One last look at the V & A!

I cannot believe this day has come - it seems just yesterday we arrived and had our four weeks in London stretching out in front of us! Now, I've been out for my last outing - we will be having dinner at a local restaurant for the last time, and will head off to Yorkshire and Ackworth tomorrow morning. I'll also not have web access after this, so you won't hear anything about Ackworth until we can get back home and back to our dial-up connection. I'll miss the speed of the wi-fi, but I sure won't miss the fiddliness of this laptop keyboard! Every time I type the letter "b", the cursor skips to another spot someplace on the page - very annoying! Ah well.

This morning, I headed back to the V & A. I knew I was meeting Charlotte and Linda Conners, but lo and behold, there was Caroline and Laurie Morrison and Joan Mills as well (and I should have known Joan would be there - we'd talked about it! But the old brain is not what it used to be! ) After all my bragging about how easy it is to get around, all the trains were running late today, and I was the last one there! (and I "live" only about 10 minutes away by tube!)

Off we went with all our fingers and toes crossed to the Textile Study Room to see what's what. When we arrived, there was a barrier up and the guard told us the room was "closed" - he knew nothing about it supposed to be open on this date - and from the look of things - it wouldn't be open for months, if they really were making the changes they talked about.

The adjacent gallery, which had been all textiles, was now a mixture - and not much textiles at all - it was open, but the part we wanted to see - the samplers - was what they were working on now. However - it looked exactly as it always has, according to Charlotte and the others who had been there before. There were two young women working - but they were pulling all the samplers out of their sliding spots and vacuuming out the cabinets and cleaning the glass on the samplers and putting them back! So maybe, they will not be changing it as much as they'd said....

Charlotte and the guard walked off a ways to talk, and in a few minutes, we were told we could go in for a short while, but it had to be brief, as we were interrupting their work! Oh joy! Luckily, others knew just where to go to find the best prizes, so in just one minute, we were gazing at Jane Bostocke! More were pulled out and we were treated to whitework, blackwork, and many, many band samplers! So many to look at - so many photos to take! We enjoyed ourselves thoroughly!

When they came back and asked us to leave now, we went meekly on our way - glad to have had the opportunity to see what we came for! Then we went back to the British Collection rooms and once again spent some time with those wonderful textiles - Mary Queen of Scots embroideries, and of course, Martha Edlin, whose sampler is shown here.

Before long, it was time to head back out and have lunch. We enjoyed a delicious Chinese Buffet lunch in a nearby restaurant, and then parted to spend our afternoons at various pursuits!

Now, here I am, putting the finishing touches on my last blog entry for the next week or so.

Tomorrow, we get the train up to Pontefract/Monkhill and start that new adventure with the Quaker girls and their beautiful works!