Amidst the Dreaming Spires ...

Hi Everyone,

I've just returned home after a lovely long weekend in Oxford with three of my favourite people.

The Radcliffe Camera

We stayed in University Halls of Residence and enjoyed several days exploring this beautiful city.

Attempted quadruple selfie - Me, Em, Chel, Poll

The university accomodation was great - clean, comfortable and very reasonably priced ...

Love this little pack of freebies with a Christ Church coaster

We had everything we needed, including a shared kitchen-diner where we gathered around the table in the evenings to eat, drink and be merry and do a bit of crafty stuff ...

Kitchen table on our return from a day in Oxford - coffee, cake and crafty stuff

 We also made good use of the common room and outside seating area ...

Catching the last rays of sunshine on Sunday evening

Diets were definitely on hold :o) We ate only naughty things, nothing sensible at all, and washed it all down with a bucket of wine of course. The oven was used only once, when Polly's book had a watery misadventure ...

Polly cooking the books

Our rescue attempts were futile and the book was consigned to the recycling bin - if only I could have squeezed one more thing into my suitcase I would have brought it home to use the pages, but I just couldn't! 

Emma gave us all beautiful hand-made bookmarks, with little tokens to remember each of us by ...

... and Polly gave us each a pair of gorgeous velvet gloves and a little "Happiness Kit" with such thoughtful words ...

It's probably fair to say that we spent more time chatting, eating, drinking and falling about laughing than actually making anything, but we did do a bit of crafting - I will never forget watching Polly and Chel working out how best to thread 4 packs of playing cards onto fishing line, whilst under the influence of a glass or three of red wine ...

Polly working on her bunting, which looked fantastic in the end!

Emma was making the most exquisite miniature mediaeval-style pennants for one of her up-coming miniature fairs - but unfortunately I only got a picture of her doing something she said she never would - loom bands!!!

Emma looming!

Of course, we had to do a spot of shopping here and there. The Food Festival at Banbury was wonderful - lots of free samples and tempting goodies. I did pick up a couple of souvenirs from the Ashmolean as well ...

Souvenirs - ooops, how did those loom bands get there?!

I love the embroidery kit which I bought at the "Stitch in Time" exhibition at the Ashmolean, along with the postcard of a little miniature cabinet which inspired an idea for a future project. The loom bands did NOT come from the Ashmolean of course - they were from a stall in the High Street and I couldn't resist the bright blue, the camo colours and the metallic bronze ... and the charms :o)

Well, that's it for another year - it was wonderful but it was over in a flash.Thanks girls and here's to the next one! 

See you again soon,

Annie :o)xxx