London

 It probably seems like I am gallivanting all the time now :)  I had a day out to London yesterday to visit with my friend Anita, over from France to attend the Kensington Dollshouse Festival, and I also dropped in to some exhibits at the V&A.  The trains continued their mediocre performance with short-notice industrial action cancelling the train I was meant to get so I was 30 minutes late to meet Anita - sorry! I think the lesson learned here is to assiduously check the 'live trains departure' lists online and not trust anything the timetables are saying. Even the Underground wasn't cooperating: the journey that took 25 minutes going east to meet Anita took almost 45 minutes coming back thanks to unexplained waits at stations and endless connecting tunnels, so I missed my one-train-an-hour-thanks-to-industrial-action home and had to hang around St Pancras station for an hour. So it turned into a very long day.

However, it was fun in the middle part.  It was lovely to catch up with Anita, a friend of some 25 years or more, whom I hadn't seen for several years. I hadn't been to the London show since I think 2015 so I was interested to see what it would be like.  Unfortunately due to COVID test requirements that had changed at short notice, there were very few European traders and the show itself was quite small.  In the old days it used to be over three floors, but this year it was only on the ground floor. I suppose we should be grateful we can go at all, considering what's going on the world.  It did make me feel old though: many of the traders whom I had always seen there have retired (or died!) and some of the remaining ones looked very elderly. I overheard one customer monologuing at a trader about how the glory days were gone in the hobby, when all the big names used to be at the shows, and how we were the last ones to see that and it's all gone now etc.  I suppose that's true - I first went to the show in I think 1989 just after I moved to the UK, and I went regularly through the 90s, when the top international names in the hobby would all be exhibiting. So you could see up close works of art costing hundreds or even thousands of pounds with incredible workmanship. Not that I had that kind of budget but it was wonderful to look.

I picked up a few things despite not really having a shopping list:

The chintz plate and stand is from Stokesay Ware and is for my Canadian house to symbolise my small collection of vintage chintz ware in real life.  The basket is by Francine Coyon of Vannerie Miniature in France, which along with the pierced caddy by Truly Scrumptious is for my Japanese house.  The Art Deco candlesticks and chip-carved spice box are also from Truly Scrumptious.  The former for my Art Deco roombox and the latter has found a home in my Gamekeeper's Cottage.

(excuse the poor flash photos, the light is so bad this time of year).

After saying goodbye to Anita, I strolled through Hyde Park on my way down to the V&A London museum in South Kensington.  There is a long fenced walk there called the Flower Walk, which was just swarming with urban wildlife. In between all the signs warning you not to feed them because it attracts vermin, were many people throwing food to the pigeons, parakeets (!), and everywhere fat voracious grey squirrels who would come right up to you hoping for food. The squirrels were actually a bit intimidating: at one point I had three of them surrounding me and eyeing me like they were considering climbing up my clothing. I also saw a very fat and large rat sidling along with little fear.

At the V&A I did a bit of shopping before visiting the Faberge exhibit, which was quite interesting despite the usual appalling traffic flow design. I really don't know what they teach in curator school but it sure isn't human behaviour.  The displays highlighted various points in his working career and culminated in a display of several of the famed Faberge eggs.  My favourite was the Winter Egg, absolutely exquisite in rock crystal and diamonds. Photos weren't allowed so this photo is courtesy of Wiki. The little basket of spring flowers carved from hardstones is the surprise from inside the egg.

After Faberge I went into the 'Bags:Inside and Out exhibit, which was a fairly random collection of methods with which humans have carried their possessions over various eras and cultures. Photos appeared to be allowed here, or at least everyone was taking them without any objection. I particularly liked this tiny opera bag which folds out to reveal all kinds of compartments holding opera glasses, a folding fan, hankie etc.

And of course no trip to the V&A is complete without a visit to the gift shop, where I bought this tea towel to use in bag sewing.

Crafts this week:

When I was at the Harrogate show a few weeks ago, I saw some lasercut MDF plaques at the Riverside Craft Warehouse stand including this one for the sewing room.  It was only £2 but I knew I would never get it home in one piece. So I ordered online when I got home, which was £3 plus £3 postage. So three times the price, sigh.  But I had fun painting it, and adding a bit of faux quilt as an accent, and it is now displayed in my sewing room.

I put another Trimits kit together: this one is a Robin decoration with a little embroidery trim.  I actually bought several Trim-its kits in a sale a while back, and kept them for my own advent calendar for December.  I've also got the Petite Properties '12 days of Christmas' 1/24th scale advent calendar to look forward to, which will start on the 14th of December.

oh, and in the Cross Stitch Guild magazine, they had a little feature on glass flower frogs; which are glass holders full of holes intended to sit in the bottom of a flower vase but oh so useful for holding sewing tools, pens etc.  I got a purportedly Edwardian example on ebay for a few pounds and it's now on my desk holding my pens and pencils. I'd never heard of these before.

I used my new Scan N Cut to scan in the applique templates from a Christmas pattern kit I won in a raffle I think many years ago, then got the machine to cut the shapes out exactly in card.  This photo just shows the cut outs for better visibility but you get the idea.  Then I could use the card templates to cut out the felt shapes accurately, genius.  I could have had the machine cut the felt for me as well but I think that would have just gummed up my tacky mats so I didn't go that far.

I've hand-stitched the felt appliques down and am part-way through adding the embroidery detail before making them up into xmas ornaments. I'm not loving the oatmeal mitten colourway but otherwise enjoying the little project.

Having previously tried a swim session at the public pool, confirming my hatred of public pools, I did force myself back to try out an Aquafit exercise session which, surprisingly, I actually enjoyed. So I've signed up to those every week in an effort to become more active. I hate exercising, but this was more like silly dancing in water for 45 minutes. I'm hoping to build up my stamina more in case I can do some travelling next year.

Right, I'm off to go put up some Christmas lights outside with DH - braving the cold weather and chilly winds!