The Hardhome Embroidery

So far you have only seen this

and then this

and this

but at last I can show you what I have been working on!

A family crest as part of the Hardhome Embroidery created by the Embroiderers Guild in partnership with Royal School of Needlework, Hand & Lock and Fine Cell Work for the launch of Game of Thrones Series 5 boxset this month!

The request for participants from the Embroiderers Guild dropped in to my inbox at the end of last year and well, being a huge Game of Thrones fan, how could I resist?? Of course then I began to worry about whether I was up to the challenge, and continued to worry about that throughout the whole process I might add!

 

https://embroiderersguild.com/index.php?page_no=869

As you can see the final piece is huge, 5m (nearly 17') long by 4m (13.6') high so my contribution is just a tiny part of that, but no less thrilling all the same. (second down from the top left hand corner in case you are wondering!) The timescale for the project was very tight given that the completed embroideries had to be returned to the organisers by March 2nd at the latest. My poor fingers didn't quite know what had hit them :)

My adult sons are hugely impressed that Mum now has a connection (however tenuous!) with Game of Thrones so it was worth the sore fingers for that alone!

The Hardhome Embroidery will go on tour in the coming months so I am hoping that it ventures far enough North for me to get a chance to go and see the complete banner and maybe mention in passing that I was involved in its production :)

Of course if you get a chance to see it too I would love to hear what you think of it, the descriptions that I have seen of the different elements of the panel sound amazing so I am sure that they will be worth seeing.

You can see some of the progress shots here and a list of contributors to the project here.

One of my three projects for the 100 Day challenge done and dusted!

Linking up to

Competitive Cakes

Since our boys were little it has been a tradition in our family that they decorate the Christmas cake on Christmas Eve.  Even when they moved away from home, first to University and then to employment, cake decorating on Christmas Eve was still mandatory :)

The cakes started out with traditional themes like polar bears and Santa's but in recent years they have gone a bit "off-piste" with the Elvis year being a particularly memorable cake!

This year, with the three of them living away from home and two of them now married there were some changes afoot in the tradition.

So, during December I made them each a plain Christmas Cake and delivered them complete with packets of coloured icing and left them to their own devices.

Here's what happened next!

Middle Son and his wife went for a Cool Runnings theme for their cake

So we have Santa careering down a Bobsleigh run jettisoning presents right, left and centre! (If you haven't seen it, Cool Runnings is a brilliant film about the Jamaican Olympic Bobsleigh team)

Youngest Son went for a completely different tack altogether and opted for a Game of Thrones-themed cake!

Naturally, being a Northerner, it is a House Stark cake because Christmas is Coming. (For those of you not acquainted with Game of Thrones, the motto of House Stark, who rule over the lands in the North, is Winter is Coming)

Finally, our Eldest Son and his wife got their act together and decorated their cake. Being big Game of Thrones fans too, they went for a similar theme. Living and working in the South now, our Eldest chose to ignore his Northern heritage and opted instead to represent a Southern power, House Baratheon! Their motto "Ours is the Fury" needed a bit of tweaking though, so it became "Ours is the Christmas" which suits that stag much better I think.

So, it looks like we have a new family tradition in the making :)

Needless to say, being boys, there was an element of competitiveness in the unveiling, so I promised them all that I would post the photos on my blog and ask readers to vote for their favourite. Naturally I couldn't choose between them :)