Thursday 29 February 2024
Bear Accepts Challenge
Wednesday 21 February 2024
Today Was A Good Day
Tuesday 20 February 2024
What Do I Know?
I had a look at the stats on my blog and one of the recently popular posts dated from July 2016. Most of it was about the bees. For those new here, I had bees in my chimney (not a euphemism) for years, but eventually they left. In the same post I talked about bear and Shakespeare and how I was confident that one day he would enjoy it. I was wrong.
Bear has never enjoyed Shakespeare. He tolerates the Bard at best. This is unlike DH and I who both seriously enjoy Shakespeare and I'm planning on dipping into the Shakespeare Network on YouTube where there is a version of Macbeth with Ian Holm and Penelope Wilton. I will be very happy to settle down with my knitting to that. Bear would rather be excused. Last week he went to a party where he stayed overnight and he was late home the next day because he stayed behind to study maths with his friends. I would rather be excused from that!
Hugs and good health to all.
Monday 19 February 2024
I Need to Learn Self Control
I signed up to the Knitting Network's newsletter and it's been hard. There are offers about yarn landing in my inbox at least once, if not twice, per day. That's a lot of temptation. When they advertised that they had a mystery box on offer, I caved.
I had absolutely no reason to go for this. I still haven't got through the yarn sent by my lovely friend. But I've always wanted to get a mystery box and I succumbed. It looked like this.
I also ordered enough yarn for a simple, sleeveless, plain sweater knitted side to side. Funnily enough, the same yarn I ordered also appeared in the mystery box.
The box was supposed to have five balls of chunky and ten balls of dk. The chunky looks like this.
I'm really looking forward to the pale blue one. This is the yarn that I've got for my sweater - if I ever get around to finishing it.
There were some nice looking dk which are absolutely earmarked for the Mission for Seafarers.
But there was also four balls of 100% cotton that looked far thinner than dk.
They not only look a lot thinner, but I don't think that they'd work for scarves or hats. They're more like dishcloths. I shall have to have a think.
I'm determined to get through the yarn. I finished the scarf for the nice man at the garage but it's too short. I'm considering unravelling and re-knitting.
Hugs and good health to all.
Saturday 10 February 2024
Saturday Again
Thursday 8 February 2024
A Small Amount of Snow
There was a very small amount of snow here.
Other parts of Yorkshire were hit harder and bear's school was let out early. A lot of his classmates travel some distance and there were real issues for some. Bear hung around Leeds with a friend or two and then DH picked him up. I would willingly drive over snowy mountains for him, but DH is much better qualified for Leeds at rush hour. He said the drive was a little tricky in the dark and wet, but it could have been worse. I was watching the traffic monitors and there were quite a few crashes showing up.
I found a load of comments in the spam folder. I'm sorry that I hadn't answered them. Every time I see a comment, I feel that I've been hugged.
Hugs and good health to all.
Wednesday 7 February 2024
The Cooker Came!
The cooker came and got stuck on the steps.
We have a small outhouse type thing under the front steps. We had to replace the door, which was rotten, and the lovely neighbour that we had at the time fitted a door for us - but it was a door designed for indoor use. It may have been fitted before bear was born, or if not then, when bear was very young. Needless to say, the door is not in a fit state and the handle, the sort you get inside a house, sticks out. In fact everything sticks out.
Then the dratted thing got stuck in the door way to the kitchen which is a standard sized door. Next time we'll have to pick a narrow cooker. As it was, the poor delivery men had to strip the packaging from the cooker and polystyrene bits were shed all over the kitchen and garden.
Tuesday 6 February 2024
It Could All be Worse
There's not been much to write about. Or at least, I'm not seeing the stories at the moment. So I'm tempting fate and planning stuff to do tomorrow that's worth posting about.
The hotplate works, but we're still mainly using the airfryer and microwave. Tomorrow I need to get everything ready for the delivery of the new cooker but it won't be taken away and the new one hooked up until next week.
I actually left the house and went to Tesco today. I picked up some flavoured water that DH likes because I know that there's snow forecast and the water is getting a little low. My impulse buy there was a new bag for life as I had just got rid of a couple of ragged and elderly bags.
Saturday 3 February 2024
Nearly Normal Saturday
Friday 2 February 2024
Headache Continues
My sinuses are killing me. But we should get a new electric cooker from the insurance (less £100 deductible) next week. Unfortunately the earliest that it can be connected is the week after. As we're getting 'like for like' we're getting what to me is an extremely expensive one.
After Bless reminded me, I checked and I could saute onions etc in the rice cooker as it's actually a multicooker but we just use it for rice. However it's not as familiar as a frying pan and I caved and picked up a £20 electic single hob from Amazon which should arrive tomorrow. Bear is almost certainly going to university so it may come in useful for him at some point anyway, and I suppose it's useful if there are other problems with the cooker.
Incidentally, tonight we cooked frozen peas in the microwave and they came out a little cold. Please let the microwave hold on!
I've also picked up some Merchant and Gourmet packs of grains and veggies as they're down to £1.50 on the clubcard price. Bear wants to eat healthier. I will be chasing my tail a lot here as terms and conditions apply when it comes to what he eats and it can change like the weather. I'm aiming for something shelf stable. I can't have the Merchant and Gourmet packs because they have gluten, but a microwave pack of eg Korean Style Vegetables and Mixed Grains should be okay for bear if he has them with something like the frozen salmon fillets that are on offer or a nice bit of chicken and as there's two portions per pack, it could be a lot worse.
Speaking of bear, he got A+ in his tests for computer science and physics and is entitled to feel a little pleased with himself. Mind you, the poor lad is shattered today and had an extremely early night.
Also today I swear I saw a squirrel running past with what looked like a can. I refuse to speculate.
Hugs and good health to all.