Of tweeds and tartans, cream soda and cupcakes!

this is the final 'post' from Edinburgh as it now seems a rather long time ago! a lot has happened. i have spent 3 hours sitting in the Games Workshop watching my son battling with his 'blood Leta's', i have gone back to work and school has started thank goodness, i was beginning to tear my hair out! as i mentioned in another post (if anyone reads them!) i am very keen on tartan. so whilst in Edinburgh i wanted to get a few offcuts to play with. although i hate 'touristy' shops we ended up in Geoffrey kilts mill just below the castle. like the Dovecot it was built on water, an ex reservoir. where the water used to be there is now a rabbit warren of tartan this, tartan that and the noise of the looms. somewhere down in the depths i sought out Murdo who found me a few samples, some of them shown above with other goodies brought back! i am now wondering what to do with them!
as part of the festival each year there's a craft fair; i love craft fairs you can never have too many to visit. two of the stalls 'Breagha' and 'Fieldy' i was pleased to see were using Harris Tweed which i am also rather partial to. unfortunately i didn't buy anything but do check them out. of the various shops we visited or walked past was Jenners (above), one of their windows was decorated with Timorous Beasties wallpaper. Timorous Beasties are a Glasgow based company who use modern day motifs to re-invent 'toile de jouy' wallpaper and textiles.
other eye catchers were this sweet shop in Glasgow, full to the brim of amazingly kitsch packages and exceedingly garishly coloured sweets. i bought my 'hello kitty' sweet dispenser there!Harvey Nicols always has wonderful window displays, this time they had a different theme in each. metal, fabric, wood, cardboard, string and glass all with the exciting use of cable ties for foliage. most of my photos had too much reflection in but this shows the 'metal' window.
walking along Whalebone Walk for the first time i was interested to see this attached to the large whale bones at the start of the walk. originally they had been on the 1886 international Exhibition of Industry, Science and Art on the site. somewhat bizarre.
and finally one of the best things about travelling is the food! (are you reading Jackie?). this time Edinburgh was bursting with serious cupcakes and when you have to stop for morning coffee and afternoon tea the tummy gets bigger and the purse emptier! my favourite restaurant in Edinburgh is Urban Angel, so we had to go there and in amongst the necessary stops between Packed Lunch (a taster from various festival acts), the revenge of brainwashing puppets, the high street swarming with people, various acts and paper being thrust into our hands, we have made a new discovery (besides Sainsbury's making a cream soda of my youthful memories),of 'Loopy Lorna's. a wonderful tea room with butterflies, polka dots, knitted tea cosies, painted clouds on the ceiling and oh of course cup cakes! my one regret is not getting to see Michael Clark perform his new work.