Finished Anne Bronte's Agnes Grey

I've read this as part of Laura's challenge, the version I borrowed from the library was the Penguin Classics version "with a memoir of her sisters by Charlotte Bronte".

It was a nice gentle read and I picked it as I hadn't read it before. Amazing to think that she while waiting for Agnes Grey to be published, she started writing the much wilder Tenant of Wildfell Hall, which was published only a year later.

You can really sympathise with poor Agnes, volunteering to work as a governess and then having such awful disobedient children to manage. They ended up telling Agnes to work for them leaving her no time of her own. Then when she meets Mr Weston, the elder daughter of the family tries to add him to her collection of men. Luckily good trumphs and the story ends happily.

Throughout the book, I kept realising how autobiographical the book was about governessing from the Brontes' own real life experiences. This made it all the more poignant. In the introduction, one critic in the past said: "The heroine is a sort of younger sister to Jane Eyre, but inferior to her in every way". I agree with this sentiment.

After finishing the book, I then read the introduction and another section "Biographical Notice of Ellis and Acton Bell" by Currer Bell dated September 19, 1850. Charlotte wrote beautifully about her sisters, revealing their true identity.

All in all, a pleasant, gentle read.

Recent pieces of bobbin lace

On the left is a piece of Bedfordshire lace I made last year and on the right the present piece on my pillow (well, ONE of my pillows!) an easy Torchon circular design, only a few repeats to go. I am determined to finish this and sew it to the fabric before I start anything else, as I always have a hard time doing the finishing (in my stitching too!!).

Dimensions Sorceress

Another Dimensions Charts and Charms project. She is rather lovely, and I havent added and of the blended filament threads in gold and silver yet. She really will sparkle. First project on black for a long time, so I'm only doing it in daylight.

UFO sampler

This is a sampler kit of a historic sampler that I bought in the US when I worked there in 1980!!! It languished for many years as I put off starting it. One of my needlework groups (2muchXS) has a yearly Jan 1st challenge, we only have to say what we will start and begin it on this day. No pressure to finish it that year! So I started it a couple of years ago. The bottom half is a great picture of animals, flowers, trees etc in satin stitch. I did do some more on it this week. Hope to work on this UFO every Monday! This sampler is stamped on linen, and in the time since 1980 I have changed my tastes a lot and no longer like stamped pieces, but I never give up on things, so one day it will be finished!! I wonder how old I'll be then!

Sew Cozy

Here is my photo of Sew Cozy (a Dimensions Charts and Charms chart) from February 2009!!

Unfortunately no more progress till last week

All About the Brontes Challenge 2010!!

Great, another challenge for more of my favourite authors! Laura is being great and setting this up for us.

I'll list the following items, of course I may have to change them depending on what the libraries have available.

1. Agnes Grey (by Anne) - book
2. Shirley (Charlotte) -book

I've included these as I think I read or tried to read them a few decades ago, so need to refresh myself.

3. Wuthering Heights - DVD (not sure which version, will update later, depending on what I can borrow)

4. The Bronte Yearbook (book)

5. The Bronte letters

6. Regarding Jane Eyre by Susan Geason - book

I also read a great book on Charlotte by Mrs Gaskell (I love her books too!) many years ago, might be time to re-read that too.

Thanks Laura for the opportunity

regards
Julie in Australia

At long last another post from Julie

Long time since I posted, I managed to mislay the login and password (I had created a new blog for this), but found the details a few days ago. I just hate it when I lose (well mislay) something.

1. Watch Becoming Jane DVD -Done!
2. Watch Pride and Prejudice DVD BBC series again (with Colin Firth) Done! Watched with my dear mother, its one of her favourites. I think we could start it again straight after we've watched it!
3. Watch Pride and Prejudice Kiera Knightly version -Done! I watched this twice actually.
4. Watch Emma DVD Done! The version with Kate Beckinsale.
5. Watch Sense and Sensibility DVD Done! Ooooh, I just adore the guy who plays Colonel Brandon. When he arrives and stands near the doorway and watches Marianne playing and singing, the look on his face is just incredible!! I actually have 2 versions of this, I watched the one with Emma Thompson, Kate Winslet, Alan Rickman and Hugh Grant. I also have a BBC verison with Irene Richard and Tracey Childs, this one still has cellophane round it!!!
6. I have to change my #6 item, it was: (Make a Jane Austen sampler from The Gift of Stitching magazine) . I didn't quite get my act together sorry to say for the last item:

BUT I received a beautiful book for my birthday in October: Jane Austen's sewing box by Jennifer Forest and so I changed my last item to this gorgeous book. As I received it in Spring and the weather here in Australia was good (well probably too hot in November), I read it out loud to my mother in the garden two chapters at a time. I love reading out loud and loved reading the quotes from my favourite books!! And the things the women used to make are so lovely, maybe I'll even make one or two of them myself! I recommend this book to anyone crafty, even the cover is lovely :)

Well I still hope to do some of the other challenges I listed, pity work gets in the way

Hope everyone else is going well with their items and I wish you all a Merry Christmas with lots of reading time in 2010!!

cheers
Julie