Post 40: Deliveries

The photo of the day is this one sent to me this evening by my friend Jennifer in isolation in a Perth hotel. I really love it. Jennifer is waiting on the results of a second test for Covid19. She's managing to keep calm and keep embroidering.


My outing today was triggered by the need to get the battery in my car key replaced. Although I have the spare key that usually stays with my daughter and son-in-law, I wanted to restore my key as soon as possible. I rang my Toyota servicer. They could do it, so I drove there as soon as my deliveries had arrived. It was strange to see no customers waiting for their cars to be cleaned or serviced.

The spare parts counter was carefully marked out. The replacement only took a few minutes and cost $12.

On my way home I stopped off at the Veale Gardens in the South Terrace parklands. I haven't  been here for many, many years.

The roses are looking really good at the moment.

I liked this very dark pink the best.














The roses, however, are not, in my view, the best part of the parkland's gardens. There are well laid out walking paths, with water features and landscaped groves of trees















There are ducks and a few ibis.



We are fortunate to have these parklands surrounding the CBD. The sun was out, and there were three or four families playing games with children, a couple of cyclists and three walkers other than myself. Plenty of space to keeping our distance.

I often wake quite early. I check emails and news and sometimes read a book or do a daily sudoko puzzle online before I get up. I preference text-based over video-based material. However, Phillipa Turnbull has been making a daily Crewel Work video, each one demonstrating a very specific skill. Phillipa is really good at this. Her demonstrations and explanations are exceptionally clear and helpful. I watched her first two videos as they were posted. This morning I caught up on most of the remainder.  I'm convinced these have had an impact on the leaves I've been embroidering on the Mellerstain Firescreen. I really recommend them if you are a surface embroiderer. The first video can be found here or you can Google 'Phillipa's Crewel Corner'.

After breakfast I got stuck into sending out an email to the World Embroidery Study Group, attaching Lori's pdf version of the PowerPoint she made of what would have been her talk to the Group this coming Wednesday. It's really good.  I tried to upload it to my website, so I could put a link here for others to view, but there was a problem. I've asked my web developer to fix it when he gets time. These days he makes videos for companies, and is probably rushed off his feet at the moment. I didn't ask for priority treatment, so it might be a while before I can share it this way.

My Marino's Meat delivery came around 11.30, and the Post Office delivered the Can Do Books order less than 10 minutes later. The meat was vacuum packed. The book is the one about embroidery on knitting. I think it's really good - more about it tomorrow.










I am  comfortable, well-serviced and connected. Today I had a charming eCard from friends in Nowra and a long, relaxed phone call from a neighbour, as well as messages from a range of friends and family.  These are what sustain me.









Along, of course, with the embroidery. I managed three more rows on the Fair Isle scarf on the sunny Western balcony this afternoon. The Mellerstain parrots progress - or at least the leaves and berries progress. I'm debating whether to do the remainder of the leaves and berries or launch into the parrots themselves.


Sleep on it.

Day12: Crewel Orange , Holy Trinity and I win a prize

We had free choice today of whether we took a formal class with Phillipa, caught up on things we were unsure of with tutors, visited other tutors, or generally hung out.
I chose to spend the morning in Phillipa's class embroidering an orange. It was a lot of fun and very satisfying. It is such an "ah" moment to see the colours blending and forming a unified whole. I look forward to working on this next week after I have finished my plaited braid stitch! The colours are so rich and rewarding.

This will, I'm sure, fill a gap in my crewel chair.
After lunch the shop was open for the last time. I bought two pieces of Phillipa's specially woven linen. I came intending to buy this so I can contribute to the many discussions at the Embroiderers' Guild of SA about linens. It isn't an area where I feel qualified to comment, but I would like to introduce these linens into the discussion.

I also bought a scissor chatelaine. I admire the way Christine Bishop carries hers this way at the Guild, so thought I'd try (ignoring the 12-15 pairs of scissors I already have in scissor keeps, with scissor fobs !)

I spent a bit of time putting some of the sequins and beads on Titania, from Nicola Jarvis's Midsummer Pillowe class earlier in the week. I am nervous about (1) losing the beads in the kit, (2) dropping or pinging them around the room while using them and (3) forgetting which go where. I still have a few to go. I hope to finish it in my new hotel tomorrow. I packed it up to walk down to Holy Trinity Church and meet Melody, so we could see the interior we were unable to see last Saturday.

It isn't a large church and Shakespeare, unsurprisingly features strongly in what it has on display. It is the church where Shakespeare was baptised, married and buried.


It was late afternoon, raining as I walked there, but the sun came out and filled the church with light and shadows.

In terms of architecture I liked the roof best.

However, my favourite element was by far the kneelers - big chunky ones embroidered with text, illustrated text or environmental images

There were lovely long ones in the choir stalls with psalms.




My favourites were the three in the prayer chapel, two in needlepoint and the last in silk.
















There was also some  notable stonework detail. I like the angels - they'd make great embroideries.









Then there are the miseracords - the mercy seats provided for ailing monks and other clerics who could not stand for the whole service.

These are truly beautiful - and numerous.

I only photographed those in easy reach of my camera. I liked the creatures and plants but there are many storied - sacred and secular - represented in the misericords.


I might go back during the week to have a more extensive look.

It must be a bit of a burden for a church to have to focus so closely on Shakespeare. They have used his association with the church very positively to educate visitors in historical practices. There are boards explaining, for example, marriage practices in Shakespeare's time, using his daughter's wedding as an example. These boards tell about his funeral, broadening it to funeral practices in general.


His grave - and the graves of his family - have a prominent place inside the church.



The Clapton Chapel is a side-chapel, full of tombs of the Clapton family. It was a Lady Chapel until the Reformation, after which the Clapton family kept it going and were buried there.





To me, it creates an atmosphere of death in the church. I'm sure there is a lively congregation. Almost for the first time in an English church, I felt a sense of a dead past, rather than a current congregation and church life.  It was interesting and much of it beautiful - but the past weighs heavy. The past is always present in a church, but it doesn't usually dominate.








The pulpit belies this





and the light from the windows in the very late afternoon gives hope.



















At 6pm we gathered in the dining area for farewell drinks and canapes. There were thanks to the wonderful tutors and helpers. After dinner we thanked the kitchen staff, who have been truly terrific. The food has been superb and the service without fault. 




We also had a preview of the Muncaster hanging, stitched by Harriet. Extraordinary. So lovely to see.

At the end of the evening Richard drew a name out of a bag to win a £100 Crewel Work Company voucher. For your name to be in the hat you had to have returned your feedback form.

To my total astonishment it was my name! Wow!

It has been such a good 8 days. Amongst this group of people I find my tribe. We recognise each other, share not just embroidery, but values and experiences. We pick up where we left off and connect to each other in very fundamental ways.

I'm so glad I came.

Day 11: The dreaded Elizabethan Plaited Braid Stitch

At home today I'd have been taking Niamh to JEMS. I hope she had a good time.

We began our day working the gold work on the pea. This was the warm up to the main task of the day - Elizabethan plaited braid stitch. The pea proved quite difficult. I actually cut my first attempt  out - a rare thing for me. The problem, I decided, was that the linen ( woven to Phillipa's specifications on original Elizabethan looms using flax uncontaminated by pollution or chemicals) was very soft, and pulling hard to shape the goldwork stitches pulled threads on the linen.

My second attempt was passable, but by no means perfect.

In the afternoon, most retreaters went to the Shakespeare Trust for a lecture on Corsets and Codpieces. All agreed it was very interesting - and fun. Both garments, it seems, were designed primarily as fashion accessories rather than protection and changed shape to fit with fashion aesthetics.

I stayed behind to work on my plaited braid stitch. I found it much easier than the earlier needlelace. The instructions in Kate Barlow's booklet were very clear and helpful.

My braid is not even and I acquired a twist in it at one point but I am pleased with it. I got the stitch right. As I progressed I discovered it lo.oked better a little larger than the design lines so it varies a bit.

My ort pot filled up



I worked on it pretty much until dinner at 7. I finished one plaited braid loop and all the blackwork. I have two leaves to outline in silk stem stitch and the rest is plaited braid. I'm pretty confident I can now finish it before I leave Stratford on 18 March.

I'm thinking  of turning it into a pouch to hold my gold work tools.

This evening's meal was leisurely and relaxed. We are all a bit tired and most people thinking of their homeward travel. It was again a lovely meal. I couldn't resist a photo of my desert - a rhubarb icecream and sorbet. The biscuit-like thing on the icecream is a wafer-thin slice of candied rhubarb .

Tomorrow is a bit of a free choice.  I'm hoping to spend half a day on a Phillipa project and perhaps progress Nicola's beyond the beads and sequins. It could, however, go somewhere else altogether.

Day 10: Stitching, stitching.

There were very few takers for breakfast at 7.30 this morning. Most people drifted in after 8.00, perhaps worn out by our night at the theatre.

It was a bright sunny day in Stratford-on-Avon. It looked great from inside the hotel. Outside, though sunny, it was cold.

This didn't much matter, because we were stitching inside all day today - the best of both worlds, cosy and warm, looking out on sunshine.

Our group made good progress on the Blackwork in the morning, working a range of stitches and beginning the outlines.

After our coffee break we began the first of the gold work.

Like Nicola's project, Kate Barlow's is really well designed for the teaching time. There is a variety of stitches and techniques, all on an achievable scale so a stitcher has a continuing sense of achievement. The project grows quickly. I realise some like projects that are larger and require a lot of ongoing work after a class, but I very much want to get close to seeing the finished thing. This one is really doing it for me.

I have been meaning for days to go out and photograph the lamppost opposite the hotel. Melody told me about it on the day we arrived. I could see it from the dining room but did not realise for several days that it was the one Melody was looking for. Today I finally walked across the road with Melody and Genevieve to have a closer look.

There are three bronze figures - the owl from the Owl and the Pussycat, the Fiddler on the Roof and Bottom from A Midsummer Night's Dream.


The sun was not in the best position for photographing it, so I might try for some better shots early in the morning.

The lamppost was a gift to Stratford from the Israeli Government. The owl oversees the scene from the top.




























NickBottom sits on one side, playing what appears to be a lute and singing, seemingly unaware he has the head of a donkey.


On the other side of the lamp is a Jewish fiddler - fiddling on the roof .






Stratford has many lampposts donated by various organisations and countries. None I have seen are as elaborate as this, but I will perhaps go looking for others next week.



In the afternoon we did the needle lace strawberry. I was pretty pleased with mine The first row should have been tighter, but other than that it came out well.







This is where I was at the end of the day.

I was feeling very tired again this evening, a combination of the theatre, a later night than usual last night and a full, concentrated day of stitching.

Before dinner Prof Richard McGregor interviewed our five tutors (Jenny Adin-Christie is on her way to Australia/NZ) about their entry into embroidery and their lives as professional embroiderers. Richard is very good at this and there was much lively discussion and interaction. Most had begun their post-school lives in an area other than embroidery and found their way there through an encounter or idea. The Royal School of Needlework had played a significant role in  the lives of three of them.

For all of them, the hardest thing related to the stress of having to turn time into money. What they can be paid for does not cover the hours of preparation and conceptualisation that goes into a product.

It was a most stimulating session and the conversations it provoked went on for hours through and after dinner. A fabulous day - great stitching and stimulating conversations with like-minded people.
Deo Gratias.