English Fields Quilt

I finally finished a quilt that I dreamed up in 2009 when we first visited England.  I wanted to make a patchwork quilt that would look like the farms and fields of the English countryside.  It took me a while to figure out how to incorporate some diagonal pieces along with the rectangles (and to gather all of the green fabric).  I sewed straight rows through the quilt to look like furrows.  Last year when we visited England, I bought a ball of yarn made from the wool of the sheep at Blenheim Palace.  I used it to tie the quilt randomly so that it would look like lambs in pairs or threes.  I like the effect that it created on the back.

 

Blenheim Palace Trees

I saw an episode of Downton Abbey the other day and noticed some lovely trees on the grounds of Highclere Castle.  They reminded me of some that we saw when we were at Blenheim Palace in May.  I learned that they are Cedar of Lebanon trees - you can see one drooping in the picture below (along with some lambies).  The picture at bottom shows some Copper Beech trees that we learned about while we were exploring Blenheim (the purple ones).  We were fascinated by the way that they grew into such uniform mounds.  One of the unexpected and interesting effects of travel is learning about the flora and fauna of other parts of the world.

Marlborough Cologne

One of the souvenirs that my husband came home with from England was Marlborough cologne by D.R. Harris & Co.  He bought it at Blenheim Palace, home of the dukes of Marlborough (and birthplace of Winston Churchill).  The scent is described as a subtle blend of woods, including cedar and sandalwood.  It's a very nice manly scent without being too cologne-y (you know, that strong teenage boy department store stuff - blech).

Pavlova

I have a couple more posts to do about food from our trip to the UK. Tony's favorite food - and one of his favorite parts of our trip - was a big blob of meringue that was served with clotted cream and berries (including currants) at Blenheim Palace. Martha has a recipe for what looks like basically the same thing here. Yum!