Going home -- and London stash

Sunday the 14th was travel day for the father type and I.  Father type flew on to Dublin for business, while I flew home.

There were so many duty free shops at Heathrow!  Pretty amazing!

This was the fancy schmancy part -- with Burberrys and Harrods and other fine stores.

Goodbye, London.

I missed International Knitting in Public Day by a day.  Does knitting on a plane count?

Eastern tip of Long Island??

And now pictures of my purchases in London.  Not tooooo many.  :D

An old Elizabeth II tin, a Buckingham Palace ornament, and a piece of Liberty Tana Lawn I've had trouble tracking down (in this colorway at least).  I love how everything matches!

A needlepoint kit from Liberty London.  I've drooled over this for ages.

And a sweater's worth (there's more in the bag) of Eden Cottage Yarn Bowland DK from Loop London.  I had to try some British wool!  Yes, I have a pattern picked out, but I don't want to jinx myself so I won't say which one.  (The bag isn't a purchase.  It was used as my bag for my purchases -- which I love!)

I also picked up this Banksy t-shirt.  Don't you love it?

The father type has his own souvenirs (much less than me, of course), and we also picked up some souvenirs for the kids.  But that's it!  I toted a suitcase to London that was empty on one side.  That side was pretty full on the way home!

I have started both the Kiss kit (which turns out to be in cross stitch -- hooray!) and started my sweater.

The father type also brought back a scarf from the Book of Kells Exhibit at Trinity College in Dublin for me.

I hope you've enjoyed my posts about our London trip.  It was a wonderful trip for us, to a place I've always wanted to visit.  I was in London only once before, as a small child, and I was sick most of the time and didn't care a bit for the place back then.  What a treat for me now though!  I loved how different London is from the US, with beautiful old buildings, cool chimneypots, and of course the ever present double decker buses, phone boxes, mail boxes, and London cabs.  I hope we get to go back someday.  I would love to visit London again, plus other parts of the UK.

Thank you, father type, for a lovely anniversary present.  I will never forget our special time in London.

Last day in London

Saturday we decided to do the V&A.  Plus some other stops.

This is London's definition of a subway: a subterranean walkway to the museums from the tube station.  lol!

We saw this exhibit.  No pictures allowed.  We also saw the fashion gallery where there were many many examples of fashion through the years.

(Can you tell which era I'm not that interested in?  Insert it here.  lol!)

Yummy lunch at the museum -- cheese and chutney sandwich, with a chickpea salad and a carrot salad.

Then we made our way to Islington, London and Camden Passage, where I went here!!!

Loop London!  What a great shop!  And I got to meet Anna Maltz, a talented knitwear designer whose first day of work was happening that day!  (She is sweaterspotter on Instagram, a fun feed to follow.)

The colors -- so beautiful!

(Yes, I did buy something.  I think I'll cover stash in another post.)

On the way back, we stopped at the Marble Arch (Trooping the Colour had happened earlier in the day.).  There were some protesters there.

And we found Speaker's Corner in Hyde Park, although no one was speaking that day.

Speaker's Corner is another of those places you read about in books (including in Dickens).  Amazing history.

We walked back to the flat through Hyde Park.  We even saw an English Magpie.  Didn't get a pic of it though.

Day 6: East London

The father type chose the next stop for us on Thursday -- East London, to see the artsy areas and the old Spitalfields Market.

Even place names give me a thrill.

Old Spitalfields Market.

A stall of hand knitted baby items.

English fast food, a pie shop.

This was across the street.

I love the old buildings everywhere.

We stumbled across this -- my first Etsy pop up shop!

So many talented men and their wares inside.

The father type got this little notebook specially printed with whatever word he wanted.  Love that little printing press.  Brings back memories of my junior high school printing class, still one of my favorite classes ever.

Love these baskets too.

This is outside -- I believe this area was the Truman Brewery Market.

Scenes from the walk back to the tube station.

If you called a number, the goat would talk to you to tell you his history and reason for being.

Love the look of this shop.

A shot of the Gherkin.  So many interesting shaped buildings in London -- the Shard, the Walkie Talkie, the Gherkin.  lol!

Saw this in the tube station on the way back to the flat.  The boy child loved the Mr. Men series as a child.

Chocolate from one of the Etsy sellers at the pop up shop.  This chocolate kept me going on the trip home!  So yummy!  I think I'm developing a taste for coffee.  Which is saying a lot for me!

One more day!