still here........

Today has been a first day in weeks I have spent indoors;

all through the lock down we had wonderful weather, at times too warm to do any sewing. In our part of the world, the month of May was the sunniest month on record.

We are now slowly coming out of the lock down, despite many scientists warning against it.

At last we were able to see our grandchildren for the first time since early March, and our children could visit us in our garden. Normal? No, long way from it, but even these small steps are very welcome.

We spent weeks living outside in our small patch of a garden, which has slowly woken up, and despite the very dry weather, it has somehow survived. It is much cooler today, and we have seen the first rain in weeks.

I spent the time mostly reading, doing some baking, and being very thankful that we have a small outside space all to ourselves to hide in, away from all those horrid statistics and numbers.

I worked on another 10in block;

So this a lock down block no 5. 

I think I will finish with these, for now anyway. 

I will just put them away for a while, may be they will come useful sometime.

There is also few more circles on the "Circle Play" top.

Last week some new fabrics arrived by post, and I have been playing with something new,

but that is for another post.

------------------------------------

And this is something for our Australian friends - 1976 Holden Kingswood ("the car that got Australia moving, mate").

It is good few years since our son returned from his year long trip to Australia, working his way around; travelling and sometimes living in this car, clockwise from Perth to Melbourne. When he took a flight back home, the car started a long sea journey to UK. He just could not part with it. Since then the car lived in front of various houses (including ours) and garages, but at last during the last 2 years was being lovingly restored (the parts being ordered online from Australia); even the leather upholstery is new. It was entered in this May's Mendip Rally, but of course that was cancelled;
another day...........

Someone in Perth might recognise this car 😀 

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2020

FnwF

 It was that time again, to get together at Cheryll's for another FnwF, and I was all set.

Unfortunately in the end I could not join the others, as I had some technical issues with my emails, which needed to be sorted out.

I have been using Windows Live Mail for years, but Microsoft stopped supporting the software last year. I just carried on using it anyway (simply because I was afraid of doing anything else!), but the software just refused to do anything last night, so I realised it was obviously the time to be brave (as I am not technically minded, so you can see my point) and take the plunge.

I decided to download Mailbird, as this one seems to have good reviews. All well and good, I even managed to receive some emails, but I just could not get the setting right to be able to sent out.

Also, Mailbird doesn't synchronise with WLM, so I had re-input all my contacts into Mailbird manually.  A couple of hours and a huge headache later I gave up trying - best to sleep on it 😕 .

Another day and today I found out where I was going wrong last night. Some test emails sent out and all seems to be well now 😀

But I did some crochet yesterday afternoon

and I completed row 5 of the Arabian Nights blanket.

I like how each motif is joined to the rest straightaway, 

which cuts out that lengthy job later on.    

I will come and see what the others were up to later on.

Enjoy your weekend!

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2019

noreply-comment bloggers

OK, I know I bang on about this from time to time, but that is only because I like to answer all your comments left on my blog by email. I find it the most convenient way of having a conversation with you directly and to answer your questions, which sometimes are private

Unfortunately, there are still many of you which are "noreply-comment" bloggers, which means that I am not able to answer you directly by email, because your email address is not linked to your profile.

You might not even realise that you are a "noreply-comment blogger", so please do check your profile.

Go to "View my complete profile" and click on "Edit Profile". You can choose where to put a tick.

Mine looks like this, and I have a tick against "Share my profile" and "Show my email address", although for some reason it is not showing here, although I did copy it from my profile.

If you don't put a tick against "Show my email address", your email will not be linked to your profile or your comments. 

Edit User Profile

Privacy

Share my profile		Your profile will not be shown if it is not shared. ?
Show my email address		Currently set to radka@greenbee.net
Show my blogs	Select blogs to display	Blogs that will appear on your profile.
Show sites I follow		Sites you follow will appear in your profile. ?

Now, I understand that some people prefer not to show their email address, and that's OK, but it makes it more difficult for fellow bloggers to communicate with you, and if you are wondering why sometimes you don't get a reply to your comment, this could be the reason. Blogging is supposed to be a two way communication, and not showing your email address makes this very difficult.

If you are doing it for a security reason, I understand, but your email address is probably all over cyberspace already, and by leaving a comment, you are leaving your footprint behind anyway.

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2019

driftwood cottage

I don't advertise or allow others to advertise on my blog, but occasionally I come across something from the world of crafts, which I would like to share with you; be it a picture, a design, other people's work. I stress that this is not for an advertising sake, but because I consider it beautiful, or unusual, and I want to show it to you.

This was a Christmas present for a family member, so I could not show it much earlier.

When looking for presents ideas, 

I remembered reading a magazine article some time back about
Gaynor - Woody Woman's World , and luckily I still had the magazine with the link to her website.

This is one of her creations.

There are many people collecting driftwood and making stuff from it.

But there are not many with the imagination, artistic vision and skill to produce something this special.

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2019

Why wouldn't you want a tree in your garden?

Some time ago, at the start of the summer, when the local supermarket had some small trees for sale in the front the shop (chosen to be suitable for small town gardens), I witnessed an exchange between an older couple (probably husband and wife). He, obviously very interested in the trees, was trying to get his partner to have a look. She, obviously not interested, said to him "I don't want a tree in my garden!" It was puzzling me, and as I was walking home, I kept thinking "why wouldn't you want a tree in the garden?"

I remembered his episode again when our new tree arrived last week.

Sadly, we had to say goodbye to our quince tree, because it just got too large for our small garden (no, we didn't do our research very well 😞). 

Still, it will provide very welcome logs for our son's wood stove.  

We love trees, there is eight of them in our small patch, various shapes and sizes, some in pots, some in the ground. 

This new one is Amelanchier "Robin Hill". It has various common names, I like "June Berry" the best of all. It has pretty flowers in the spring, berries in the summer and wonderful autumn colour.

We planted it in a newly made bed; the rest of it will be planted out in the spring, with a selection of perennials.   

 You might remember that when we moved to this house 5 years ago, the garden was very "flat", filled up with a model railway and lots of small walls; no trees, no birds.

The battle for the garden began .

Around seven hundred bricks and two skip fulls of concrete came out of here.

Fast forward to 2018 - late summer in our garden..

The birds love it, so do the butterflies and the bees; in the middle of the town.

All sorts of birds, many varieties, visit now, summer and winter.

Blue tits nest in the nest box DH put up for them. Various finches pass through here.

The crab apple tree is the most popular at the moment;

since the weather got colder, the blackbirds can't leave the apples alone,

the small birds (robin, wren) pick the soft bits which fall to the ground.

Blackbirds and starlings come to have a bath in the bird bath. 

Last week the wind brought lots of leaves down, and many fell in the bath. 

The blackbird was very displeased; we watched with some amusement how he set himself in the middle of the bath and picked the leaves one by one and flicked them over the side.

The job done, he had his bath 😀

There are doves coming onto the bird table; it started with a couple, now there is a whole flock of them.  

There is a constant movement in the garden.

I am not even going to mention the ecological importance of trees........

So, it is still puzzling me - why wouldn't you want a tree in your garden? 

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

21 August - a quick followup

Firstly - thank you very much for your kind comments, and I just would like to comment on a couple of them.

Paul's comment - yes, I am aware that people like me have been called traitors.

That is the one thing I have never, ever thought about myself, being a traitor. For centuries millions of people have left their homes to look for a better life elsewhere. Some countries have been built on that. If anything, I have always felt, that we were the ones betrayed by our country. The invasion did not just happen. The communist hardliners in Czechoslovakia did not like the way the country was looking West, becoming more democratic; they were afraid of loosing power, so they (as we know now), asked the "Big Brother" for help.

Interestingly, years later, when the  Czechoslovak authorities were "legalising" our emigration status, they had no shame about asking for exorbitant sums of money in return for our passports, and they wanted western currency only (my parents offer of paying in Czech currency was refused).

Some of us payed up, wanting to be able to visit and wanting to make life easier for our families.

Do read Mirka's answer to Paul's comment in my previous post (Google can translate it for you). 

I wonder how many stories like hers were there. She also mentioned the dreadful "normalisation" which followed after 1968.

People had to suppress their true believes to be able to carry on "normal" lives, to be able to study, to pursue their careers.

During my first year in England I became friendly with another Czech girl, who returned home before the border closed down 1969; she was just too homesick. We wrote to each other for a while, and one day she wrote, asking me not to write to her any more. She already had a "black" mark in her file because of her stay in England; she said the authorities were watching her, so she just couldn't afford to have friends in the West (the letter were censored, I know that my letters and my parent's letters were opened and re-sealed on route). She was very apologetic and of course I understood.

One of my close friends happened to be in London when the invasion happened. Knowing his views I did not think he would return home. But he did; he returned to carry on with his studies of journalism; he said he return because he believed that, as a journalist, he can make a difference.

We lost touch for a long time, but later I was told that he was working for a some small provincial newspaper; he joined the communist party to be able to get that far. That was "normalisation".

At my (large) secondary school I had a wonderful teacher of Czech and history. She inspired us to read and to question; we used to meet at her home to talk about books, theatre (her husband was an actor) and many other things. A teacher you never forget.

Years later my mum met her somewhere in town; she was pleased that I was "out".

She herself was removed from that secondary school and given a job in a small village primary school, where she could not do so much "harm"; she was lucky, it could had been worse; that also was "normalisation".

Thank you, Mirka, for sharing your story. 

On a more interesting note - I finished my Gardenhurts quilt, I will post as soon as I take some pictures!

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

21 August - 50 years ago

I wasn't going to do this, I wasn't going to write about this anniversary on my blog again. But what happened that day changed my life completely and had a huge effect on who and where I am today.

On the 21st August 1968 armies from five Warsaw Pack countries invaded my country, Czechoslovakia, as it was then.  They came in the early hours, while most us were asleep. My mum woke me up much earlier then normal, she was crying; the news came over the radio, before it was shut down.

I came across this picture some years ago on the internet, and instantly I knew what it was.

This is the main square in Liberec, my home town, north of Prague and close to Polish and German (East German as it was then) border.

The Russian tank skidded on tram lines and crashed into the building. The soldiers inside the tank got spooked, or panicked, and came out shooting.

The first ambulance on the scene got crashed between an armoured car and the wall.

How do I know that? Because I was there; I was just coming into the square from the side street, which is to the left of the picture. Of course I did not realise instantly that what I was hearing is shooting.

I was 19 and my world just fell apart. In the days following, like others around, I fell, at first a total disbelieve, and then the realisation that this is it, the Russians are going to be here for a very long time, and we could only imagine what was coming. And I also decided that I don't want to have children in that country, for them to go through the same communist indoctrination I did. I left for England by the end of that year.

In the end the Russian occupation lasted 21 years, until 1989.

For the first 13 years of that I wasn't able to visit my family, until (following a long campaign by my father) I was given a "presidential pardon". What was my crime? I was living abroad without the permission of the Czechoslovak authorities. Yes, it was a crime in those days.  

Both of my children sent me emails yesterday, and a link to this article they saw online.

My son gently reminded me, that although the anniversary brings bad memories for me, he would not be here today if it wasn't for what happened then. How true 😊

The article says that a half of today's young Czechs don't even know what happened that day.

One can only wonder - how is that possible?

And now - back to crafting!

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

my emails are back!

It seems that Blogger has sorted the "email problem" at last, and I am getting comments notifications by email again, great!

You also might have it sorted by now, but if not, try this - go to your "settings" - "email" - and in the "comment notification email" delete your email address, save, and then re-enter your email address and save again. When I did that, I received an email from Blogger, with an invitation to receive comments notifications and a link to "Subscribe".  And it worked!

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

GDPR - and all that

We have had some great weather in May, and as you can see from my posts, we have been making most of that. 

I have been spending lots of time outside, and not much sewing is going on at the moment.

I have been taking my crochet outside, but I have also managed to get through a couple of books.

The rain has arrived now; the timing is not great, as we are having a long weekend here in UK, but but our garden has welcomed it!

The other thing which has been occupying my time, is this whole new EU General Data Protection Regulation, which came into force a couple of days ago.
For most of bloggers this has been a great mystery, and there has been a lot speculation and some panic out there - what to do to make your blog to comply, or even some bloggers opting out for stopping blogging completely - what a shame!
There are however some, who have done a lot of research, and kindly have been publishing their findings on their blogs (the ones I have come across are mainly German blogs), and I would like to say a big THANK YOU to them, because it has helped me enormously. There has been a very little help from Blogger (judging from the comments on their forum), only the advice to get a legal help - how many of us can afford to that?

So, I have made some small changes to my blog:
I removed from my side bar anything which could be misunderstood as advertising, like "Interesting Links" section, other links, and a link to my Pinterest.
I have also created (with a help from other blogs) Privacy & Disclaimer page, which you see as another page at the top of my blog.
The only concession I can see from Google has been a message about the use of cookies (when you visit another blog), but as this happens only on your first visit to a particular blog, I have copied this message to the top of my blog, to be seen at every visit to my blog.

The Privacy page has been created to the best of my abilities, considering I know next to nothing about the legal side of the new regulation; although some of it is a common sense conclusion.

Also, possibly because Google has been doing some work on Blogger, the function, which alerted me by email to new comments being posted on my blog, has now gone. It means that I no longer receive a notification to my mail box, and as a result it takes me longer to realise that there has been a new comment posted, and I can't answer directly. Again, if you read comments on Blogger forum, I am not the only one who suddenly has this problem. Lets hope this is just temporary and this function will be re-instated.

So, enough of that, lets get back to something more interesting!


©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

follow up

Thank you for your comments on my previous post.

Please, do not close down your blogs just because you are not sure how the new regulation will effect you.

The thing to do is to find out, there is time. My intention wasn't to "spook" you, just to alert you to it.

I think that by now we all know that whenever we use the internet, in whatever form, we are leaving our "footprint" behind, be it our name, email address, IP address, etc...., we are doing it at our own risk, there is nothing new there.

We have been trusting various companies and organisations with our personal details, be it social media sites, shopping sites, banks, doctors.......We took for granted that they are protecting it, but as we are finding out now, it is not always the case. So the new regulation should be welcome.

I don't know how safe they can make it, there always seems to be someone else "ahead of the game", 

and so, I am sure, there will be more regulations in the future, this is an ongoing process.

I know that my computer had been hacked into in the past, because I started to receive emails from contacts in my private address book, with some very strange links in them. 

I deleted the emails without following the links, and I changed my password. A couple of weeks ago I received a message from my internet provider telling me that my account has been "compromised" and they suspended it. A phone call and a new password sorted that out, and it was good to know that someone is looking after me.

I can't advise you what you should do about your blog, I can only tell you what I am doing about mine.

This is still a "work in process", but there are some things to consider :

We are already getting a message about cookies, whenever we visit someone's blog, so it is a personal choice to carry on or not.

Do you sell from your blog? If you do, you should look at that. I don't, so it doesn't apply.

Do you send a newsletter from your blog? If you do, you need to look at that. I don't, so it doesn't apply.

Do you keep a contact list connected to your blog (if you do any of the above, you probably do), so again it is something you should consider. I don't, so it doesn't apply.

There are a couple of small changes I have made to my blog already.
I deleted "Follow me by email" from my side bar, simply because I don't understand what happens if anyone signs up to that - am I storing their email address somewhere on my blog? I don't know, but I don't need this to be able to run my blog.

I have also deleted "share" gadget; again, I am not exactly sure what it shares, but it is not essential to my blog.

I will probably delete "Interesting Links" from the side bar, as soon as I'll have time to go through them and store the chosen ones privately on my computer. This could be an overreaction on my part, but I don't think many people actually visit there, and again, it is not essential.

I don't think there is much more I can do, for now anyway. Surely the rest is up to Blogger/Google, they are the ones providing a service, and storing our data. 

I am a subscriber to newsletters from various sites, and I have already been contacted by some of them (National Trust just today, Quiltmania magazine last week...), asking me to re-register for their newsletter, if I still want to receive it after 25th May. And I expect to hear from others.

They are obviously getting ready for the deadline next month; it is good to know that.

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

The new General Data Protection Regulation - how does it effect my blog?

The new EU GDPR (or DSGVO in German) comes into force on 25th May 2018.

Yes, I think that we all understand that there is a big need for more data protection, specially after the whole Facebook revelation.

I am little slow when it comes to the technical side of my blog. Yes, I have been hearing about the new data protection legislation in making, but naively, I had not made a connection with my blog. 

It was only when I came across a debate on the subject on some, mainly German blogs, that I suddenly became aware that yes, it effects us bloggers as well, as we are very much a part of the social media. Some of the bloggers are even talking about closing their blogs down, because they do not understand the implication to their blog, and they do not want to be paying fines for breaching, and like probably most of us, can't afford to pay for a legal advice.

The legal side of the new legislation is overwhelming; apparently this is not a case of just ticking boxes.

I set down last night (too late in the evening in fact, and went to bed with a headache), trying to find out little more on the subject. Of course there is a lot of info out there, but it is mainly aimed at companies and organisations, most of which already have IT and a legal teams behind them.

A couple of the websites I was reading last night, where you can read more ; here  and  here .

One hopes that Blogger has already been sorting this out behind the scenes.  

So, what changes do I personally (if any) need to make to my blog to comply with the new regulation? The Blogger Help pages are not very helpful - they say they can't advise on legal matters.

Great. And there doesn't seem to be anything in Blogger Setting one could just tick 😕

The option of closing down my blog really doesn't appeal, I am enjoying it too much and it has become a part of my life. So, for now I am just collection some information.

It could be just a "storm in a teacup", but if any of you know or understand more on this subject, please share.

I quote from https://www.eugdpr.org/gdpr-faqs.html:

What constitutes personal data?Any information related to a natural person or ‘Data Subject’, that can be used to directly or indirectly identify the person. It can be anything from a name, a photo, an email address, bank details, posts on social networking websites, medical information, or a computer IP address.



©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2010-2018

Gardenhurst - first two blocks, and winter "pick me up"

Yes, I have been busy this week and the first two blocks are done.

We are having cold winter this year; cold and grey, although in our part of England without snow, just the little dusting now and then - it is a hibernation time. 

Without snow, the greyness is even worse,

so it is nice to work with this sunny yellow fabric for my next block.

It is from the  Grunge range by Moda Fabric,

and so it the blue/grey below, I really like that one; 

it is actually more grey then in this picture - it is so hard to get the right colours in the grey winter light.

Anybody watched Monty Don's "Paradise Gardens" on BBC2 last night?

What a delight, it is just what we need to see at this time of year!

Enjoy your weekend, thank you for stopping by 😀

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2018

the week and FNwF

Firstly - big thank you to Cheryll for hosting another FNwF , the last one of the year! See you all in 2018!

After another mild spell at the start of the week, this winter's first snow came on Friday; 

not the nice fluffy stuff, more sleet then snow, which did not settle, but made everything wet, and which froze overnight, changing footpaths into a skating ring, with just little white here and there, including our kitchen roof.

On Friday afternoon I made a cake; 

no, not Christmas baking yet, just a simple marble cake to have with coffee this weekend.

In the evening I settled down with my  "Mystical Lanterns" blanket and made few more motifs.

Earlier this week I spent a quite bit of time rearranging my sewing room. 

You might remember that I had a bash not so long ago and tried to make it more tidy, but still it just did not work for me. Since we moved to this house and had to "downsize" my sewing room, I didn't have enough room to open fully my Horn cabinet, which seemed a shame. Not a huge issue, but there were other problems also, like not really having enough space for the ironing board. I do have a smaller, table top ironing board, but to enough "top" to have it comfortably out all the time, so I prefer to have a floor standing one. This one is smaller, not a full size one, so I should be able to have it up all the time, which is so much more convenient.

So, I decided to turn the whole room around, which also involved moving all the shelves (with DH's help). I also had a good sort out of my books and some various stash, and made a trip to the charity shop.

It is quite incredible how much difference moving few things around makes.

The floor area stayed exactly the same size of course (very small), I did not remove any furniture. But the room now seems larger, and the Horn cabinet can be fully opened.

So, welcome to my "new" sewing room.

Today started very wet and windy,
and now there is some sleet coming down, which will (I expect) freeze overnight .....

Have a safe week!

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2017

sometimes it needs a blitz

Because I like to have several projects on a go at the same time, I am very good at organising them.

Each new projects gets its own project box, which includes most of the materials I plan to use (fabrics, threads, yarn, needles etc).  That's the exiting bit.

So whenever I feel like working on any of them, I pick up a particular box and just get on with it.

But what I am not very good at is "filing" it all back, when I finish a project.

And so my room sometimes ends up being a chaos, no space to create.

Action is needed....

That's better!

I like this storage system by Really Useful Storage Boxes .

And they come in so many different sizes.

The threads are stored in ArtBin boxes, 

for which DH made me a simple cabinet, so the boxes can be used as draws.

I love my Horn sewing machine cabinet, it has been with me many years.

I keep it permanently open, but when I need some desk space, 

I just push the machine down and put a wooden board across the top.

And at last I got around to allocating a box for small fabric scraps for applique.

For a tiny room I have a lot of storage here.

I just need to keep it tidy!

P.S. If you have tried to leave a comment on my blog in the last couple of days and did not managed to do it, or have not received an answer from me, I apologise. It was because I was "fiddling" with the system and managed to mess it up! 😕 All back to normal now (I hope).

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2017

Very little stitching was going on here, for more then one reason.

For the second week the weather is not "summer weather"; not only wet, but cold too. Some nights I wish we had our winter quilt back on our bed.

Our garden is very lush, but we have not been able to spend much time out there 😒.

And then there are other things which get in the way;
a routine breast cancer screening, a two weeks wait for the result, only to get a letter asking to come for a follow up screening. Oh dear, not again....

Another week gone before an appointment at the hospital - it is all that waiting .... I am sure that some of you know exactly what I am talking about. Another x-ray and ultrasound (thankfully no biopsy this time) - and given "all clear", hurrah!

I find it difficult to be "creative" when I am worried; I tried to read, but I found myself just browsing through my bookshelves. But the hands wanted to do SOMETHING.

An idea for a wall hanging in one the my books - the central panel is made out of green hexies; 

EPP - I can do that without too much thinking.

I was determined to use only my stash for this project, but when I finished the central panel, I realized that I haven't got a suitable large piece of fabric for the background.
Oh no, I had to go shopping! 😉

Luckily the wonderful one stop Midsomer Quilting shop is little under 10 miles from me, and always such pleasure to visit. Not only they pride themselves on having more then 3,000 fabrics in stock, but you can also help yourself to coffee (or tea, or whatever) and sit down and have a chat with fellow quilters (if you find the time, with all those fabrics around).

They are working on their on-line shopping website at the moment, 

but they promise to stay a friendly shop as well.

Well, it is never just that one piece of fabric, is it?😊 

But the rest should tie in as well.

I also made a nice cake for my DD's birthday recently, 

a new recipe for me, Persian Love Cake, from Yasmin Khan's "The Saffron Tales".

It is made with lots of almonds, cardamom, lemon juice and rose water. 

It is beautifully moist and keeps well (I made it a couple days ahead), decorated with lemon icing, pistachio nuts and dry rose petals (from our roses).

I will definitively make it again!

In between the rain we managed to finish the new raised flower bed.

Before it got too wet, I harvested some lavender from our front garden, and it is now drying in the summer house.

This lot should keep me in lavender bags this winter 😊.

 Just as well, because the rest of the lavender is now too wet to cut and has gone over.

I think that's all for now; 

I managed to catch up here and I will come to have a look what you are up to!

©pleasureinstitching.blogspot.co.uk 2017