Joys of April

"Oh, to be in England

Now that April's there..."

 

April is my favourite month of the year and I love walking in the countryside to see how green everything is becoming. The birds are really busy at the moment building nests and the summer migrants are starting to return. I saw my first swallow on Friday as I was walking down Ogston New Road, alongside the reservoir. On the opposite side of the road to the reservoir, there is a colony of herons and for the first time I got the chance to see some of the chicks in their nests. This was a real thrill and the colony seems to be thriving. Chiffchaffs were singing from all directions. If you look on Google Earth, you can see this road in its summer glory.

 

Having come home in a really good mood, I was greeted by the sight of a large parcel waiting for me. If like me you used to buy New Stitches magazine, produced by Mary Hickmott's company, you will know that late last year the publication came to a sudden and premature end due to unforeseen circumstances. Subscribers were given two options: either have the subscription transferred to a different magazine or have a 'lucky dip' of fabric and threads. I chose the lucky dip and so when I saw the parcel, I knew it must be full of stitching goodies!

 

 

I wasn't expecting to receive as much as I did and so I was really excited to discover what was in the parcel. There were five pieces of various fabrics, six skeins of DMC stranded cotton, a kit of a classic Mary Hickmott floral design, a booklet about Lagartera embroidery, a John James pebble containing an assortment of needles and a reel of gold thread (which I forgot to include in the picture).

 

 

This was such a treat and I have already sent a thank you message to Mary and her team. You may be interested to know that Mary now has her own blog which you can find here. I am so glad that she will still be sharing her knowledge and beautiful designs with us. I have learned so much from her over the years, particularly from her Masterclass articles, and I can honestly say she has been a huge inspiration to me.

 

As if all of that excitement wasn't enough, a male reed bunting landed on one of our feeders and had quite a good feed. Reed buntings look very handsome in their spring plumage and it was such a delight to see one through the kitchen window.

 

 

I can assure you that in spite all of this, I am still working! Two of my current designs are having a spring makeover. The new version of Dale Abbey Alphabet Tile will be available very soon and the second pattern will be available in time for summer. This is on top of several new patterns which I have already scheduled for this year so keep checking my shops for updates.

 

Reed bunting photo (c)Roy Eley 2015

Lest We Forget

In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row

The summer of 1914 was a time of great excitement for my part of the world; there was to be a royal visit to the industrial town of Heanor. On 25th June, people from Heanor and surrounding towns and villages lined the streets to see King George V and Queen Mary. Industry was closed to let the workers enjoy the occasion and flags and banners were waved. Just three days later, the Archduke Franz Ferdinand was assassinated in Sarajevo. This would begin a chain of events that would lead to a conflict of unprecedented scale.

 

For five weeks there were rumours about Britain's potential involvement and the scenes from the August Bank Holiday weekend became a poignant last glimpse of a country that would soon be changed forever. On 4th August at 11pm, Britain officially declared war on Germany and less than three weeks later the first fighting took place at the Battle of Mons.

 

There was not a place in the country that did not have men going off to war. Those who did not return are listed on memorials in their home towns. With so much time passing, those men barely remain in living memory and there was a danger of them becoming little more than letters on stone. With the centenary of the war now being commemorated, we have a  real opportunity to bring them back to life and to remember them properly.

 

On the war memorial in my home village of Codnor, there are the names of two of my relatives. Arthur Hubball was my Grandma's uncle. He had already been wounded once before returning to the front. He had survived the Battle of the Somme which took place through most of 1916. He also made it through the terribly cold winter of 1916-17. On 9th February 1917, he was reported missing. It would be eight months before he was officially declared dead. He was the first man from the small village of Stoneyford to die. The second was a son of one of Arthur's cousins, Arthur Darrington. Having joined up in June 1918, teenager Arthur arrived in France in September. Just a month later he was mortally wounded and died in a military hospital.

 

Arthur Darrington is buried in Bellicourt British Cemetery but Arthur Hubball has no known grave. He is commemorated on the colossal Monument to the Missing at Thiepval. It made me wonder, what would their families do, when there can be no funeral, no headstone to visit? I imagined a woman in silent grief taking up a scrap of fabric and oddments of thread. She takes up her needle and embroiders the name of her loved one, with poppies for remembrance.

 

I took up my own needle and created a small piece inspired by John McCrae's famous poem In Flanders Fields. Before white headstones were installed, the resting place of each soldier was marked with a wooden cross. Red poppies with their fragile petals sprang up across the churned up earth and became a symbol of remembrance, as well as the hope for peace. Arthur Hubball and Arthur Darrington, men of Codnor, you are not forgotten.

 

If you would like to learn more about my two relatives and the men from Codnor who died during the Great War, you can do so here.