Number 6 mini move

Number 6 has moved.   He's now in the big yellow brooder.  He's tiny.  He must be Siouxsie's, I can't see how any of the others (apart from Ping & Pong the Dorkings) could have produced such a small egg. 

We've moved the brooder into the kitchen, on the big dining table I use for my sewing.   At least he'll see us during the day.

He's had a little drink and he's eaten a little.

All good signs. Right?

We're always hot on hygiene,  and we're being extra extra careful now.

The incubator is dismantled.  The non-electric bits are in a Miltoned bath.  The electric part has been sprayed and dried.  Tomorrow the incubators will go back in the loft,  until next year.


The steam press has been moved back out of the guest room, I've vacuumed and cleaned.   Tomorrow I can get to the filing cabinet and do the filing,  and sort out the rest of the room.

It's returning to normality. 

Merge

Well, we've made the shed brooder bigger (but not as big as it can be), and we've added number 1-5  to ABCD.   

ABCD had a holiday in a bucket while we altered the brooder ring.   1-5 started to try and eat Aubiose the moment their feet touched down.    ABCD had a little peck of 1-5's egg teeth, but other than that, all seemed OK.

We're keeping the baby monitor close so we can hear of any trouble. Hopefully.

Number 6 is looking very small and lonely.  We've cleaned and disinfected the big yellow brooder, and we're going to transfer him sometime this evening.

I'm thinking of moving the brooder into the kitchen so he'll see us and we can talk to him.

Number 6

Number 6 survived the night.

This morning, the yolk sac was detached.  I can't open the incubator, so I can't see whether his tummy is OK and healed, or whether there is a problem.

He's a yellow/brown chick, and he's tiny.  The egg he came from was very small, and I don't know who laid it.  It was the wrong colour to be one of the Dorkings.  It was too small for most of the harem.

It could be a Siouxsie egg.  The colouring of the egg wasn't quite the colour I remember from Siouxsie's eggs, but it was very very glossy like her eggs were.


It's possible that this little lone chick could be from that line. I looked at pics of Siouxise, Pogo, Not Norman, and Norman when they were chicks.   Number 6 could definitely be fom that line!   Pogo and NotNorman's   nephew/niece. Norman's  first cousin once removed .

But I need to not get ahead of myself.  Poor little Number 6 is going to have a bit of a long lonely  road ahead.     And the incubator has to stay shut for now.

And the others are going to have to go out in the shed brooder today so tha the upstairs brooder is empty for Number 6 to move in to.

We talked about keeping one of the chicks back to put in with Number6.    The problem is that if Number6 has got some sort of latent infection,  it'll transfer to the chick we put in with it. 

I looked back in my blog to see what we had done with Norman,  and I could see what we need to do here.

The exercise  reminded me of why keeping a blog is so useful.

Chicks 1-5

Chicks 1-5 are in the small brooder upstairs, and seem to be OK.  The foot fetish seems to be over.
They all look very similar, although there are some differences with the feet.     We won't know any more until they get a bit older.

There is no evidence yet of any Vorwerk colouring in any of them.   We've no idea which of our allotment girls are the Mums.  I know there were at least 3 different egg types, but  I don't know who laid what.

It will be interesting to see how they turn out.

Unless we ring some of them,  we won't know which were from our controlled group and which were "pot luck".   That may make things difficult later, when we have to decide who to keep and who to cull.

I don't like ringing chicks at this age.  I do have some rings tiny enough, but I don't like doing it.

We'll have to make a decision soon.

Chicks ABCD

Last weeks's 4 chicks (A.B,C and D) are bouncing around in the brooder in the shed.   Two of them are black, and I think are one of each sex.    One is currently black and is a different breed.  And one is brown striped, and so I know it's from Barbara.

Barbara's chick is very. very alert.  When we go in,  it watches us from a beady eye.

We're going to extend the brooder today or tomorrow so chicks 1-5 can join them.

End of hatch

So, the 7 other eggs.

The other incubator was cleaned and disinfected, and set to hatching, which mainly means much higher humidity. Humidity is important when hatching:  the membrane surrounding the chick needs to be moist, other wise the chick will bocme 'shrink wrapped' and uable to get out.

Before transferring the eggs for their final 2 days, we candled them. One was clear (unfertilised) - the last Dorking egg, sadly - which left us with 6.

I'm not sure I can rember the sequence of events.

Thursday
Chick 1 chick hatched on Thursday.  No other chicks emerged, and we were concerned we might have a lone chick.  After 12 hours, we moved him into the brooder.  Small Person popped over to see.

Friday
On Friday morning, nothing was happening at 6am,  but at 8am when I went to look, we had a chick.  And another one on the way.

Small Person was away fishing with her Dad.  I phoned her Dad and arranged to meet them so that small person could see the hatch.  We got back just in time to see chick 2 emerging.  

Two more had pipped, possibly 3 - although the 3rd one looked like it might have been pecked from the outside. Small person stayed to see what happened.   She popped out with DH and  chick 3 hatched while she was out.   Honestly. You couldn't make it up.  I tried to video it for her.

Nothing else was happening with the others so after some hours I took Small Person back to her Dad.

Later on Friday,  I could see that we were going to have a timing problem.  I decided to pop the Chicks 2 and 3 in the brooder, with the original chick,  before the next chick emerged.   I also took the opportunity to take out the shells.

Chick 1, who has black legs and feet,  was shocked to have 2 newbies in with him.  He was also fascinated by their pink toes and kept going for them. I presume he thought they were worms.  He would not let the newhatched chicks rest,  so I had to take them back out and put them back in the incubator.

Chick 4 hatched.   I was really conscious of the timing problem now. I had 2 dry chicks, 1 wet chick,  and another one on the way.   Once number 5 arrived, I woudln't be able to open the incubator until he was dry,  and by that point number 2 would need food and water and number 3 would need water. . So, much later, when number 4 was dry,  I removed number 2 and 3 and put them in the brooder.   The same thing happened with the feet fetish,  but I couldn't do anything about it now. 

Number 5 was well pipped and had a fairly big hole.  I realised that the membrane was probably too dry,   probably because I'd opened the incubator a few times.    Damn Damn Damn Damn.   I was going to have to intervene (as I had caused the problem).

I boiled some water,  soaked a new dishcloth in it,  then took the egg out of the incubator and wrapped it in the warm cloth.    I soaked some kitchen towel, and attempted to drip water on to the cracked edges and on to the membrane.  I had to make sure I didn't get water near the beak or nostrils,   I resoaked the cloth as it cooled down.    I could hear the chick inside the egg cheeping.

I put the egg back, and picked up the small 6th egg. No sound.  I put it back.

Several times over the rest of the evening, I used hot boiled water and went through the process with number 5.  I was sure the chick was going to die, and it would be my fault.

It was not an easy night.

Saturday
On Saturday morning, number 5 had emerged.  I was so relieved.

So we had just one egg left in the Incubator.  It had pipped but hadn't got any further. We weren't even sure it had pipped,  it was possible it had been a peck from the first or second chick.    Then I saw it had cracked a bit and there was a small hole. I heard it cheep.

If number 5 made me think Damn Damn Damn,  you can imagine what I was thinking about number 6. 

This poor chick.  All the faffing about with Number 5,   all the times I'd opened the incbator,  the damage might be irreperable.   I had assumed it was dead in shell,  and I hadn't done anything to keep it damp.

I had to try and do something now.   I tried the soaking thing, but I couldn't risk dripping water because the hole was too mall.   I got a brand new artist brush,  put that in boiling water, and tried using that to dampen the edges.  I even chipped away some shell and soaked the membrane.

I could see the little beak trying to poke out.  It cheeped.

I picked up Small Person at 2pm and brought her back.   During the afternoon, I tried again a couple of times.  Each time I tried, I was wishing I hadn't,  and simultaneously wondering about doing more.   I used the brush to get some membrane off its beak and part of its body.   It's very easy to break a blood vessel when interfering like this.  So many things can go wrong.


Every time we opened the incubator,  4 and 5 would try to hop out.  Later in the afternoon we decided we'd have to get the other chicks out.  I wrapped the Number 6 egg in a wet cloth,  Small Person moved 4 and 5 into the brooder, took out the shells, and put fresh kitchen towel down.

Several times I used my brush, desperately trying to help the poor thing.  If it really had pipped on Thursday,  it had taken far too long.      At some point DH had also had a surreptitious attempt at 'helping' by breaking off some shell.  It was so stressful.

Much later, it was desperately trying to break free.  I looked at the shell and could see that our 'helping' had probably made it harder for the little thing to get the leverage it needed.    I walked away.   They have to push out of the shell to strengthem their legs, otherwaise you get "splayed leg" and various other deformoties.


I came back and watched for a bit.   I walked away. 

Eventually, I had to wrap it up again and help the shell a bit.

Eventually,  it hatched.

It still had it's yolk sac attached.  That's not good.  They need to have absorbed all the yolk before they emerge.   I googled.  I struggled not to cry.  The outlook was not good.     It might ot survive more than a few hours.  It might survive but it could be susceptible to disease, some of them so horrible they don't bear thinking about ("mushy chick").   It mght ie within a day or two.  It might carry a disease and infect the other chicks.  It might survive and die young. 

It was done now. We had to leave it alone, not open the incubator at all in case infection got in.
I struggled not to cry.    Small Person kept asking if it was going to be all right.  We answered honestly.   We don't know.  We just have to wait and see what happens.

No matter what happens, we cannot open the incubator.

Much disappointment

One of the eggs, one of the ones I'd bough, was leaking.   I removed it from the incubator, in case it exploed and we put it in a sealed bag.  Research suggested there must have been bacteria in the egg, and the leaking as where gas had buit up and was forcing the liquid out of the shell.

We were worried about the other eggs and the hatched chicks.    Then a second one started leaking.  That was also removed.    We put the chicks in the brooder, quickly disinfected the incubator and put the remaining eggs back, on kitchen towel in case of further leaks.

One further chick hatched.  As soon as s/he was dry enough, the hatchling was moved to the brooder.  We monitored them very, very closely.  We also left the remaining eggs in the incubator for a few extra days.  No more hatched.  One of them, at least, should have. 

Meanwhile, we have 7 other eggs in another incubator, due to hatch in the next couple of days.   Some of the eggs were in with the failed eggs.  It's a worrying time.

We moved the now-4-day-old chicks to the shed brooder today.  We haven't used this shed as a brooder before. It's double insulated, so we've no idea how it's going to be, compared to our revious shed.   We've installed a camera and a baby monitor.

I hope they will be OK.

It never gets old

Yesterday morning, early, one of the eggs pipped.

Much relief and excitement.

During the day, a small hole appeared. It was slow progress.  Yesterday afternoon, we heard cheeping from inside the egg.  Before we went to bed, the cheeping was quieter.  The hole was no bigger.   It's so very tempting to want to "help",  but "helping" isn't always the right thing to do..     We've had eggs before which have taken more than a day to hatch, so we went to bed leaving well alone. For now.

This morning I went to look at about 8am and there were two chicks in the hatcher. Two!.  DH said the second one had pipped when he checked at 4am and the first one stilll hadn't emerged.

I'm so excited to see them!

One is from the set I bought, a Leghorn/Legbar cross.  The other is one of ours, from the 5 girls Bertie was penned up with.   It's a brown egg, so we know it isn't Ping or Pong (the two Dorkings).  So, it could be Barbara (Australorp x Indian Game,  the more Indian Game markings) or Annie, Barbara's sister (but more Australorp looking) or Barbara/Annie's Aunt who doesn't have a name.

I hope more hatch soon.

Broody breaking

We'd been expecting Poppy (or Gloria) to have gone broody a few weeks ago.  We'd thought we might pop a few eggs under her, to reward her for her years of determined broodiness.   Once she's gone broody, she sits tight - on an empty nest - for six or seven weeks.

With the disappointment of so many clear eggs,  it seemed that popping some under Poppy would be a good idea.... but she didn't go broody.

Yesterday, DH separated the eggs from the two incubators.  One lot is due to hatch this weekend,  and they were moved into the incubator whch was set up for hatching (higher humidity). The other lot, the eergency lot I collected when we realised so many of the originals were clear, aren't due to hatch until 6 days later, so they are in the first incubator still.

Today, Poppy went broody.

DH brought back the Dorking's eggs from the allotment.  I cracked a couple, and they don't look fertilised to me.  They have a white spot on the yolk, but I can't see a definite bullseye ring.     Eggs from the garden girls often look like that, so I know it doesn't mean anything.

Anyway. We decided to write on the shells, and put them under Poppy.   We know they aren't likely to develop, but, well,  you never know.  And she might as well be sitting on them instead of sitting on nothing.

She gave me a Look as  I put the eggs under her.   I realised that I should have waited until she wasn't looking. Maybe when she was having her daily poo, or when she was asleep.  But it was too late.

Half an hour later, she was wandering around the garden, unbroody.

She may go back to it, so we'll have to see.  At least they weren't bought-in eggs.

Blah Blah Blah

I killed my sourdough starter a couple of years ago.   It had taken me a long time to create him - I think it took two attempts  -   and I had kept him fed and refreshed for a loooong time, even when I wasn't making sourdough (or similar) breads.  And then I just stopped. I missed one refresh, which turned in to missing a couple,  which turned into me not wanting to open the jar......and he died. Or at least,  I couldn't face trying to resurrect him.

I couldn't be bothered to make another one.  Its OK when you're making sourdough, but if you're not, it's a bit of a faff and a bit of a waste of flour.     Ater our recent scandi bread course, I  decided to try again, but this time I bought two sour dough starters from Bakery Bits.   

I refreshed them, following the instructions carefully, and then I made a sourdough loaf from one of them, using their instructions.  It was OK.   It wasn't fab, but it was OK.    

I felt vaguely reassured that I had, actually, been looking after my home made one correctly. Well, until I let him die of neglect, of course.

Today, a kilo of fresh bioreal yeast arrived.    It had seemed like a good idea when I ordered it.  I remembered that a kilo was much better value for money than 42g portions, even if i ended up throwing a load away.         They were out of stock at the time, so it was back-ordered   Today's yat is, therefore, very fresh and will stay useable for nearly 4 weeks.

I have no idea what I was thinking I'd make with it.

DH is going to make a rye loaf, I think.  We've been on a bit of a hand made rye kick for some time - apart from the last week when we've been having sourdough.  I miss the nuttiness and moistness of the rye.

I might try a white loaf in my machine. Usually, it's not possible to use fresh yeast in a breadmaker; I assume the programme isn't long enough at the right times for it to work?    Our breadmaker does have a setting for fresh yeast though,  so it would be rude not to try it.

At last.

At last, the Inquest is over.    

The first date - sometime last year, lost in the mists of time now -  was postponed becase of the Serious Incident Report (SIR)

The new date arrived,  as did we all,  and the 'other side' asked for an adjournment.  Their grounds were not unreasonable,  we didn't object.    

The next date arrived, as did we all, ready for an extended two days.   One of the key witnesses was too ill to attend.     We asked for an adjournment.   Day 1 went ahead,  and Day 2 was adhourned.

And then the final date arrived, as did we all,   and the Inquest was completed.

I don't really feel any sense of resolution.  I'm just glad it's done.

I'm glad I don't have to pore over the SIR again,  looking at the failures, the missed opportunities to save a life, the processes that would, if they had been followed,  have prevented the death.

I've still got one uncle to phone, to give an update to, and I'll try and do that today.  Then I can put it all away.

Windows Pain

Those nice people at  Microsoft decided to update my computer.   It was a long update.  It should have happened last night - I chose "Update and Shut Down", but it only partially happened last night. The rest happened today after I restarted.

It was a biggie.   When it was done,  I had to answer loots of questions asking for my permission to share data with them.

I loaded Firefox when it was all done, and found that all my bookmarks, saved passwords etc had gone.  I had a new profile.   I went through the "switch profile" optiomn to get it to use my old profile,  but it wouldn't cooperate.

Was it the Windows update that had done this, or had it coincided with a Firefox update perhaps?

I tried a couple of other programs. Some worked,  some decided they needed to be configured for Windows.  

I was very, very cross.   I am very very cross.

That wasn't getting anything resolved though,  so I pushed my annoyance to one side, rolled up my sleeves, and looked at what options I had.

 My last Mozbackup was a couple of months ago, so I knew I could restore that.  But I'd been busy tidying up, ready for my next backup which is (or was going to be) in a couple of days.

I googled for some options.  I tried forcing Firefox to use my old profile, but it didn't like it.

In the end, I had to find out what the elements were that I needed, and I copied them from the old profile to the new.  I needed more elements than I had realised.

So, I've spent a couple of hours in total and I'm now back to where I should have been at 8.30 this morning.

Today

Pilates this morning.   Tiring, but good.

Afternoon Tea, held locally in the village, and organised by a lovely lady. I've been looking forward to it for weeks,  and it was superb. I don't think I've had better.

Off to the allotment, to bring back all the eggs.  I fertility tested some from a few days ago.  Then I attempted (and failed) to match the fertile shells with newer eggs.

In the end I picked 8 different eggs, washed them using special santiser,  weighed them, marked them, and I put them in the incubator.  2 were definitely Dorkings, one from each;  one egg may have been from Siouxsie; the others... I have no idea.

It's not how I like to hatch, and it is very possible we'll end up not being able to keep any hatches from 6 of those eggs. It's highly likely that they are from the Girls who have traits we don't want to propogate,  and if that's the case..... well....  we'll be eating hens as well as cockerels.

I'm still debating whether to buy in some additional eggs. It's such a difficult call.

I made a triple batch of Thermie Lemon Curd, to use up 6 of the 8 eggs I tested.  I used lemons from Costco. They were huge and juicy.  They didn't say "unwaxed", so I had to scrub them.   The flavour is a lot less sharp than I'm used to, so I probably wouldn't use them for lemon curd again.

I've also put the breadmaker on to make dough for some olive bread.   I was going to make it by hand but...well....I just felt too lazy.

I'm going to make a cup of tea (I know! I;m not long back from Afternoon Tea) and have a sit down (I know. I've already spent several hours sitting down having afternoon tea!).

And maybe a power nap.

Eggstreme disappointment

DH candled the eggs today, as he's not going to be able to do it tomorrow.

None, yes none, of Bertie's eggs seem to be fertilised!  Four of the 6 I bought from someone else are.

We'll have to candle again in a few days to make sure, but I now need to come up with a back-up plan.

Anticipation

Ants are such hard working creatures.    We have quite a few in the garden, normally they ignore us and we ignore them.   The other day,  I had a couple of ants climb on me while I was sitting outside by the backdoor.  I knew this heralded potential ant trouble.

Over the next week, we saw the odd ant on the worktop.   I picked them up and threw them outside, asking them not to come back.   Then I killed the next few, but realised that was futile as the colonby would just send replacements. 

I cleaned the worktops and the stiff on it, and moved anything vagiely edible off it on to shelves.  I hoped that the ants would go back and report that there was nothing of interest and they'd not bother to invade.

I searched for the entrance point, but failed.  Outside, the ant activity increased, but we couldn't see where they were getting in, nor where they were going to. DH was adamant we'd have to find the nest and destroy it.    I baulked at that.   We've done it once before, and I always regretted it.  (I know they are only ants,  but they aren't generally doing any harm and they have the right to live).

We then had 4 ants over two different (adjacent) worktops.   Small Person was here, and she reminded me about talcum powder.  If I could find where they were coming in, I'd try that.

Yesterday afternoon,  I opened the condiments cupboard and an ant came out.  I checked, he was on his own.     I checked the other food cupboards,  no ants.     Last night, there were 8 ants running around on the worktop.

I could see that this was going to end in an invasion,  and that is horrible to deal with.    We had an invasion when I was a child, and it wasn't pleasant.  We'd had an invasion here once, that's when we destroyed the nest I mentioned earlier.  

I didn't have anywhere to put talc, but I did decide to try an ant bait station.   I had two in a drawer  so, last night, I opened one up and put it on the worktop.  DH was not impressed.    The ants avoided it.  

This morning, we had no ants on the worktop.

I'm not sure if the scouts have died,  or if they've gone back and the ant bait has made the colony decide not to invade, or if they are rallying troops ready to invade.  Or, of course,  if I've sent back poison which is going to kill the colony.

I guess we'll find out.

Hmmm

So.  Bertie has a real downer on Pong.    He chases her away when their paths cross.  For that reason, we decided we'd breed from Pong's sister, Ping.   Ping scuppered this plan by deciding to go broody. Ish.

So, plan C was to separate off the breeding girls (Barbara, Ann,  Pong, and one of the Harem girls),  and to put Bertie in with them for periods of time but not to leave him in there overnight.     Immediately we separated them, Ping got distressed (presumably because she couldn't get in to her usual nestbox),  and Bertie got indignant.   He called, and all his ladies came running, lined up against the fencing that separated them.

Bertie showed no interest in any of the girls.   We put Ping back in with them, and went home.   We came back later that day to let Bertie out and to check on the girls.  As soon as he was back with everyone else he humped everything in sight.

There were 3 eggs, including one each from Ping and Pong.  We collected them, and broke them at home to see what was going on.  One egg - we don't know which of the other three laid it - was definitely fertilised,  it had the tell tale white bullseye ring.    One of Ping/Pongs was definitely not fertilised.  And one had a white bit (as many eggs do) but I couldn't be sure it was a bullseye.

Since then, every other day,  we've shut Bertie in with the 5 breeding girls in the morning,  and let him out in the afternoon.    The idea is that the breeding girls don't have to put up with him all the time,  and he he can still keep control of the main group.    We were going to put him in every day,  but we were sort of hoping that a day's absence from the breeding girls might make him fonder.... but we haven't seen any evidence of that.

Still, we've collected a number of eggs, although we haven't tested any more for fertility.   The plan is to incubate all the eggs, even if it means 2 incubators,  and then remove the clears at Day 7 when we candle them.

That's the idea, anyway.

We're planning to put them in the incubator on Saturday.

Knees up

Yesterday, for some reason, I decided to try and play some classical pieces on my Orla, and to use my left foot on the pedals.  I hardly ever use my left foot any more, I'm well out of practice.

It was hard work.  I managed to get mself into position so that my left foot hung naturally over the G pedal (as I was taught when I was 11),  but that isn't the position I sit in normally so my chord hand was out of position.

I tried The Blue Danube and was slightly more successful than I anticipated.  I think it was muscle memory really.   As a child, I used to play this all the time.   I've played it a couple of times in the years I@ve had Orla, but I've never really tried to play it properly.    I fluffed quite a bit,  but it was much better than I thought it would be.   

Then I tried Symphony Number 40 and was surprised that I could do that (sort of) too.   I don't remember when I last tried to play that.

Even my nemesis,  Arrival of the Queen of Sheba was not a disaster.   It wasn't pretty, but it wasn't a disaster.  I have played AoTQoS, the right hand,  quite a bit.  I've even tried using my left hand to play the pedal part (obviously not to press the foot pedal, dummy,  I've been using the left hand on the upper keyboad to press the foot pedal part as my right hand plays the tune).

I had to stop because my knee was killing me.

Today I put a brace on my left knee, and tried all three again.      None of the pieces were perfect,  but they weren't at all bad really. Well,  Arrival of the Queen of Sheba was not good, but that was mainly because my hands were too cold to flow.  I had a cup of coffee, and another go.

The sound quality on Orla was amazing.

Even though they were all riddled with mistakes,  I'm really really happy at how un-badly I did.

Old Childrens Tv

A Don Quixote related crossword clue led me to think of Sanchez,  to Sancho,  to a Mexican hat and a donkey.

A very clear picture popped in to my head, and I knew  it was a kids programme I had watched.  I remember my mum and I talking about the donkey.      I just couldn't remember the name.

I reached for my phone to google, but put the phone down and tried to remember.

I just couldn't.  At all.   It wasn't a programme I'd thought of in all the "do you remember....?" discussions during my adult life.  Not ever.

I just couldn't think of it.

So I googled it.

Donkey Sancho Mexican hat.

And there it was.

Hattytown.

How could I have forgotten that!?!

Card work

May is a busy month for birthdays, and the first 4 all take place over 3 days in the middle of the month.

I had been trying to work up enthusiasm to do some embroidery, but...well... it just isn't happening.

 I bought some 3fold aperture cards to see how they would work with embroidery,  and it occurred to me I had the ideal fabric for two of the birthday people .  So,  here are those two cards.

It took longer than anticipated to get the fabric placement just right.   I then decided to work on something special for the insides.   I had to obtain a Batfont to do the text,  and it then find just the right Batman related images.   The wording worked just as I pictured it in my head, so I'm really happy with that.

I hadn't used this size card before so it took a while of faffing around trying to get the sizing of the paper  and then the relative positioning of the artwork just right....  I had a pile of rejects!

For the second one, I searched for a simple E-type jaguar outline,  then a font that suggested speed. I made the '65' in a circle, and voilà  Sorry it's upside down.


I'm really pleased with them.

I've still got two more cards to do for the middle of the month, and one at the end.    I've not had any bright ideas yet.  I'm hoping inspiration strikes soon.

Blacksmithing

For our last-but-one birthday's,  DS/DDIL bought us a Couples Blacksmithing experience, some way away at a forge in Herefordshire.    We had planned to go late summer last year, but plans for this were stymied early in the summer by a complicated broken arm which was going to take many months to heal.  As soon as I knew we weren't going to be able to use the voucher  I contacted the company and asked if they could extend it.  I explained why, I was phoning  with still 4 months before the expiry date,  I offered to send proof of incapacity... and they agreed to a limited extension,  on a weekday only.   That suited me, I wouldn't have picked a weekend date anyway.

We have commitments at home which make overnighters (for both of us at the same time) difficult,  so we wanted to be there and back in a day.    Worst case, we'd leave at silly o'clock to arrive for a morning course, and then get back mid afternoon.   I was pleased to find that they did a session starting at lunchtime which meant this was doable without an early start .   We'd only miss one of our commitments, and that was manageable.

Yesterday was the day.

A good journey there.  Sparkling sunshine when we left home,  not so much when we reached Herefordshire.  The scenery was spectacular, and the sun did come out eventually.       Oldfield Forge was easy to find, the setting is magnificent,   and we were surprised and pleased to find it was just the two of us booked in.  

I picked the easiest thing to make,  a hook,   a DH picked a useful thing to make,  a poker.  

Of course this was all right up DH's street and he took to it like a duck to water.     It was more of a challenge for me, I've never done any sort of metal working or woodworking.  The process was actually being quite straightforward, it was just all new,  and I was pleased with the way my hook turned out.

The chap teaching us was lovely, very patient, and very encouraging.  Just what I needed.  

I decided to make a second hook, to consolidate my learning.    Poker finished, DH also decided to make a hook and of course his was not only complete before mine, it was perfect.   I don't mind.  Mine is fine; not perfect but perfectly useable. And MeMade.

We stopped at The Red Lion at Peterstow on the way home.  The food was excellent, much better than we were expecting.  I nervously had the pulled pork.  I've had pulled pork in pubs before and it's been really dry.  This was lovely,  it was shoulder of pork in Five Spice,  and I couldn't have made it better myself.   They served kimchi with the meal,  and it was lovely. Better than my own attempt at kimchi some years ago,  and I think I might have another try.   I'd definitely make a detour to visit there again.


Happy day.


 

Clean

The unexpectedly warm weather may bring red mite, so I decded to do a preventative clean at the Allotment.   I emptied and cleaned and poultry shielded the shed and two coops.  I also dod the nestboxes in the shed.      I scrubbed and Miltoned all the poo trays,  the three metal drinkers, and the watering can.  When I got to the end, the shed was dry enough to put stuff back in,  so I stalosaned and diatomed,  then put stuff back in, and put fresh Aubiose everywhere. Then the other two coops.

One of the Girls was desperate to lay part way through this,  and she seemed very upset. I made up a neat box for her in the shed, but she wouldn't use it,  she wanted to lay where she usually lays. So I made up a nest box in the appropriate coop and then worked round her.

I wished that Small Person was here to help,  it's much quicker and easier with 2.  It took me several hours, I'm cream crackered.

Bear necessities

The lady from Little Baby & Co liked my teddies.  She posted about them.

Kneed it

We went back to Pilates today, it's been four weeks since our last class. 

I've got problems wth my knee, so it was tough.

But good.

Umbrella-ed

Three of the Girls -  Poppy, Gloria and Fay - are cheeky enough to come in the house and to eat the cat food.  We chase them out, and they run,  but they aren't scared.  They just wait a few minutes and try again. Poppy is probably the cheekiest/worst offender.

Poppy came in this morning.  I chased her out.  Then I remembered that I had had an idea to try and resolve it,

I armed myself. With an umbrella.

The next time she came in, about half an hour later,  I went in to the kitchen umbrella first.  I was opening and closing the umbrella as fast as I could.  She shrieked, and ran out.

I'm pretty sure the call of the cat food will overcome her fear,  so I the umbrella is on the sofa, all ready to go.

We'll see.

Summer

We had Summer today.

Not Spring. Definitely Summer.

I did many loads of washing, and put them out on the washing line.  I love washing on a washing line.  I did 6 loads, including 2 loads of fabric.

I was going to do a bedding change for one of the chooks's coops.  I found a broken egg,  not the first, either Gloria or Poppy is laying very weak shelled eggs at the moment.  I decided a deep clean would be a good idea,  and I wondered about waiting to the weekend to see if Small Person might want to help.  

In the end, I decided I'd best just get on with it.  And then I decided as I had the pressure washer out that I might as well deep clen both coops.  And the nestboxes in the run.  And the patio.  And all the run covers.....

I also put up some green netting inside the run,  which helps keep the heat out.   I can't believe that 2 days ago it was really cold and wet,  and today it is so warm.

DH hacked back the Pampas,  digging up lots of bramble that was hiding inside.  The girls were delighted to investigate his handiwork.

I also cleared out a bit of Myshed, mainly because I was trying to find the pressure washer, and the Stalosan, and the Diatom. And clean covers.

I'm cream crackered now.  I've put my clothes, which are covered in moss and heaven knows what,  in the washing mashine.  I've had a shower, and I'm in jimjams.  It's only 5pm!

Fabric fail

I bought some inexpensive stretch fabric about 5 weeks ago.   The supplier was struggling with the hugh level of demand,  and the package eventually arrived a couple of days ago.   I told DH it was fabric,  and I left it, unopened, in the hallway.

Today I opened the parcel ao I could start washing the contents.   The first piece that came out was....well,  it was a (to me) bizarre shade of pink. It wasn't a colour I would knowingly have picked,  and it was also on its own - the rest of the fabric was in two other parcels inside the main parcel. I wondered if maybe they'd thrown in a freebie as an apoogy for the delay.

The other 4 pieces of fabric looked like stuff I'd order, and a couple of them I actually recognised as ordering.  It occurred to me that I should probably check the original order, so I did.

Turned out I'd ordered 6 pieces of fabric, not 5.

The original confirmation email had helpfully contained pictures of the fabrics.  Unfortunately, the images weren't actually sent in the email,  they were just links to an online repository.  Only 3 images still exist,  but luckily one of them was a pic of fabric I hadn't received.

How frustrating. Still, this sort of thing happens.

I've emailed the seller to ask them to send the missing fabric, or to credit my Paypal account. I've also queried the pink stuff.

Normalcy

I made a thank you card for my uncle.  He built me a beautiful castle.  I embroidered a castle for the thank you. Its quite large...both the castle made for me, and the embroidery.   This is my second version.  I managed to snip the border thread on my first  one.

DH is teaching himself how to cut glas and join the pieces using copper tape so it looks leaded.  He's planning to make me a terrarium big enough to cover the castle.

Spring is finally on its way. The Forsythia, which normally blooms in February, is finally in blossom.; the grass has been cut;  DH is cutting back the pampas grass (which will be a bit of a shock for the chooks); we've emptied the stored wood out of the greenhouse; and  I accidentally Spring cleaned a set of kitchen drawers.  I was looking for something, which caused me to empty it out, which resulted in me sorting it out as I put stuff back, which then impacted on the contents of two other drawers.

Not sure I can stand the excitement.

Adjournement.

The inquest started yesterday, having been adjourned last time immediately after opening (and that one having been moved from an even earlier date). 

Just before it started we were informad that one of the key witnesses was ill and after a brief consultation it was decided to go ahead with Day 1, but to adjourn the second day.   

My cousin's children had travelled several hundred miles, again, to get there.  Others had booked holiday from work,  arranged childcare, done preparation, whatever.   Adjourning was the right thing to do.

It was an intense day, with a lot of written evidence and some live witnesses.   Going over it all yet again was hard on all the family. It was hard on the witnesses too.

Oh well.

The delay couldn't be helped.

Bearing up

My latest "make" is for a charity called "Little Baby & Co".  This charity provides special items for "Angel Babies",  babies which are miscarried before 18 weeks.

There was an appeal last year on one of the embroidery groups I belong to  to make angel wraps for them  The angel wrap is a cleverly designed piece of clothing which wraps round the miscarried tiny  baby, which would otherwise not be dressed at all (it's not possible to put even dolls clothes on them.  It's shaped a bit like angel wings.

Meryl from MerylMakes digitised the pattern so it would work on an embroidery machine, and she did two options.  It's a really small item of clothing.  I tried 3 times (using 2 different options), and I just couldn't make it work, my workmanship wasn't good enough.  I gave up in the end.

A few days ago, there was a request to see if anyone could make some tiny tiny bears, smaller than a 1p piece.    Meryl again stepped in and digitised a tiny bear,  and I had a go.   My first attempt was awful.   

I then decided to try and do a whole load in one go,   hooping the front of the bear and some wadding, and stitching the face and outline.  Then I put some felt underneath, and stitched the outline again.


I then spent a few hours cutting them out,  and  cutting & trimming them more carefully.   I wasn't able to trim them quite to the shape of a bear, but they looked as good as others had posted on the facebook page.    

There was a lot of trimming, which was frustrating.   I love the multi needle capability of my machine,  but I miss the cleverness of my top of the range, single needle, Janome.     I think that's why I haven't bonded so well with the multi needle.

I didn't think to take a pic of any of the cut bears before I packaged them up to send.

Add caption

Finish line

I completed 3 UFOs (unfinished objects) today.

First was the top that I made to wear to the show at Birmingham,  but stopped working on because I stuffed up the shoulders.   I cut and attached a band for the neckline today, then overlocked (serged) it, and then folded it over and stitched in the ditch all the way around.  I had planned to coverstitch it instead of the overlocking/folding/topstitching, but my coverstitch machine was in a mess.  I don't quite know what happened to it.... I'm wondering if the small girls accidentally did something? 

I fixed the coverstitch,  rethreaded it, and did the waistband on the posh fabric leggings for DGD.  I also attempted to fix the ankle hems,  but that didn't go so well.  I was tempted to cut them off and redo them, but I suspect they may be too short then.   As the test pair had been left behind, I also did some finishing to the ankle hems of those  and I'm not sure I improved them.

I think they're all done now.  I just need to package them up and send them.  And think about what to say to DD about the less than great ankles.


I've got another top cut out waiting to be sewn  but I've had enough sewing for the mo.     I've got a couple of "really ought to do" embroidery projects, so I'm going to try and do those next.

Sunshine

We've had some sunshine for the last couple of days, making the days (although not the evenings) warm and pleasant.

Yesterday DH cut the grass and gathered some bits of carp ready to go to the Tip.  My brother and I visited a nearby large town, in search of somewhere to have a proper up of tea.   Coffee shops just can't make decent tea,   there are several of us having business in this large town in a couple of weeks,  and we really wanted to find somewhere that we could get a proper one.


We planned to visit a few cafes and restaurants and try the teas.  They needed to be within a few minutes of the train station and the TownHall, so we had a defined area to look in.  We both like tea, but we knew it wou;d be difficult to sensibly sample more than, say, four cups, so I'd compiled a shortlist of likely venues. 

The main car park was closed to casual parking for the next two months.  That in itself was good to learn now rather than on the day.  Against my brother's better judgement, we parked in another central car park.   My brother said he'd parked here befoire, and it always stank.

He was right.  It was the most expensive car park in the town,  and the stairs reeked.  We'd had to park on the 11th floor.  We took the lift (which I never normally do) because I couldn't face that stench for the length of time it would take me to walk down the stairs.  The lifts smelt of  cleaning fluid, so were marginally better.     Another good learning.  Even though this would be the most convenient car park,  we couldn't suggest that anyone park here.

Out in the fresh air, we started on our shortlist.  One failed immediately because it turned out it doesn't open until 9.30,  and we need to meet at about 8.   We added the opening time to the criteria.

The second one,  which was an ex-Wimpy bar,  looked promising... the sort of place where you would expect a good honest cup of tea... but the tea arrived in a bag in a cup. It was definitely better than Cafe Nero,  but it was still not good.        We sipped our teas and discussed the demise of tea.

We realised that maybe we needed "tea in a pot",  and that might be a better way to approach the task. Doing this would mean that we didn't need to restrict our list. We could walk in to any venue and ask if they served tea in pots,   if they did we'd try it,  if they didn't, we'd leave.    

 If they didn't open before 9, we didn't bother to ask anything.  If they opened for breakfast, we went in, asked if they served tea in pots, and took it from there.

M&S used pots, and open at 8.  We didn't bother trying the tea,  we knew we at least had a fallback.    We then tried the  main streets, the connecting streets, the little alleys....  it was, from a teapot point of view,  disheartening. It took forever.

Some of the places were very interesting and looked like they'd be good to visit for a meal, but not suitable for our purpose.    After quite a long time, I peered down a dingy street whose name suggested it should have shops down it (but I couldn't see any). 

We decided to walk down it because the street sort of led to the stinking car park.  Half way down, we found a little tiny cafe.  We stood outside.  I didn't want to go in... if we chose this place,  those people driving would park in that god awful car park, and what on earth would they think?  They were coming from various parts of the country,   I didn't want their dimpression of this big town to be that it was a complete sh*thole.

My brother said "I think I can see teapots".  So we went in.

It was lovely.  The food looked fabulous,  the place was clean and welcoming, the service was great.  The tea was in pots (and not typical catering pots),  they open at 8.  It was one teapot per person, and each pot held 3 cups of tea.

We had our winner.

I hope all is OK when we need it in a couple of weeks.

Holiday over

Small Person was here on Tuesday Wednesday and Today.

She has been super excited for the last couple of weeks because we've arranged for my youngest DGD to come and stay, and they haven't seen each other for three years.   DD and I exchanged messages a few days ago, and DGD was in a similar state of excitement.

So, Tuesday,  Small Person was delivered to my door ny her Mum.  We jumped in my car and drove for 2 and a half hours to collect DGD.     They spent about 15 mins in DGD's bedroom, while I had a cup of tea and chatted to my DGSs.

.I've lost track of everything we did,  but I remember that making slime was part of it.   They went to the shop to get some of the ingredients,  and they went back to the shop later to get some more.  One of the shopkeepers phoned me to check it was OK to sell them a particular item (shaving foam) because he was a little suspicious about their motives for buying it.   In the hardware shop, the shopkeeper guessed that they were making slime when they asked him for Laundry Starch.  They went back later for yet more PVA, and he remembered them.


I also made leggings for DGD - a test pair, and then a pair in expensive fabric.  She was not particularly impressed, which was a bit of a disappointment. I'm pleased that I've done them, but Ill focus my making energy elsewhere next.

They played lots of games, went to the Park,  played with loom bands,  chatted.   It was mostly OK.  They are very different personalities, in almost every way you can think of.   It's an interesting dynamic,  challenging (draining)  at times.

We met up with DD at lunchtime to hand DGD back,  and it seems likely that Small Person will go to stay with them in the Summer Holidays if mutually convenient dates can be found.  They'll l

Small Person was tired and quiet on the way home.    We got home and had about half an hour before her mum came to take her riding.

And that's the end of the Easter Holidays.

It's all been a bit of an abrupt end,  and I'll miss her.  It's a long time to the next holidays. 

Delia Chocolate Beer cake fail-ish

So I followed Delia's online recipe  for  Chocolate Beer Cake.  All went well, until I followed her instructions for the icing.

It said:To make the icing: melt the broken chocolate with the stout in a bowl set over a pan containing 5cm of barely simmering water, without the bowl touching the water. When it’s melted (5–10 minutes) take it off the heat. Beat in the butter and leave it to cool a little before beating in the icing sugar with an electric hand whisk.

I read it twice, because putting anything containing water in with chocolate is a bad idea. It causes seizing.   It was definitely correct though so I did it.

Beatng in the butter was OK.  As soon as I added the icing sugar,  it seized up into a horrible, grainy, mess.  I'd used spreadable butter (as stated in the ingredients list). Maybe that was the problem?

I tried again, with ordinary butter, which I'd let soften.  I waited longer before adding the icing sugar.  Same result.   I put it on Bernie the Bosch and beat the c*ap out of it to see if that helped.    It was smoother, but still seized up.  

I used some to sandwich the two halves of the cake together.  There was no way on earth this was going to work as an icing.  I looked at the picture of her glossy chocolate icing.  I looked at my... my...  attempt.

I googled delia chocolate beer cake icing and found someone else had had the same problem.

I felt better knowing I was not alone.

I had no more 70% chocolate in the house.   I did have some 51% cocoa nibs, maybe I could use those?

"Can't you use Nutella?"  DH asked.   We have a ginormous jar as it's a staple of Small Person's pancake breakfasts.   "tToo sweet!" I replied, shuddering.

And then I remembered.   Tucked at the back of the cupboard.....  a jar of posh dark chocolate hazelnut spread.  Not Nutella.

I've used that now.  I hope it saves the cake.

Easter

We don't 'do' Easter, it's usually just a normal Sunday.   We used to do something when the children were, well, children.

This year Small Person's mum and dad have asked us over for dinner.   I wasn't sure what to say.   It was very kind of them to ask,  and we like seeing them.... but...  well..  we don't do Easter,  we don't really want  to do Easter...  

DH and I chatted about it, and in the end we decided it would be much harder to try and explain things without it sounding like a weak excuse,  than it would be to accept the invitation.   It's also a very sad anniversary today and tomorrow,  and that is more important than the whole Easter business.  So, we're going.

Of course this raised the spectre of  the whole Easter Egg/Chocolate stuff. I'd already explained to SP (before we were invited for dinner) that we wouldn't be getting her anything, and I asked SP's Mum not to get us anything. She said it was too late.

I know I'm ungrateful,  but I don't want or need Easter pressies. I'd rather they spent the moneh on buying stuff for themselves, or for Small Person, or whatever.      I also don't want to get a present and have nothing to give in return.      I know one doesn't  'give to get',  but it's just so uncomfortable. I know Mrs SP means it all very kindly, and I don't want to hurt her feelings.  

I just prefer to do little things throughout the year when I think of them,  not on days that someone else has designated as needing to be marked.

Anyway. Earlier in the week I  went to the supermarket,  stood in front of the grotesque displays of Easter Eggs and chocolates,  and tried to decide what to do.  I couldn't bring myself to buy any.    It's all so overpriced and overhyped.  It has nothing to do with Jesus Christ's deatha and resurrection, it's all just marketing.

I thought about just buying a selection of sweets  but, for some bizarre reason,  that seemed worse than not buying anything at all - like it was an afterthought.  How ironic that something I've been fretting about for days should seem like an afterthought. 

I decided I'd make a chocolate cake instead.


I'm trying Delia's chocolate for Adults, which is made with Guinness.

The cakes are cooling, and I've still got to make the icing and ice them.    The kitchen looks like an explosion in a chocolate factory.  I've gone into another room to escape the mess and to pull myself together before I try and tackle it.

I hope this bloody cake tastes OK.

Small Person at Easter

We were lucky to have Small Person for 3 days last week.  Her Mum messaged me today to say that SP had been very excited on the way home, telling her all the things she had done.

I hadn't thought we'd done much,  so I was scratching my head a bit to work out what had been so enjoyable (so that we could, perhaps, repeat it).  I asked DH  what his recollection was.

She'd been to the Allotment with DH, twice;  She helped DH with putting the base down on the new Garden Girls run;  we'd made cheese scones. There had been a lot of homework - maths puzzles,  comprehension,  reading,  and there had been  lots of teacher-mistakes in (I was seething!).  We'd watched some TV;  she came to Air Rifles with us; we played a couple of games of Hide and Seek.  She'd played on the xylophone I bought to put in the chicken run;  she'd tried to teach the chooks to eat seeds from the xylophone;  she'd tried to get the Girls to fly up on to her outstretched arm.  She'd read most of the first chapter of A Bear Called Paddington out loud, and I'd read th elast couple of pages to her.

We'd done some work on Space and she used my laptop to so her research She likes it because it has a touchscreen.     We tried to help her remember the planet names, as she was mispronouncing a couple: Plunto instead of Pluto,  Mercy instead of  Mercury  . To help her remember Pluto, I told her to think of Mickey Mouse's dog, and  said "Hey Pluto!" in a Mickey Mouse voice.      It sort of worked,  except everytime she said Pluto, she said it in the same voice as I had used.   She was very upset on Pluto's behalf to find that it wasn't classed as a proper planet any more.

I taught her (or attempted to teach her)  the mnemonic  My Very Excited Mother Just Served Us Noodles to help her remember the order of the planets.    To help I was trying to get her to picture her own Mum being excited andholding a big dish of noodles.  This is where it stopped working, because SP was adamant she didn't like noodles so her Mum wouldn't give her any,  and her Mum wouldn't be excited about serving noodles anyway.

She popped to the shop,  and she borrowed DH's old phone to use while hers was out of action. She was very excited that it had facial recognition (which didn't work when she tried it wearing a Minions hooded dressing gown).

She's most excited because our youngest DGD is coming next week for a couple of days.  They haven't seen each other for over 3 years.   I hope it all goes well.

Distraction

The start of a difficult few days, today.

I decided distraction would be the way to go  so I started by decluttering my baking cupboard.   That may not sound like much of a challenge,  but it is - it's a floor to ceiling 500mm larder cupboard.     I've already decluttered (sold, selling, given away, charity shopped, binned) enough stuff to give me one free drawer.   The rest has been rearranged to reflect changed priorities, which mainly means most of my cake tins are now in a crate up out of the way,  the sugarcraft stuff has been thinned out and packed into one small drawer,  and I've been brutal in culling my cookie cutters.

A couple of other bits got sucked in to the decluttering process,  and a few more will undoubtably follow.

No creative work done.  I keep thinking I ought to do those two tops that are currently buried under the mountain of bakeware but I need to clear the clutter first. I know that's just an excuse.    And I keep thinking I ought to be making some bits on the embroidery machine.I was going to make a treat bag for Small Person for Easter.      I ought to try and make that bag thing I bought a sewing pattern for.

Ought, ought, ought.   We all know what that means.

It's wet and miserable here, which suits me.  I'm going to light a fire and then I'm going to crack open another cupboard.

Does this count?

Pilates yesterday was tough going.    It's our last class for 4 week. FOUR weeks!    That's not good.

I'm limping along on my creative challenge.    I managed to cut out the back and sleeves for a top (I cut the front out a week or so ago) while SMall Person and DH were at the Allotment;  I pinned the bust darts and shoulder datrts on said top as well.

We made cheats lemon curd in Thermy.   It's not as luscious as proper lemon curd... but it took 7 minutes in Thermy instead of 45 minutes of me stirring over the hob, and that was a trade off I was happy to make.  I'll definitely make it again and I'll probably double the recipe next time.     That counts towards my creative challenge, doesn't it?

 I was trying to teach Small Person how to use a potato peeler to get zest off a lemon.  She managed, but I couldn't quite teach her the knack.  I might get her to use a grater next time... but I'd really like her to learn to do it 'properly'.  I might have to buy a different sort of peeler for her to use.

Raymondo's new AeroVac bin arrived.  I fitted it and set him off to work straight away.  It's much quieter than the old bin.   It seems to work really well,  so that's good. And a relief.   After testing him, I installed a new side brush.  I can't remember when I last did that.

It's going to be a tough week this week and I'm not feeling very resiliant.

Raymondo's new lease of life

Ten years ago, give or take a couple of weeks,  we bought our first robot vacuum cleaner. He was the top spec Roomba when we bought him, and we spent ages watching him work (and trying to confuse him).    Once the novelty wore off, we set him up to go cleaning overnight, and we'd take things off the floor before we went to bed.

Raymondo has worked hard over the ten years.  He's very battle scarred, because he's taller than he realises.  Mostly, the two-tone "Uh-oh" means he's managed to get wedged under something.

He's had a couple of  (3 maybe?) new batteries in that time,  and when we bought the second replacemwent battery we bought some additional bits (newly designed brushes) which effectively upgraded him to  higher spec model.

I've also replaced the front wheel, because it got damaged with years of pulling it out of its socket with a skewer.

He isn't, and hasn't ever been,  our only vacuum cleaner. For the past few years we've kept him upstairs where he does an outstanding job of picking up all the cat hair. 

Recently, and quite suddenly,  his battery became useless.   I had always tried to make sure the battery discharged fully each time I put him to work, so the NiCad didn't "learn".  Bit I may  have messed up, or maybe it was just worn out.    We tried a few things to rejuvenate the battery, but no luck.

He's also lost a bit of his bin,  so I needed to replace part of that.    We discussed what to do.  DH suggested getting a newer model... I knew how much they cost and said I wasn't sure I wanted to spend that much.    DH didn't know the latest price,  looked online, and then agreed with me. 

We decided to buy Raymondo a Lithium battery.  It arrived a few days  ago and today I put him to work for the first time.    He did upstairs and downstairs, and still had a bit of puff left.  Now that I can see it was definitely a battery issue, I've ordered him a new, upgraded,  bin and spare filters.   An upgrade all over again.

He's not quite like Trigger's broom... but he's still mainly the original Raymondo. 

Head Butter

Small Person visited.  I picked her up from her Drama class on Saturday afternoon, and she stayed until lunchtime on Sunday.  A rare treat as she's usually picked up at 9am to go riding.

This Saturday I needed to make butter, so she helped.  I explained the butter making process and it all went swimmingly.  I showed her how to pot up the salted butter,  and she did that while I got on with the rest of the process.  I now have two bowls for Bernie (the Bosch Mixer),  and so the process was remarkably smooth.

I churned 4 litres of cream, then washed the butter in the churn.  I divided the butter into two, one in each of Bernie's bowls.  First bowl was salted and put on to mix.   When it was mixed,  Small Person started potting, and I put the second salted bowl on to mix.   Meanwhile, I got on and churned the second lot of 4 litres.  

We watched Paddington 2 in the evening, and all went to bed at about 10pm.

Small Person was very tired, she slept until about 9.30 Sunday morning.    After she's made pancakes (using buttermilk), she got dressed and helped me put some covers on the sides of the Cubes to try and protect the chooks from the vicious wind.   She also made snow angels, so she got soaked and had to get changed before going out again.

I'm looking forward to the Easter holidays

So close

I made a top!

I haven't made one for ages - my time has been spent on leggings for Small Person and then leggings for me - and I was struggling to remember the construction steps.     It came together very quickly though, and I even managed to hem it.

A minor disaster struck when I was putting the sleeves in.  I managed to have an overlocker steering malfunction.   I cursed a bit.      The top is still sort of wearable, but it wasn't suitable for it's intended purpose.  It's still sitting on the kitchen table waiting for me to cut out and apply the neck binding, and I really ought to do it otherwise it'll just become another UFO (unfinished object). 

So what was the intended purpose? I was making it to wear to the Sewing show at the NEC.   I

I wasn't going as a visitor, I was going to be helping out on one of the stands!    I decided I couldn't risk wearing it because I was afraid people would look at my top, and judge the product I was representing by my shoddy workmanship. So I wore shop bought clothes.

I had a really enjoyable day.      I found it tough at first, because I don't like encouraging people to spend their money (even though I thoroughly endorse the product I was representing).  Luckily the lady I was representing was not interested in making people buy her product at the show,  she was happy for them to find out about it and go away and maybe buy it later.    

I settled into it when I talked with people about what the system was and why it might help them.  I usually started the same way Do you make your own clothes?  Do you use a commercial pattern?  How did you find the fit?  And then we could talk about the system and whether it might help them.  There were some people where the system wouldn't help them and I was honest with them about that.
I guess it helped that I am a customer of the system, not an employee.

If I hadn't already had other commitments, I would have gone back to do a second day.

I'm looking forward to finding out how the remaining 3 days went

Bittersweet

When I bought my latest lovely sewing machine,  I sold my previous one along with the myriad of feet I had accumulated.  I was sorry to see them go, most of them were unused, just waiting for me to find a project to use them.

I resolved that I would not buy lots of additional feet for my new machine.  I would only buy feet that I was (reasonably) sure I would use.  (Unless I saw one at a bargain price, of course) .

I kept to that.  I did buy some additional feet, but the feet I bought have been in frequent use. Mostly.

When making my duvet cover recently,  I needed a "stitch in the ditch" foot.  I could swear I had one.  I looked through the myriad of feet that came with the machine,  and the feet I had bought. Couldn't find it.  Then I loaded my spreadsheet and realised that I'd had such a foot with a previous machine,  I hadn't bought one for this machine.

I did a quick search and saw one on Ebay at a really good price.  It was too late for my duvet cover, but it would be rude not to buy it.    I bid and, as usual, I had a look at the sellers other items, just in case.  She was selling quite a few feet and other sewing bits.   I decided to break my rule and bid on several of the feet which I didn't have.  I resisted bidding on some of her other items,  and I didn't bid on all the feet. 

I won some, and I didn't win others.    I messaged her to ask about combined postage,  and found that she was a really lovely older lady.     I realised from her messages that she was me in the future.  Lots of feet, unused and still in their packaging.  She was obviously downsizing  and getting rid of the paraphernalia from a once loved hobby.

It choked me up a bit.

Ta Daaa!

Finished, at last!

I wish I'd thought to take a picture when it was pristine: newly finished, newly ironed, and newly on the bed. 

I've ended up with puckering and not straight stitching, but I'm not too bothered.  I spent so long measuring, marking, sewing in lines before I started cutting; I finished my raw edges before I started working,   I measured and basted everything before sewing,  then I sewed.  I've sewn hidden seams, folded hems, I've done all sorts.  At some point I stopped taking out the basting stitches, partly because I'd reached the "I don't really care anymore" stage,  and once because I realised I hadn't done a proper stitch afterwards. Oops.

To make sure that it all stays in place, I was going to coverstitch it.  This worked really well for one of the four sides.  Then it just wasn't working.  My little Bernina Coverstitch machine has a tiny space to the right of the needles,  and I was trying to feed a superking sized duvet cover through that space.  It just wasn't working. 

So,  I decided to top stitch all the way round using a decorative stitch.  My thinking was that my decorative stitch would also stitch down the folded seam underneath,  if I did it a particular way I'd also topstitch the very edge of the panel down,  and a decorative stitch  would cover my decidedly wonky seam (and basting) stitching.  I chose to do it in a colour which wouldn't show up too much.  

I chose a cat shaped stitch.

I then spent forever holding a superking quilt over my shoulder and across my arm while trying to keep the seam straight.  It takes a surprisingly long time for the machine to sew a cat shape (complete with whiskers).  I thought it was never going to end.    When my arm and leg started to ache, I tried disassociating myself from the task.  That was OK, but did cause a wonky stitch line.

When it was all done,  I whipped up a couple of extra large pillow cases.  We have lovely wool pillows, but they are a bit too big to fit comfortably inside normal sized cases.  I'm really pleased with them.  I was cream crackered when I started them,  but I really wanted to get the bed made.  The picture doesn't so them justice.

I know that not doing this project  (and knowing I should  do it) has been a contributory factor to the loss of my Sewjo.  I'm hoping that having completed it, it may come back.

We'll see.

Working on it.

I was going to send my mum some flowers for Mothers Day,  I just had no enthusiasm for embroidery. Then I saw a really simple design on merylmakes.com.   Meryl is a friend of mine in real life,  I love her embroidery designs.     I decided to do it.  So, I did.

I still had the clamp frame attached to Bertha.  I faffed about choosing colours,  rethreading the machine,  changing the colour selections, blah blah blah and cutting the upholstery fabric I was going to stitch on.      I centred the design, did several tracings  (getting the machine to pretend to stitch the design so I can check it isn't going to hit the frame),  and then I decided to add a border.   I faffed around doing that, and then I was ready.

I decided to get the border stitched first, as this would help keep. the fabric and stabiliser taut.  It's lucky I did.  It's also lucky I didn't walk away  There was an almighty crunch, as the needle hit the frame.  When I added the border, I hadn't repositioned the design.   The frame was scratched, the needle snapped,  the fabric chewed... but all survived.

New needle.  Rethread.  Recut fabric.  Try again. 

The fabric was fraying like mad, so I ended up using the sewing machine to stitch an additional hidden border.   I just did a straigh stitch, which wasn't enough - that will only stop the fraying once the ffraying has reached the stitch.  next time I'll probably do an overedge stitch.

 I hope Mum likes it as much as I do.

I've also been making progress on my duvet cover. More about that another time.  Maybe.

Oh, and I handmade enriched bread for hot dog rolls lasrt night.   They were good, but no better than breadmaker made. 

Lambiness

Lamb butchery at Shirley's on Monday.

She's right, it's very very different to pig butchery.     With a pigm, the carcass is halved and you work on a half carcass.    WIth a lamb, the carcass isn't halved,  and you don't halve it to butcher it.   That means you butcher the whole carcass as you go.

Our lamby requiremens are quite simple, so I don't know how much butchery there will be for us to do next time.  From Shirley's point of view, it's actually easier for her to cut it for us than it is for her to cut it into pieces for us to butcher further.  Unless we wanted a rack of lamb -  which we don't. 

Made some amazing-smelling lamb stock from the bones yesterday.  We've got lamb chops today,  and Im making with boulangere potatoes.  It was going to be dauphinoise,  but we don't have any cream.

Slippery

My fab new slippers arrived in the post today.

I was hesitant about buying them because often these sort of slippers are too tight for my poor feet.

They seem OK.    They are so lovely that I'd probably wear them regardless.