Moonlight Walk and makings
WordPress has decided to read all my photos as landscape so please tilt head appropriately.
I was back home for a little while so grab a cuppa while I walk you through town. Radcliffe Camera.
St Peter in the East C12th church on Queen’s Lane.
Oxford University Examination Schools
My fav dog grotesque on Magdalen College.
My fav dragon grotesque on Magdalen College.
There was a beautiful sunset from Magdalen Bridge over the Botanic Garden.
The tower of Magdalen College and Magdalen Bridge (where Magdalen School Choir sing from on May Morning) taken from the Angel and Greyhound Meadow.
These days though it isn’t all “Dreaming Spires”. There is a minaret on the sky line with the new construction of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies.
Time to refill your cuppa.
Imagine you have had a wonderful evening where you come in at midnight and get offered a mug of hot chocolate or a midnight walk under a nearly full moon. Well of course I jumped at the chance of a walk!
A Narnia moment with a lamp post.
The air was crisp at -2C /28.4F
Each step on the frosted grass was a soft crunch, a bit like eating flapjacks where it is crispy at first then gives way.
Someone else had broken the ice on a flooded field.
Mist came off the River Cherwell in the cold.
There have been no naked dons bathing at Parson’s Pleasure since 1991, and there are no trace of the buildings.
The rollers for taking your punt to the higher river level are still in place.
Uni Park Cricket Pavillion
Keble College Chapel -Holman Hunt’s Light of the World is here.
A Victorian Gothic revival cottage style building by the Natural History Museum.
The New Bodleian Library (Art Deco). This is just the upper part! There are many huge floors below ground under the road leading to the older parts of the library by the Radcliffe Camera. A copy of each book published in the UK comes here. Reader requests would arrive by vacuum capsule to each layer in the stack, where the book would be found.
Broad Street by moonlight.
Radcliffe Square.
My fav door in town. Let me show you why.
Beautifully shaped door with a Green Man carved on it leading to Brasenose College.
The legend is that the 2 faun carvings holding the porch up inspired CS Lewis’s Mr Tumnus’ character in The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe.
It is so important to have beautiful buildings to inspire new generations. I am glad that the centre of Oxford is preserved for all to enjoy.
Victoria Fountain at The Plain. This area of Oxford was a Danish enclave in 1002AD. Ethelred the Unready ruled that all Danes (Vikings) should be expelled from England in what is known as St Brice’s Day Massacre. The Danes of Oxford fled to St Frideswide’s on the other side of town to claim sanctuary, but the locals burned the church down and killed everyone they could while they fled there. Bones possibly backing up the story have been found (2011) in St John’s College in St Giles which would have been outside the city walls at that time.
Next time I will show you the walk in daylight. It was a truly wonderful and special walk in the moonlight with scarcely a soul to be seen. We went inside at 2am and had that hot chocolate. I think I was grinning from ear to ear, happy to be home and feeling the history under my feet.
Talking of feet- I made these on my trip so am calling them my Moonlight Socks in commemoration of that walk.
This idea began as a punch needle rug design in a Winter’s Simply Vintage magazine. I changed it to applique,
added a snowman and left out the original lettering, and quilted stars and trees in the border using freezer paper templates.
It was meant to be a Christmas present but instead it will be a birthday present for that person this year.
A friend showed me a French glove pattern, and another friend translated it for me. These are the result!
A little bit steam punk and a little bit dressy. These will be a birthday present too.
This is currently on the needles- a cardi for Daughter. It is a much richer darker teal blue but my camera wont photograph it accurately. It is a much darker Gorjuss blue like in this link.
Off to see what you have all been doing now and replying to comments left to my last post. I’m slowly getting back in to the swing of Blogland.
Posted in Crafts, Knitting, Quilts, Travels by House Elf with 6 comments.