lovely places....
Aberdyfi
and the legend of it's time and tide bell .....
Looking out over the sea, you can see beautiful sandy beach for miles opposite but you cant get to it over the water.....
You can drive the 19 miles around the Dyfi estuary and arrive close to Borth. Taking the dead end road, you drive onto the wide open beach in the car and see Aberdyfi where you just came from.
The first time we were there is rained, but someone didn't get wet, they'd driven their tiny caravan onto the beach
We passed there another day on the way to somewhere else and stopped off for a picnic lunch. This time glorious sunshine, time for a picnic on the beach with a couple of gulls who wanted to join us...
as we sat we looked across back to Aberdyfi ......
We walked in forests, under a bridge with a steam train carrying holidaymakers going overhead (we travelled on the train last time we were here)
Very steep climbs up to the Dolgoch Falls ....
the lower falls ....
and on we went, higher and higher, over the bridge...
to view the upper falls.....
Down the other side and we saw that someone had been yarnbombing at Dolgoch little station where the Tallylynn steam train stops to take on water and let passengers off to see the falls ...
Swallow babies were being fed by their mamma in the roof of the stationmasters shed ....
A visit to the Osprey project to see the latest chicks that were growing well. Our cameras don't have such long vision so we watched with binoculars provided and saw the live web cam of the 3 little ones as they were being watched by their mum. They have all fledged since we came home you can see here. Dad is called Monty and he was born only a short distance from our home at Rutland Water before making his home in Wales. The only pic I got of the nest was rubbish lol
but we did see some waterbuffalo (hiding in the undergrowth so no clear pic) at the Dyfi Osprey project and such an interesting variety of other birds feeding from their vast array of feeders. A fabulous place to visit for bird lovers and all for £3 each.
We visited old ancient sites like Cymer Abbey, founded in 1198
and Castelle Y Bere, a real castle dating from the 13th century. You can read about it here.
A drive up the coast to Barmouth saw us passing more yarn bombers work, a colourful bicycle ....
and someone keeping a close eye on who was coming over his bridge - it reminded me of the childrens book Billy Goats Gruff.....
closer inspection needed.... it's a troll - a fabulous crochet troll in fact.... he let us pass without any trouble lol
You can access Barmouth over the Mawddach Estuary, but only by foot or train ....
It's 20 miles or so round the estuary along the coast road, beautiful scenery to see, although some parts of the road are very narrow.
Nice shops in Barmouth and a lovely sandy beach to explore with sand dunes to protect you from the wind ....
We got stuck behind some escaped sheep. The farmer was not impressed and getting even crosser every time he got near them and they ran off again .....
Time for a picnic on the beach ....
the locals looked a bit menacing - rooks are very popular in this area
Lovely sunshine, reading and resting on the sand .....
and dipping your feet into the lovely water.....
One evening the sea was very rough......
Every night we enjoyed a lovely evening stroll along the promenade taking in the setting sun.....
A lovely relaxed and fabulous time was had by DH and myself (and we didn't want to come home!)
Blessings to you all
