The Lake District

We spent a week in the Lake District in July.

We had mixed weather, with quite a lot of rain at night.

This is the Bridge house at Ambleside .

Rainbow Bear

The finished rainbow bear!

He is approximately 15" tall,

he has black glass eyes and needle felted dreadlocks.
He is a one of a kind bear and is crafted from hand dyed curly mohair in rainbow colours.
He has ultra suede foot and paw pads,
and is filled with super polyester fibre.

I like to add pellets and steel shot to give my bears extra weight.

He is available for adoption.

Rainbow Dying bears

How to hand dye a bear.

There are many ways to hand dye. One way is to immerse the whole piece of fabric in to a deep pan of dye making the mohair all the same colour. Another way is dip dye each piece making it have different levels of the same colour.

I prefer to "Rainbow dye" my bears using rainbow colours.

These come in a small packet in powder form and you add water to them. I use the plain white or natural mohair or "Loom State"
The mohair I have chosen is a wavy natural colour German mohair.

I draw my pattern pieces on the back of the fabric and then carefully cut them out making doubly sure I have two body pieces one left one right, two head pieces one left one right, two arms one left one right, one head gusset, four ears and two legs.





I use newspaper to paint the mohair on. I then lay the cut out mohair pieces on newspaper right side up.
I have a brush for each colour dye and each dye is in a small container with an airtight lid, this avoids spillage and you can keep what is leftover for another time.
I then carefully paint each colour on the mohair starting at bottom, dividing in to sections as I go equally painting each piece the same colour.
Normally I paint the mohair in stripes, the bear being painted in the photographs is spot painted by spotting the dye on the mohair.

I start with one colour, doing all the pieces with that one colour at a time. Then I move on to the next colour.
Carefully covering all the hairs as I go, right to the top with each colour.
When all pieces are all covered I place them on clean newspaper and make sure the pieces don’t touch each other and leave them to dry.






When they are completely dry I put them all in to little net washing machine bags with zips and place them in the washing machine, on a rinse and spin cycle with a little fabric softener.
Once they have rinsed and spun I take them out of the bags and brush all the pieces.


I again leave them to dry, and then I take sharp scissors and trim all the fur away from the sewing seams.
The bear is now ready to make up. I normally sew all my bears by hand, occasionally I will use the sewing machine.


I think hand sewing is neater, but that is my personal opinion.
Kerren.

My next post will have the finished bear!

Hugglets guide 2009

Hugglets Teddy Bear guides available now

Sherry trifle

I really enjoy cooking and baking.

This is my take on sherry trifle. I hate to see trifle in a large bowl it is fine until half of it has been eaten and the rest looks so messy.
I make mine in individual bowls, dishes or glasses.

I used with chocolate chip muffins for the base, crumbled in to the glass, and then I add the sherry, strawberries and raspberries.
For the custard I use half a bar of dark chocolate and one tub of low fat double cream, heated up in a pan until bubbling.

I let it cool and pour it on to the fruit and put it in the frige to set.
For the creamy topping I use low fat well known powdered topping, mixed with skimmed milk and spooned on the top, and to finish it off I place a raspberry on the top.

Delicious!

The Worth Valley Railway

Howarth is the home of the Brontës,
and also the home of the Worth Valley Railway

This beautiful picturesque part of Yorkshire brings thousands of visitors to this Keithly village every year. The steam trains are one of the main attractions here.

It is just a beautiful day out.



Haworth station on the Keithly and Worth Valley Railway line.
Last may bank holiday we started an eight-mile walk from Oxenhope station to Haworth Station and on to Oakworth station.

Oakworth is a Pennine village overlooking the Worth Valley lying between Haworth and the larger town of Keithly in the heart of West Yorkshire's Bronte country.

Oakworth's main claim to fame is probably

for being used in location filming of the classic 1970 film version of The Railway children.

The story is centred around a family who move to a house near the railway after the father is imprisoned as a result of being falsely accused of selling state secrets to the Russians.

The three children, Roberta, Peter and Phyllis, watch the trains on the nearby railway line and wave to the passengers. They become friendly with Perks,
(Bernard Cribbins) the station porter, and with the Old Gentleman who regularly takes the 9:15 train.

He is eventually able to help prove their father's innocence, and the family is reunited.
Most of the filming is done at Oakworth station.

Howarth the home of the Brontës

The Brontës were the world's most famous literary family and Haworth Parsonage was their home.

The main street in Hawarth, and the famous "Black Bull" public house.


This is now the Brontë Parsonage Museum. The parsonage was their home from 1820 to 1861.
Charlotte, Emily and Anne Brontë were the authors of some of the best-loved books in the English language. Charlotte's novel Jane Eyre,
Emily's Wuthering Heights,
Anne's The Tenant of Wildfell Hall were written in this house over a hundred and fifty years ago.
Charlotte and Emily are ranked among the world's greatest novelists.

My favourite has to be Wuthering Heights.
I can see why it was so bleak and cold on the Yorkshire moors where Cathy and Heathcliff lived. The weather was so cold today I ended up wearing my winter woollies!


Here is the church on Main Street. It is estimated that 40,000 people are buried in the churchyard, the burial registers go back to 1645.



This beautiful picturesque part of Yorkshire, brings thousands of visitors to this Keithly village every year.

Lots of quaint little shops displaying goods from yesteryear, antiques, jewellery, jam, bread, and plants.