Old Town, Edinburgh in pictures.

As I had such a short time in Edinburgh last week, I didn't have time to visit the New Town as well as the Old. The Old Town, as suggested by its name, is the oldest part of Edinburgh and many medieval buildings, as well as the medieval street plan, have been preserved. The Castle is on top of a hill and most of the Old Town flows down from it towards Holyrood (where the Palace and the Scottish Parliament are). There are many steep streets, small alley ways and lots of steps! Buildings appear to have been built on top of each other and there are some that could almost be skyscrapers, built hundreds of years before those in the USA. There is one section of the town that did build on top of, and closed off, a whole section of streets because of plague. Some of these buildings can now be visited. 

If you're interested in more information about the history of Edinburgh, I'd start at the history of Edinburgh pages on Wikipedia.

Now for the pictures. A lot of these pictures are of buildings and bits of buildings that took my fancy and therefore I don't know the names of some of them.

The first pictures are of buildings in Blair Street. Look at those built out windows in  the second picture, there's a roof addition on the same building too.

The next five pictures are of buildings on the Royal Mile or High Street.

The next four pictures are taken from the back of a building on the High Street looking towards Cowgate (a great name isn't it?).

This picture is off the High Street looking towards St. Gile's Cathedral.

The next three photos are of buildings on Cockburn Street. You can't really see from these pictures but it is very steep. I was glad we were walking down rather than up!

Steps on Cockburn Street leading up towards the High Street.

This is the first photo of the Balmoral Hotel. The glass roof is over Waverley rail stations. 

Princes Street Gardens, this used to be, many hundreds+ years ago, a loch (Nor Loch). The railway line runs along the bottom of the depression.

Two views across Princes Street Gardens towards the Castle, the other large stone building is the Scottish National Gallery.

This last one is of the Scott Monument. There'll be more photos of this and other bits of Edinburgh in a future post.

I hope you've enjoyed seeing these photos.

TTFN
Louise

Shopping, a second go at crochet and a little trip.

 A lot of my raw materials comes from charity shops. They're a good source of vintage bedding (there's bucket loads of fabric in a king size duvet cover!), crocheted mats, wool, etc, though you can't guarantee a good haul every time you go. My regular haunt in New Brighton hasn't had much in it (for me) the past couple of weeks but this week I found yarn. Lots of it. There's some in the picture below, plus there was at least of a dozen more that stayed with my Mum. I also bought a stack of cross-stitching magazines and a couple of pillow cases. Not bad eh?

                                                   

On Thursday, I went to Calico Laine's shop in Neston. I usually visit their Liscard shop, but their Neston one is a bit bigger and laid out differently, but I can't get there on public transport. This week we had access to a car so to Neston we went. Unfortunately, I was accompanied by my other half so I couldn't mooch around as much as I'd have done if I was on my own. I think I did manage to see everything though!

You can see what I bought in the picture below. One of the reasons I wanted to go there was to see things that aren't in the Liscard shop, but are on their website. When it comes to fabric you really do need to see what it looks and feels like.

                                                    

On Friday I was on a day trip to Edinburgh and on the journey there and back I had a go at my first granny square. Earlier this year I had my first try of crochet and made a flower, but I have been wanting to do a granny square for a while, as I'd like a granny square blanket. 

Once I had mastered the triple crochet, it was quite straight forward.I started the square a few times until I had the hang of it. You can see my finished square below. It's a bit wonky and I think I missed a treble on the second ring, but it is my first one. For my second square, I'm aiming to keep it as neat as possible, so I'll keep redoing it till I get it right.
 
                                                 

I didn't have long in Edinburgh, but I did take quite a few pictures, a couple of which are below. I'll share more of them in the week.

The Balmoral Hotel

Looking across the roof of Waverley station towards Edinburgh Castle

This building used to house The Scotsman newspaper, it's now a hotel.

On the making front this week, I've made a couple of Christmas decorations and done a bit more of my knitted sleeveless jerkin that I started in January 2011! I've had a commission for three of my decorated fish so I've also drawn the design for the embroidery for these. I've also drafted a design for a new sampler, even though I have another that's unfinished, along with the rest of the pile of TBCs (to be completed). My excuse is that I have to draft a design as soon as I get the idea, otherwise I'd forget!

Have a great week.

TTFN
Louise

P.S. Don't forget to pop over to Handmade Monday to see what other bloggers have been up to in the past week. There's also a list of other blog parties I share with in the right-hand side column.

P.S.S. Don't forget that you still have plenty of time to enter this month's Creative Connections challenge. The theme is 'wedding' and the closing date is 30th September. If you'd like to join in go over to the monthly challenge blog.