Look what I got from Faerynuff....

A Miffy Bag.....to go with our Miffy and Miffy apron...aw, doncha love Miffy!

Check out Faerynuffs Etsy page, lovely things that I want to treat myself to.

What is a conker?

A conker is a horse chestnut, and this time of the year most people have at least 5 in their pockets, or so DD tells me! They drop out of the trees esp when young people throw sticks in the air, or climb the tree and shake it vigorously (sp). DD has grown out of collecting conkers now, but up until a couple of years ago, her and DH used to go out on Saturday nights and collected them in supermarket carrier bags...she also came home very proud and hand them over. I was then obliged to be very grateful, and keep them in a safe place until they rotted and I threw them out - luckily by then she had forgotten about them, so it was never too much of an issue when she realised they had gone.

What do we do with conkers: well, they have holes drilled through the middle of them, string threaded through the hole and knotted, so they hang on the string, and then you meet with fellow conker owners, and take it in turns to bash hell out of each others conkers (in turn of course, we are British, so are trained to queue for everything!) until one gives up the ghost, and then yours is known as a 6er (if it has killed 6 other conkers).....the number system goes on until it becomes ultimate champion, or is killed by someone elses champion. Various tactics are employed to make your conker harder than the others: I am sure people have their own, but the ones I know of are soaking in vinegar, or baking in the oven.

That is the gentle art of conkers..........action shot!

This link is worth a look to see conkers in action. Nice photos there too.

Blog Stalking Week 3 - late to the party as always

This is how I get to work (and DD gets to school). Funny how you take things for granted until you look at it with different eyes. THIS IS HOW I GET TO WORK - how lucky am I???
First off, we leave this - the garden: The photo came out slightly blue, I used the "dawn/dusk" setting, but it shows off the Rudbeckia beautifully, the grapevine overtaking the garden, DD's garden feature (trampoline) and part of my washing line - which if I wasn't going to work, would be filled with washing - oh the joys of working full time. Anyway, we leave this, and walk out into this - our street:
We turn left here, and walk down a small gravel path to this:
Doncha love english street furniture - isn't it gorgeous? So understated!
Talking of the gravel path, which is fairly isolated, it currently has a one-person tent set up next to it, strange! We run past it quickly - you can never be too careful!

Anyway, when DD and I rget to the crossing we race to see who can be first to push the button and shout "Green Man" when he appears - something we have done since she could shout....apparently she always wins, though I am not convinced:

I then tried to take a piccie of what is through the arch, and guess who had to jump into the view? Even at 7.45am she has the worlds amount of cheekiness. Then we turn right and walk up here:

And we saw some lovely leaves. I love autumn, the colours are gorgeous:

When we get to the top we always look to the right to see who is about, and we see this:

After admiring the view, the leaves and checking for dogs to stroke, we turn round and walk down here: Yes, she is wearing funny tights, and yes that is how she ties her tie, and yes, she does spend hours doing her hair before leaving the house - sigh....

We walk past this on our left:

A bit further down, this on our right:
Look, a shite photo of a conker
Just for this photo heavy post we turned round and saw this:
Lovely!

Then we walk over the river and look to the left and see this - THE RSC

It is currently undergoing a multi million pound makeover! A little further on, and we then see this:
Guess who is bureid in the church - yes, Mr Shakespeare!

Then after the bridge we walk through here, and are 3 minutes from where I work, and about 8 mins from where DD goes to school....not a bad way to get to work ;-)

Why the orange background? Because it is October of course!

Has it really been 1 month and 2 days...

dear god, where has the time gone? And for once, some FOs...but not tonight! too busy watching Ant and Dec's Saturday Night Takeaway - gotta love the boys :)

It's a cat thang.......

We actually had some sunshine - 2 days of it, so it was gardening gloves on. DH ripped out the lavender bushes, and DD and I painted the garden fence - one side down, one to go, and then the other one - heigh ho! But it does look better for it, and should now last a few more years. If you peer closely, you can see my sunflowers in the background. Not a fab crop this year, DD and I planted about 60 seeds, and only about 10 have come up. But I did see 2 mice in the garage today, so I imagine that they had a good feast on 50 sunflower seeds sometime about May this year - buggers!DH and I went to garden centre today to spend some of my birthday vouchers, as you can see from the photo above I wasn't allowed to buy replacement lavender (the stuff he ripped out as about 2m x 2m each plant - so I can understand his sentiments). I'll wait til he isn't about!

A quick piccie to prove that my tomato plants did ok - I grew these from seeds, and despite the crappy summer these ones have actually reddened on the plants - first time ever. They taste fab too. I will definitely plant these again next year.

At the garden centre I also bought this:

and some chinese lanterns, which I have been after for years.

And I thought I would treat the kitties to a cat mint. The kittens aren't bothered but look at the old boy, he picks it off between his teeth, and spits it on the ground (foul) whilst his eyes roll backwards in his head, and he rubs his face on the left over stems. I have evidence:

But when accused, I get this face - butter wouldn't melt, would it? I bet if I go back out now he'll have it stripped off to sticks!

Finally, a few photos of the girls:

A crap photo, but yes it really is the lesser spotted 2 headed cat!
You pay £100 for the first vaccination (and worming) and then they feel they deserve the right to drink dirty water - yes, we do give them a clean, fresh option.

And yes, the rumours are true, they really are tail-less. The hamster still isn't impressed by the new additions to the household though.

1. Man playing with kitten whilst watching horse racing and listening to The Doors.
2. Cat decides that those horses really are quite exciting, and the man is happily occupied too.

What a busy month...

so much has happened, apart from the weather being anywhere near summery, hot, blistering, August-like!!! Bah to the weather, but at least I have been knitting.
First off, a pinwheel blanket - yet to be blocked because of the crappy weather. This was knitted in Laines du Nord - Dolly Mixture - 10 balls, I picked this up for a total of £16 from the Laughing Hens Stand at the Woolfest - what a bargain!!!!! I have finished this 3 times and frogged the finish twice. A normal cast off resulted in really bad curl-up (worse than here), and a picot cast-off curled like buggery too. So after some advice from the Knitties I finished it with 4 rounds of moss stitch and a moss stitch cast off. It is still curling a bit, but hopefully after blocking it should be ok. It is for friends who are expecting their first baby (a girl) on October 22nd. I am also knitting them a few other bits which will be posted later.

Next up, a WIP. This is an Argosy Wrap which I am knitting up in Noro Silver Thaw which I also picked up for a fantastic price at Woolfest in July - a bag of 10 balls for £25 - why did I only buy 1 bag - ggrrrrrrrr!

And finally 2 crappy photos of the latest additions to the Household.

Meet Pumpkin,

and Maddie

I will get better photos, but at least they are still. They are 10 weeks old, and both VERY sweet. There dad was a Manx cat, and they have definitely got his genes -

very long back legs, they run to you like a dog when you rattle their jingly ball, they jump VERY high, and most freaky of all - THEY HAVE NO TAILS. The ultimate in freaky!!!

We WILL enjoy summer, and look! ANOTHER RAK!!!

So we ventured out to Burford cos that is where we go every summer for summer birthdays..it was on the calender so we were going. We packed a picnic, made a flask of tea, and picked our way around the abandoned cars....and we had a lovely time. SUMMER HAS ARRIVED, SOD THE WEATHER!
We saw lots of animals, but these photos of Mongoose/Mongooses/Mongeese/Mongii were taken specially for Lulu, as I promised I would say hi to them if I saw any

From here we went to Woodstock, as DH wanted to eat at the Italian Restaurant there (it was very nice) and look at the weather at 6.30pm...can you believe it!!!

Then today look what I got in the post...a RAK from Knitherapy, she said that she had found some dishcloth cotton (I feel you can never have enough of this stuff in yer stash) and thought of me (I saw it and thought Italy, DD said "Christmas!!"), which was very kind, and then she added in some lovely stitch markers (how do people know that I am desperate for these), and a fab handmade card - on the outside it says "The beginning is the most important part of the work - Plato", and the inside - "For your birthday I started a sweater for you"......aaaawwwwww, that is fab. Why can't we get cards like this in the UK, or maybe we can and I just don't know where.....Thank you Janis, you are very kind :-)

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU!

Also replying to FaeryNuff, in this order ;-)

- I saw your Bib and was surprised that we had synched - they are lovely aren't they, and so quick too.

- You are knitting the pinwheel blanket?!?!?! Dear god, are we seperated at birth!! what with that and the sweetie cupboard - hee hee. Would love to join you in a KAL. I am about to join ball 3 and I am using Laines du Nord, Linea Merino - Dolly Mixture which I picked up at Woolfest from Laughing Hens at £16 for a bag of 10 balls (v. lucky I know).

- Our home is fine (touch wood) apart from a leaky window, but hey the amount of rain beating on that window over the last few days, I'd leak as well! Hope you basement continues to be ok - I love your plans for it for next year. Looking forward to seeing the photos of it, your very own building WIP.

- Pink Leggings? - New Look!

But despite that, we partayed like it was 1999.....

2 posts in one day - scroll down for the flood pictures.....