Halloween Horrors

This week again we have had a lot of wind and rain and many of the leaves have blown off the trees. With the clocks changing the nights are drawing in.

Halloween has arrived in the Artful Garden - any excuse for dressing up and inventing new artwork.


The clock strikes 13.

A surreal clock

Looby Loo won the star prize for her stunning outfit.

Lovve the shoes and tights

Bobby Barley is sporting and interesting nose. 

Bobby Barley with the footballs

Boozy Floosy is looking like a witch with her black designer dress a la bin bag.

Glam girl

Crazy Maisie was not feeling too well and felt black did nothing for her normal outlandish dress sense.

Does

Does anyone fancy an apple?

Lotta Bottle decided that a green nose would cramp her style.

Lotta on the right

Charlie Barley decided that a skeleton and a bat cloak was his frightful outfit of choice.

Like the skeleton

A broomstick complete with black cat hangs from a tree branch.

Lucky black cat

Pumpkin bunting hangs from the tress and blows in the wind.

Ahhhh

There is a horror display on the picnic table and orange pumpkins greet you as you enter the garden.
  

A scary smile

A frightful display

Orange pumpkins

The summerhouse has been transformed with orange and black balloons. 

Horror balloons

Happy Horrors. 

Autumn Abounds

This week has been torrential rain for most days so I have not been gardening very much. I have been taking photos of the trees before the wind blows all the leaves away.

Autumnal hues

The beauty of Autumn has arrived and as you travel along the country lanes there is an amazing variety shades of gold, brown, russet and yellows.

Golden glory

Vibrant rosy hues

The horse chestnut tree looks glorious even on a wet day.

Chestnut leaves blowing in the wind

The copper beech tree with its mahogany leaves.

Rich and dark

These trees  are just beginning to turn.

Seen through the rain

The yellow leaves are such a rich colour and shape with bright red stems.

Wonderful shapes and hues

The bracken has turned to russet hues.

A 'forest' of bracken on the verge

This red acer was in a garden in the village, it is so vibrant.

These remind me of flamingo feathers

These leaves look as though they have been polished.

Shiny leaves on the path

There are still a few flowers in the garden. The ruby red hollyhock is just about surviving the wind.

Ruby red hollyhock

Bony blue centuraea is in flower for the third time this year.

Blue stars

The lupin leaf looks like a starfish.

A lupin starfish

The simplicity of this yellow daisy shaped flower is so beautiful.

I love the vibrancy of these colourways

My yellow hot pokers have during the week changed from pure yellow to red and yellow. It has been fascinating to watch the subtle change. They are like a flame in the garden.

First yellow

Now red topped pokers

Lotta Bottle was delighted to be included as a star clue in another treasure trail this time for the Rotary Club. Despite the rain she was on good form and was very well admired by all the men who were not looking at her hair rollers but at her other attributes.

Hi boys

This morning it was an autumnal sunrise with mist over the river Eden a dark sky and a slight glow from the sun, very atmospheric.

Mist and sun a wonderful combination

Bobbins and Beauty

Th weather is starting to get colder and a few nights this week the temperature in the greenhouse has dropped to 4C.

On Monday I visited Stott Park Bobbin Mill at Newby Bridge in Cumbria. It was built in 1835 and provided bobbins for the Lancashire weaving and spinning industry producing up to a quarter of a million bobbins per week. Each bobbin was only used once, as if a bobbin broke when in use on the loom it would mean a break in work that would be very expensive.

Note the swill baskets full of bobbins

Sawdust in every nook and cranny

A bounty of bobbins

This is a map of the bobbin mills in Cumbria in their heyday.

Only Stott Park bobbin mill has survived

Different types of wood were coppiced and dried before they were cut into bobbin sized lengths.

Bobbin lengths with their first cut,the centre hole

Each worker was paid according to the number of bobbins they processed. Some workers kept a tally by putting aside one bobbin in 10 or used a tally stick where each notch represented 10 bobbins.

A tally of tens

The bobbin went through different stages of cutting to create the finished shape. Each worker was responsible for maintaining their own machine and keeping the cutting blade sharp.

This unguarded blade was for the first cut into bobbin lengths

Bobbin shaper machine

Bobbins were put in a drying room to dry the wood to prevent distortion.

Trays of bobbins

Young boys were employed to warm the wax which was added to the barrel in which the bobbins were tossed as part of the finishing technique.

This was the only warm area in the mill

The barrel was rotated to spread the wax

Finished bobbins were weighed and packed into hessian sacks to be sent to the buyers.

I do not think this sack is original

A steam powered boiler drove the machinery and the working conditions were very cold so the workers kept warm like hamsters. Wood shaving waste was waist high and they made route ways between the machines. With all the bobbins produced there was a huge amount of shavings.

The boiler

With the decline in England's textile industry the mill made broom handles, mallets etc and survived as a commercial mill closing in 1971.

This old fire extinguisher was in one of the buildings.

A fire extinguisher from a time gone by

I found this amazing fungus at  the Bobbin mill.

Lovely flowing shapes

Bubbly lichen

These autumn mornings are bringing some superb sunrises.

This sunrise only lasted a few minutes

Stupendous

This is my latest pottery achievement Nefertiti head.  

Queen Nefertiti  

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