My time in England

Well, I’m back after first a holiday/work in England, and then a wonderful week in the Norwegian mountains. I thought I’d share some of my memories – even if they are not quilt related :o)

I had a few wonderful days in London; I stayed with my BF for a few days – relaxed and enjoyed myself. We went to the cinema, had some time shopping, and saw “Mamma Mia” a show based on the songs of ABBA – it was really entertaining, even if the story line is a bit thin, the songs are wonderful and makes a great show! I also got to meet Patricia – one of the ladies from the Sylvia's Bridal Sampler e-mail forum. We spent a fun evening together chatting away about quilting and life and everything. She is a lovely lady and it was so nice to meet a “name from a list” :o)

After my relaxing time I went off to Leeds for the International Medieval Congress. It was really fun to see so many medievalists gathered together in one place. I got to hear quite a few interesting papers, and - being dead nervous about doing my first public speach in English - I survived presenting my own paper :o) I have not the best stamina for sitting and listening to lectures day in and day out, so I picked what I figured would be interesting, and took the opportunity of sight seeing for the rest of my time (look at the sign in the bottom right corner!*lol*).

Leeds is a rather charming city, a mix match of old and new. On one afternoon I went for a walk to Kirkstall Abbey – one of England's best preserved Cistercian monasteries. It is a beautiful ruin in a lovely park.

Next to the park is a little museum with some of the history of Victorian Leeds: The Abbey House Museum.

They have quite an interesting textile exhibition with clothes from the 19th century, and also three lovely scrap quilts from the latter part of the same century. Two of the quilts are really colourful made by chevrons making up six pointed stars – they looked like they are made from cotton satin – perhaps a blend of lining and dress cloth? The third quilt was a log cabin made in many different calicoes and black/dark brown stripes around a rather large black centre square. Unfortunately I was not able to take any pictures inside the museum, but if you are in the area they are well worth a look!

Another museum in Leeds well worth a visit is The Royal Armouries. This is a grand museum of weapons ­– both for hunting, war and self defence. It is five stories of exhibition and you need a lot of time to take it all in. And their “hall of steel” is really impressive!

After five days it was time to go home. And after 15 hours on four different busses and an aeroplane I was home – just in time to repack my bags and go up to the mountains for a week – the story of that will be in my next post :o)

Sincerely, Anne Ida