Baking Subscription February

So this month it was apple and pecan buns, a close relative of the cinnamon buns I was bought the box for at Christmas.  There's not a great deal to say about them really, they were easy, if a bit time consuming, to make, and they taste gorgeous. And although if I were doing them not from a kit, I possibly wouldn't bother with the icing, it is a nice finishing touch and not a step too far, unlike the swiss meringue buttercream last month!

In other news I am feeling much better so suspect the virus is finally on the run; still tired though, which presumably accounts for me almost falling asleep yesterday during the Great British Sewing Bee. It's not at all boring (if you like that sort of thing) so the sleepiness must just be a hangover from the virus. So it's back to writing up the thesis again today. I have a cunning plan to get the next chapter done and ready to send off by Monday morning ... fingers crossed. 

The Road to Recovery?

I think I might be getting better you know. I have managed to get through today without recourse to either cough syrup or paracetamol, and on top of that I have managed to do some work. So tomorrow morning I proof read my brand spanking new thesis introduction which I have written over the weekend and then bang it off to the Director of Studies, who can if she  wishes, forward it to the Men in Aberdeen ad Glasgow. I am past caring either way, I doubt I'll change it whatever they say, and after a bit of a rest from it tomorrow on Tuesday I'll be back, knocking up (or at least starting to) a chapter on the differences between schizophrenia and bi-polar disorder (both versions), why they apparently couldn't tell them apart in 1947, and the benefits BPD sometimes confers on the creative mind - not that that makes it, to my way of thinking, any more bearable. But then I'm not a creative writer, or a BPD sufferer, so what do I know?

I am however a long time knitter although sometimes it seems as though I know nothing about that either. I believe I mentioned en passant somewhere  here that this year was dedicated to the knitting up of things that have hung around unfinished, or even unstarted, for Far Too Long.  (Yes, well, don't mention the  blanket. That was different. Naturally.)

I began with a hat and mitts kit I had asked Son No 1 to buy me several Christmases ago from a wool mill in Maine. I've pulled it out to knit a few times over the years but always put it back again pretty damn quick because it had a decorative I-cord edging, and I didn't know how to do I-cord. But of course, I got that sorted with the Kate Davies tea cosy so I had no more excuses. I wasn't looking for them actually, it's a lovely design and I did really want to knit it. 

The construction was quite different to anything I've done by way of a hat before, although knit in the round which is how I like to do hats. The only trouble was that when it was finished it was a bit big. It didn't fall off, but equally it didn't cling to my head, and given that a good third of the knitting was constructing a rib lining to make it do exactly that, that was a bit disappointing. I thought it might improve with blocking, but it didn't. It got bigger. It now resembled an upturned bulb bowl and was very loose. 

I wasn't sure what to do next, as everything I could think of to try ran the risk of making matters worse and I was more than a bit disgruntled that my first effort to tick off a kit for the year was going to come to naught. In the end I decided I had nothing to lose; the effort had already been put in, I didn't have a wearable hat, the wort that could happen was that I would end up with a still unwearable hat, and gritting my teeth I threw the thing into the bathroom sink ad covered it with two kettlefuls of boiling water and left it to cool. 

I was prepared for this somewhat cavalier treatment to shrink the thing to child or even doll size. I had even passed under rapid mental  review the ages of all the girl children I know to whom it might be gifted. What I was not prepared for was for it to be bigger then ever!! It now covered half my face. In desperation I stuck it in the washing machine on the hottest wash it does and do you know what? it came out the perfect size. It really did. It's the teeniest smidgin felted but I don't care. It fits and I will wear it, and if you've got this far - here's the picture

Seemed LIke A Good Idea at the Time

Last summer, when I was about to have my eye done and when I still thought I would be submitting my thesis at the end of January I was starting to wonder what I would do with my time when it was all over. I wanted a big, but not humungous project that would challenge me, keep me busy, but  that was creative rather than intellectual, because I knew I would want to rest my poor stretched brain for  a while. 

And lo! into my in-box at about this time, popped an invitation to join the Debbie Abrahams Mystery Blanket Club for 2019. It looked ideal - no, let me correct that, it was ideal. I'd toyed with the  idea of doing one of these before, the colour palette from the hints that were given sounded just up my street, the material was going to be a nice blend of wool and alpaca and other soft fibres and best of all it would be starting in February, so just at the right time. I signed up - because you know, who can't knit 6  6"x  6" blanket squares in a month? (Probably anyone who signs up for a sock club and then can't produce a  pair of socks a month to be honest, but let's not dwell on past failures, eh?)

Anyway yesterday the first pack of yarn (with some beads) arrived and it is indeed lovely. Look!

I realise that won't float everybody's boat but it does mine. Sadly there  are currently just one or two small snags in the Grand Plan to knit a blanket. The first is that the thesis, as we all know, is not yet finished, delayed as it has been by illness. The second is that I am short of  free pairs of needles in the correct sizes to check tension and cast on. And the third is that I have this morning given myself a double cut, in the shape of crossed swords, on the pad of my right index finger while trying to get a paracetamol out of the foil in which it was wrapped. Ouch!

Well, we'll see how we go. I've ordered some new needles, the cuts will heal in time and I can't be working on the thesis 24/7. Although some days I feel I should! Wish me luck with the blanket, I will need it.

Still Sick

In fact so sick that I went to the doctor on Monday. He reassured me that what I have is just a 'viral infection', told me to take more paracetamol which would help with symptoms, and that I would start to feel better in about a week, and come back if I start to feel worse. 

That is not meant to sound dismissive as it was reassuring to know that I wasn't harbouring something nasty and going to end up in hospital - and yes, I really did feel that bad. 

I do have other things  to post about but they will have to wait ....

The OH is a few days ahead on this road and he is sounding and feeling better so that's a good sign. Not better as in 'back to full health' but better as in 'no longer coughing like his insides are trying to escape thorough his throat.

On which less than salubrious image I will leave you with an appropriate internet picture for the day. 

Hard to believe - but we're ill again

The OH never really shook off the flu and as he started to spend his evenings in company with a really hard hacking cough I sort of assumed that the little germies had gone and settled on his chest and decided to have a party, because he is prone to chest infections. I mithered him to go to the doctor which he finally agreed to do, after I had a very worrying weekend with him, on Monday. He got an inhaler, some anti-biotics and a little glass jar for a sputum sample. 

I assumed, since I am not prone to chest infections that I would avoid all this unpleasantness. In this I was totally wrong. I am about three days behind him with my symptoms and since my hacking cough (which deprived me of my voice for the best part of two days) originates in my throat, not my chest, I do not think I have a chest infection. I do have a temperature, off and on, I do have an almost constant headache, I'm having problems sleeping and I have a throat and a set of ears that feel like they're on fire for much of the time. I cannot remember the last day I got dressed although it was possibly Monday when the OH went to the doctor and while he was there I went to the Post Office. I know I was supposed to be going out with friends on Tuesday afternoon and was too poorly to go. 

I am reverting to the trick I developed when I had the flu, of taking paracetamol before I go to bed in the hope that this will help me sleep. Meanwhile nothing is getting done, and work on the thesis has most unfortunately ground to a halt, which is very worrying. I had a plan which was going to get the whole thing revised and sent off to supervisory people a week before we go to Glasgow for the Joan Baez concert at the end of the  month but that plan has developed some serious slippage and I can only think that once I'm better I'm going to have to put in some long hard days at the computer coalface. Oh joy! 

Never Say Never

When we had our visitor last November one of the places we went to was the workshop of Alison Moore. I adore her work, but for some reason I didn't have any of her jewellery.Possibly because for a long time she only did rings which, although beautiful, I have to have in large sizes which is embarrassing. But she's branched out recently and now does ear-rings, pendants etc. 

I treated myself to a pair of moonstone studs for 'everyday wear' . The OH wanted to buy me a pendant which I said OK to, as long as it was going to be part of my Christmas present. We had to order one especially, as they only had the display example and no stock, but that wasn't a problem, and a few weeks later, when they rang to say it was ready, we went to collect it. 

I took it down to Glasgow in December for the EA recital, but then because of what I ended up wearing I didn't put the pendant on. We came home, and the pendant disappeared. I went one day to put it away from where I thought it was, and it wasn't there. Nor was it anywhere else where I might put jewellery. Nor in fact was it in any of the places where I don't put jewellery. (Which makes sense of course! but you know how it is when you've lost something, you look everywhere, even in places where it just can't be. 

Since it wasn't here we thought I might have left it in the flat in Glasgow but a thorough search by son number two, and later by me when we were down in January failed to turn it up. I was beside  myself with shame an d irritation. Lost before I had even worn it! The OH might as well have stood in the road and thrown several large denomination notes down the drains. 

I was told not to worry. I was told it would turn up. I told him that it couldn't turn up because I had looked everywhere and he wasn't to buy me jewellery ever again because I couldn't be trusted to look after it and therefore I didn't deserve it. 

And yesterday, I found it. I opened my bottom jumper drawer and there was the box and the pendant was inside it. I could swear I had had the drawer upside down, along with all the others, when I was looking and all I can think of is that when we came back from Glasgow that first time the box was wrapped up in a jumper, stayed inside it when I unpacked, and yesterday when I was desultorily going through the drawer trying to decide if there were any jumpers in there I could usefully give to the charity shop it got dislodged. 

Whatever the case, I was a very happy bunny.

And here is the cause of all the trouble; the bottom stone is labradorite and bluer than it looks in the photo.