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Friday 10 April 2015

A visit to Brighton

Hi Guys,

Frank surprised me by purchasing two return tickets to Brighton for Saturday (day after Good Friday) and we were up bright and early to catch the bus to North Greenwich Train Station.  We then got on the Jubilee Line to London Bridge Train Station and got the fast train to Brighton which took just over the hour.  When we got off the train we walked over towards the public toilets inside the station and I turned round and noticed the roof of the station...wow!  I would not like to get up there to clean it.

We came out of the station and you immediately walk into the town which is BIG!  You just don't know where to go first.  There wasn't loads of people around yet because it was still only around 10:30 am but there were shops everywhere.  It would make a great day out if you had loads of money to spend or a girly shopping spree.  We walked down towards the beach and on the way found a Gregg's Bakers so we had a cuppa and some cake.  

Earlier in the week Frank had found a website called YAK, Yarn And Knitting and they had some gorgeous orange yarn from The Uncommon Thread and said we could go look for the shop.  We found it after a wander around and the great use of Frank's mobile app and the lady in the shop let us walk in with our dog Tammie which was really nice of her.  We had a look around and of course, I had to touch some of the gorgeous yarns and then we found the yarn we were looking for.  It's a Blue Faced Leicester Fingering Weight Yarn, 100% superwash and 400m per skein.  The colour is called Fe2 03 which Frank assured me mean't iron oxide or something to that effect.  Anyway, here's the colour for you to see....

Isn't it gorgeous!  Frank suggested I could knit a lovely shawl with it and bought me a skein for that reason.  It wasn't cheap, £21 for one skein but does have a lot of yardage and was so thank full that he bought it for me.   My mind was thinking of the shawl patterns I have seen lately on the podcast 'littlebobbinsknits' and I think the Aisling shawl would look great with this yarn.  

Anyway,  we came out of their and then went down towards the beach again and had a look around.  It was begining to get quite busy now and Frank said let's stroll over to the old fashioned lanes that he remembered.  Now, for some unknown reason I remember a programme called 'Choccywokkydoodah' that was all about chocolate and cake decorating.  Not cheap, quite extravagent and very colourful.  I remembered that the company opened up a new branch in London but they also had one in Brighton so we had a look for it on the mobile app and Frank found it in the lanes.  Wanna see a photo of the front of the shop.....it's not a great photo because you can't swing a cat in the lanes (not that I would).

The shop was so cramped with stuff and you just could not move around.  Frank waited outside with Tammie and I had a brief look around which lasted not even five minutes.  It is really really expensive.  Anyway, at least I had seen the shop and their gorgeous cake decorations in the windows.

We carried on walking around the lanes but we had to pick Tammie up in the end because it was getting so dodgy and I was scared that Tammie would get trod on.  We walked past a jeweller's window and stopped to have a look only to find the shop keeper dressed like Elvis banging on the window to get Tammie's attention.  She couldn't care less but we had a laugh anyway!

We then had a stroll around the promenade and here's a few photo's that we took on the phone..



The first photo is of the Pavillion which is quite famous and quite eccentric inside in its decoration.  We couldn't go in obviously because we had pup with us but the grounds are lovely.  The other two photos are of the pebble beach and they are big pebbles.  Apparently it gets packed during the height of summer.   It wasn't a warm day really and by about 12:30 the promenade was getting so busy that it was like playing dodgems to get out of the way.  We decided to head back to the train station to catch the earlier train of 13:56 and oh boy, the amount of people that were coming out of the station was crazy.  I can only imagine that during the hours of mid day to mid night it must be extremely packed and I must be getting old because I just cannot stand the noise and crowds.  

We were both glad, Tammie was too, to get back on the train to get home and Tammie laid down straight away and slept.  We were back in Kent by 3pm and stuck the kettle on straight away..

My knitting has been busy too.  I spent the rest of Saturday and some of Sunday knitting 4.5 scarves for  Frank's Mum.  I used size 7mm needles and the Rico Loopy Yarn and knitted them really quickly.  I then carried on knitting the socks for Frank...here's a photo I took yesterday (Thursday) in the garden at
work of my progress on the first sock.  I used Regia sock yarn and it's a 50g ball for each sock with just a little left over for me to use on my sock blanket.

                                   

That's it as far as my Easter Weekend.  I spent a relaxing time with Frank and his family away from the worries of home and work.  Tammie seem's to be settling down of a weekend there too which pleases me.  I shall leave you with a photo that Frank took today or yesterday of New River Walk while he was working there and a photo of Tammie and me having a 'selfie' moment.



Hope you all have a good crafting week and enjoy the rest of this lovely spring weather we are having.











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