I have been enjoying indulging in birthday treats. When we got back from our trip away H and TG presented me with a birthday cake. As is always the case when H bakes, it was a beauty.
It was also large! M isn't a fan of chocolate cake, and there was no way the other three of us could get through it all, so I cut the second half of it into two large chunks and froze them to eat later.
Tonight I started drinking some birthday gin. I am not a big drinker, but my current favourite evening tipple is a gin and tonic, I think because it is not too sweet. H bought me a box with a selection of small bottles of different flavoured gins and mixers, and I sampled the first one this evening - raspberry gin with mediterranean tonic. And very nice it was too!
I spent much of the summer in a cross stitching mood, and have been working on two Disney bookmarks to go into Christmas stockings for Disney-loving daughters. I finished one, and am about half way through the second. I was confused as to why I came excruciatingly close to running out of a couple of colours - I am quite an economical stitcher, and kits usually have far more than I need - until I realised that instead of stitching two different pictures I was repeating the first one! I am too far on with it to unpick and start again, and I think I can just about make the thread last, so long as I give it a different border colour. I can't believe how long it too me to realise what I was doing!
Partly because I was annoyed with myself for messing up, and partly because colder weather always makes me want to knit, I have given up on the cross stitch for a while in favour of knitting. I finally finished a jumper (sweater) I started for TG last February, but which had been left in my craft box because I was procrastinating over sewing it up. I knitted a pair of socks as a Christmas present for my brother, who loves handmade socks, and I am now on the second sock of a pair for myself. I love this zig-zag pattern (Jaywalker on Ravelry) in self-striping yarn - I think this is the third time I have knitted it.
Then I distracted myself mid-sock when a yarn order arrived and started knitting this scarf, also a Christmas gift for my brother. I knitted him one years ago, I think with the same pattern, and he has worn it almost to destruction - it is now very thin and limp, so I decided he could do with another. It is 100% wool so will be toasty warm. I particularly like this pattern because it is reversible. I have just finished the first skein of two. It only took me two days, so I should get the whole scarf finished over the weekend.
Fortunately the annoying flu jab fatigue wore off after 48 hours and M and I managed to get out for a walk on Dunstable Downs yesterday afternoon while the weather was reasonable. It has been alternating between wet and miserable and damp and miserable for most of the week. In the evening I went to a friend's for a meeting about a brass band issue with the two of us, plus two others via Zoom. She had collected a new kitten that afternoon - eight weeks old and the cutest grey and white colouring.
She was a tiny little thing but extraordinarily confident, keen to explore and happy to climb up for a cuddle. When I left she was doing battle with a fly. I think the fly was winning because her paws were too small to do it much damage and she hadn't really got the hang of pouncing.
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