Christmas in Coggeshall

Real effort has been put into Christmas door wreaths this year.  I went all round the village and hardly saw one duplicate.

 

Snow!

 Early December in Essex, after a day and night of heavy rain.

It's been a busy time on the teddy bear front.  Using the amended pattern I can make the skin in a couple of hours, but the finishing takes a little longer.

Warm jumper in a 28 inch chest size using vintage Jaeger Matchmaker yarn.

Hat and three pairs of fingerless mitts to use up the yarn.

And some Izzy dolls.  All the above now out of the house and on the way to Knit for Peace to cheer someone up, hopefully.

And, finally, my new project using oddments of Shetland yarn. I'm going for an autumnal hedgerow palette here.

Special places

 

What can this be?  We pass several of these on the way to our chosen parking place to start our daily walk for exercise under lockdown.

If we are lucky, as we were today, we see at least a few of these trotting about or grazing at the edge of the woodlands.

In the heat of summer, now long gone, we discovered this pool, spring-fed and so always full, unlike other watering holes which simply dried up and disappeared.  Then, we sat and watched as several varieties of dragonfly - ruddy darters and Imperators - hovered over the water.  One day we were privileged to see a kingfisher on patrol.  For three days he was resident at the poolside and then moved on. 

 Yesterday we were delighted to see a grey wagtail making the place his own.  He hopped up and down branches, hovered awkwardly down on to the leaf layer on the water, then took a leisurely preen, quite oblivious to our presence on the bank.  He is there in that picture.

Can you see him now - he's right in the centre, well-camouflaged because his plumage fits exactly with the leaves.

This was the weather first thing today - bright and sunny but with a hard frost and a chill to the air.

And what was that at the top of the page?  It was a sugar-beet mountain.  It has been the crop of choice around here this year, and will be taken off in huge lorries to Bury St Edmunds to be processed into sugar.  The churned up state of some of the fields has to be seen to be believed.

A bit of knitting

 A trio of bears, knitted basically to the Comfort Bear pattern.  I've worked out that it is possible to knit the bear reducing as many seams as possible. So two legs stitched together to make the lower half then knit up the body cast on extra stitches for the sleeves.  Put those on hold while knitting up and over the head, then put them back on the needles for the back.  Eventually you have a top half and a bottom half which you seam together around the waist. The grey bear was knitted this way. 

And a trio of Izzy dolls, knitted with a brown skin colour as requested by the charity.

And some clusters of fingerless mitts, using up odds and ends of yarn.

All of these have now been posted off to Knit for Peace, where there have been specific requests for these items.

I knit more when I am anxious as I find it helps.

Maldon

 

A little drive to our afternoon exercise: the historic town of Maldon.  The town itself is up a steep hill, but this is the curious section called the Promenade Park where tidal river meets a kind of seaside atmosphere.

Out on the exposed mudflats were many birds, happily foraging - a little egret.

A godwit.  We were within yards of these birds but they took no notice as no one would venture out on that mud.

Atmospheric images of ancient boats pulled up and left to decay.

We could not understand, viewing it from the other side, why the Yacht Club headquarters had such a list on it, but from behind it is clear that it is mounted on a barge.

Out on the end of the promenade, a statue to Brythnoth, leader of the Brits against the Vikings at the Battle of Maldon.  Good luck fighting in that mud

The sunshine had gone by this point, but we were cheered by the change of scene from our usual walks.  We'll be visiting again.

Planning trips to Essex.

 Wonderful idea, Maureen - planning some fantasy travel, which may or may not be possible in a post-Covid world.  

So, what would you need to know about Essex and where the best walking is to be found?  First, Essex is  very large county - in UK terms, that is - and more diverse than some English regions.  South Essex is really outer London.  North Essex runs up to the Suffolk border and is much more rural, with historic villages, such as the one I live in, and ancient woodlands.  There is an extensive coastline, but you are mostly talking marshland and mud.  There are tidal estuaries where mud is a big feature too.

From a centre such as Colchester you would be well-placed to explore both the coastal areas and the North Essex/ South Suffolk border.  Colchester has a castle with a Roman museum - an unparalleled collection of Roman artefacts.  You could drive north to Dedham and walk along the river to Flatford Mill, much painted by John Constable.  Or you could watch the tide tables and go across the causeway to Mersea island to see birds in season.

A number of long and short footpaths are on offer.  In fact, we almost always just drive a couple of miles north, park up and walk in the woodlands on public rights of way.  This is really important at this time of year as Essex is very flat in general and the field paths can be impassable with wet mud.

http://www.gps-routes.co.uk/routes/home.nsf/county-walks/Essex  This is a site which lists a range from the 85 mile Essex Way to much shorter strolls. Room for much fantasy planning here.

A short drive will take you to the famous villages of Lavenham and Long Melford - historic wool towns with spectacular churches and many ancient buildings.  Sudbury, a small market town, still has four working silk mills and is well worth a visit.  These are in Suffolk, of course, but are very similar in character to Coggeshall, the Essex village where I live.  Here the must-see is Paycocke's House, home of Thomas Paycocke, the wool merchant who built it in 1508.  The carvings inside and out are spectacular.

Mind you, I'm not sure that I would announce to friends that I was holidaying in Essex.  The county has acquired a reputation for being brash and vulgar - there's a reality tv show called "The Only Way is Essex".  I've never seen it, but, like others of its kind, it features girls heavy on false eyelashes and boys who have spent too long in the gym.  North Essex is more rural: Wellington boots are a good choice of footwear here.

Tollesbury

 A glorious autumn day, so after lunch we headed south towards the coast.  At this point in Essex you reach mud and marsh before you reach open water, but it made a change from our daily woodland walks.

Through Tiptree with its famous jam factory, Tolleshunt Knights, with its monastery, and Tolleshunt D'Arcy, once the home of Marjorie Allingham, and then straight on to Tollesbury, a small settlement with a marina and a row of pristine sail-lofts.

Heading along the raised path out towards the saltings, all kinds of craft are moored up.  Owners reach their boats along these duckboard paths.

Many of the boats are clearly beyond sailing ever again - some look like shabby weekend boltholes and some are just the bare bones of craft.

Looks peaceful, but imagine this at high tide with a storm brewing.

Looking to the east, we saw a huge flock of avocets rise and head off seawards, something we have never seen before.  Back towards Tollesbury, this was the view.

Fungi

 This has been a year without precedent in so many ways.  With our normal volunteering closed to us, and the gym not exactly an inviting prospect, we have kept up our programme of woodland walking.  Consequently, things which probably happen every year without us even noticing have been a constant source of interest this year.

Fungi - who knew that there were so many kinds?

Edited to add:  It turns out one of you is an expert! -See Comments.  I am so impressed by your identification of all these species.  Turkey Tails certainly make sense for number five.  Thank you for sharing.

Green Letter Day

This is Red Letter Day by Fiona Ellis.  I've knitted it before in bright blue.  The braided cables have a suggestion of elaborate military uniform about them.  I could see it in a dark green, perhaps worn with a tartan skirt or kilt. 

I did check out a few ranges of yarn, but bottle green seemed to have disappeared off the spectrum.  But then this cone turned up in the charity shop across the road, at a cost of £4.00. I wound it into balls and there was enough.  

I started by knitting the sleeves separately to remind myself of the pattern.  Once the body was complete, I tacked it together and it needed some adjustments.  The yarn was quite solid and had worked up larger than needed.  What to do?

In fact, I unravelled the sleeves and knitted them again in the smallest size.  Then I took out two inches at the top of the side seam of the body just by tapering off the seam.  The new sleeves fitted in easily and looked much neater.

So, what about buttons?  I decided on only three this time, placed to fit with the frogging at the centre front.  I don't want to buy buttons when I have so many in stock, so in fact I have used two which match and one of a similar type and size.  I doubt that anyone would notice.