Thankfully it's not just work that has kept me occupied, I've also taken some leave - it's proving pretty difficult squeezing my holidays in to a busy summer, but if I don't take them before term starts in late September I'll probably lose them! So I've been working long hours to be able to fit the holidays in!
I've also found some time for stitching, but not as much as I would have liked. I usually stitch every day, but there's been a few recently where my bum has hit the sofa and I've barely had the energy to channel hop...
Anyway, I took these pics before my last break, in the hopes I'd have chance to share them before I went away:
I've actually done a little more on both since I took these - I took you were hatched away with me, and spent about an hour or so working on the border one evening. I picked up waiting for ships again last night, and have had some quality stitching time today, listening to the test match (I'm still in shock that we got so many runs...) - cricket for the non-Brits out there! I'm hoping to hare another progress pic tomorrow, when I've got a little more done.
As for August travels... the weekend after I went to Edinburgh Eddy and I decided to take the Friday off work, and visit RHS Harlow Carr, just outside Harrogate. Given how much we love gardening it's a bit shocking we'd not been, given we've been living 45 mins away from Harrogate for 5 years! Here are some photos:
We had lunch at Betty's (very traditional English tea shop with excellent cakes), had a good meander, and on a whim bought another apple tree when we left... not that we know where to plant it yet. It's in a very big pot getting lots of water for the time being! When we went apple tree shopping at Easter we really wanted a bramley apple, but having a small garden we wanted M27 (dwarf) root stock. After lots of searching we read in a book that you don't get M27 bramleys, so got another apple tree instead (bountiful - another cooker, but a little sweeter, apparently). Anyway, we should have known that the Royal Horticultural Society would have M27 bramleys... and there it was with 20% off. Sadly we had to pick the smallest tree (we only have a small car) and it was the only one without apples on, so we'll have to wait until next year to get fruit!!
We've been eating lots of veggies out of the garden recently - potatoes, onions, carrots, broccoli, artichokes and green beans have all done brilliantly. The peas didn't produce much, and we got tomato blight. We have picked the unaffected green tomotoes and plan on making a chutney, using my friend's 'not mango chutney' recepie. My rose garden has been looking fabulous too, this photo was taken a couple of months ago, I don't have a recent one as I only ever think of taking a photo just after I've dead-headed and there aren't many blooms!
Happy stitching!
