Anyone for a Twiddlemuff?

I "I beg your pardon?", I hear you reply. Let me explain...

I love shopping in charity shops, you can grab yourself a bargain and also feel smug that you are giving to a good cause. But I'll be honest, I don't always pay attention to what charity I am supporting. 

I found a few things whilst I was shopping in Tewkesbury a few weeks ago, and whilst I was paying I asked the volunteer about the charity as it was one I had never heard of before. It's called Guideposts, and they help people with life-long conditions, such as Alzheimer's, physical disabilities, chronic pain or sensory impairment, to live a better life. 

They have an Independent Living Centre (ILC) where they help people try out equipment and assistive living technology that could help them with their mobility and domestic routine, enabling them to remain safely independent in their own home. 

One way they raise money is by volunteer knitters making Twiddlemuffs. Basically it is a double thickness woollen hand muff and inside they stitch buttons, bells, or any other bits and bobs you can fiddle with. They provide stimulation for restless hands for people suffering with dementia. 

There were a selection behind the till and I decided to get one for a family member, who suffers from Alzheimer's. There is no set price to buy one, just a sensible donation. 

So it got me thinking, I know some crafty people read my blog, and I wondered whether you would share the details and we could get some more Twiddlemuffs made for this charity? A chance for knitters to keep their hands busy now the nights are drawing in, and to use their imagination - make stripy ones, bobbly ones, ones with animals on. The possibilities are endless!

Here are the details to request a pattern:

Email fundraising@guideposts.org.uk

Call 01993 893565

Let's see if we can get some more Twiddlemuff knitters out there, supporting this charity!

XxXx

P.S I don't get anything out of mentioning this charity, I just like to tell people about good causes. 

Apple Weekend at Hanbury Hall

A few weekends ago we decided to make use of our National Trust membership and see what was happening locally. Problem is, we've been to most of the really local ones quite a few times, and I fancied something different. Hanbury Hall were having an Apple Weekend so I thought that deserved a visit. 

The day was overcast but quite pleasant when the sun peeped out from behind those dark clouds. We didn't arrive until early afternoon and a good job we did, as they apparently had people queueing up to get in early on, with around a thousand visitors. 

There was a leaflet handed out to all the children with Apple related questions on it. They had to follow the map and find the answers hidden around the estate. It was certainly a good way to keep little ones busy as some of the questions sent them to the farthest corners of the outdoors. 

Hanbury Hall was built in 1710 as a country retreat by Thomas Vernon, a highly successful London lawyer. It came into the hands of the National Trust in 1953, who have done a considerable amount of conservation and restoration work. 

A great idea to keep little people amused whilst grown ups looked around 'the boring old stuff' was to hunt for the hidden mice. Numerous little knitted mice were secreted in different rooms and they had to count how many they found and tell the lady in the Great Hall when they were finished, and they got a sticker. She said it was surprising how many mice ended up being posted back to them. I guess some little people found them too tempting to resist, and when grown ups discovered them when they got home, were very honest and returned them to their rightful home!

Here's one...

 Another little mouse, hiding in a 3D plan of the ground floor...

The two figures standing by the window are cardboard cutouts, not ghosts!

A notable feature of Hanbury Hall are the lavish paintings of mythological scenes adorning the staircase, hall ceiling, and other rooms. The English painter Sir James Thornhill was commissioned to paint these...

Looking out of one of the upstairs windows down on to the Sunken Parterre...

These photos don't do it justice, it most certainly had the wow factor for me. The original gardens were designed in 1705 by George London, the most celebrated garden designer of his time. Unfortunately in time the formal designs and mathematical precision of this style of garden were replaced by the Landscape movement, and towards the end of the eighteenth century the gardens at Hanbury were swept away and replaced by wide open spaces. 

In the 1990s, using London's original 1705 plans and historic planting guides, the gardens were restored to their former glory...

Venturing outside, the Sunken Parterre looked even more spectacular with the Hall in the background....

The Fruit Garden (not much fruit to be seen, but hard to get a photo without lots of bodies standing around in the way)...

The lake...

We will definitely have to come back another day as there were lots of outdoor areas we didn't explore, like the Lime Tree Walk, the Long Walk, and the Semi-Circle of trees. 

The ice house would definitely have worked, as you could feel the temperature drop as you walked along the tunnel...

The downside to us arriving so late was that the promise of a 'help yourself to a free bag of organic apples in the orchard' didn't happen. The trees had been picked bare 😐...

We were looking forward to seeing the Orangery, and it did look very grand from the outside, but inside was just a big empty room. All the citrus trees were stood outside in pots for the summer....

  The information plaque on the wall explained about how a dog in the 18th century had stood on a tile when it was being made. So the challenge was to find the 'flaw in the floor' - the 250 year old paw print. It wasn't obvious, and took us a while but Big Girl eventually found it...

The next area we visited was the walled garden, certified organic, which supplies the tea room and also grows 20,000 peat-free plants for the National Trust shops...

On the crafty front, there were some lovely fabric apples and pears marking the entrance...

In one of the polytunnels you could buy a bag for £4 and fill it with a variety of yummy organic apples. We had a little competition to see who could find the silliest names of apples...

Entrance to the Bowling Green...

The Grove - 'a place of quiet reflection where nature screens your secrets'...

After all that walking we were rather hungry, so decided to treat ourselves to dinner out. We stopped off at the Robin Hood pub at Wychbold, somewhere we've never been before. Very smart and a bit pricy but worth it and we all enjoyed our meal. In fact we enjoyed it that much we had already started eating before I remembered to take a photo!...

Congratulations on making it to the end of what I think is my longest ever blog post! I promise a much shorter one next time 😀

XxXx