ENGLAND 2012: LONDON

     Whew, things are a little slower and I finally have a few minutes to tell you about our trip to England and Rome in September and October. For those who missed it, Don and I spent 10 days in England while I taught 4 days of bead crochet classes for the Bead Society of Great Britain and demonstrated at their Bead Fair. We then went to Rome for 5 days as an anniversary present and thank you to Don for his help.

     We were fortunate to stay with our new friends Suzanne and Norman in London while we were there from September 28-30.  They spoiled us rotten and Suzanne made sure that I got to class on time.  The first two-day class was held at the Greeneford Community Center in Greeneford, Middlesex, a large suburb of London.  Beginning bead crocheters chose to work on a pendant while more advanced students made a modern version of a Turkish prisoner of war snake like those made in World War I using the stitch employed by those Ottoman soldiers.

Around the Bend pendant project

Goldilocks Snake

Sparklin' Jack

Here is part of the class at lunch.

        Since one of the class projects was the modern version of the Turkish POW snakes, Carole Morris and other members of the bead society brought examples of Turkish bead crochet for everyone to study.

A lovely example of a Turkish POW snake with a lizard in its mouth.

Purses, snakes, and another souvenir.

I was so busy that I didn't take any photos so I am grateful to Margaret Isaccs for sending me copies of her photos of the class and her snake for me to use. Margaret decided that while she could do the bead crochet stitch for the snake, she would rather make her snake with brick stitch so here is her finished project in brick stitch.




Margaret's Sparklin' Jack done in brick stitch

       I wish I had been less jetlagged so that I could show you Brenda, who made her first-ever, tubular bead crochet sample or the finished pendant from this class.
      While I was busy working, Don was off seeing the sights.  On Saturday, he visited Kew Gardens, Kew Bride Steam Museum, and Hammersmith Bridge.

Kew Gardens

Part of the machinery on display at the steam museum

Hammersmith Bridge

 On Sunday, Don took himself to the Cutty Sark, a 19th-century tea clipper that has been preserved as a museum.

Part of the deck of the Cutty Sark

Prow of the ship in front, human and wooden figures in back.

A close-up of some of the figureheads.

After class on Sunday, we were of to Barton under Needwood-but that's for another post.