So, it's that time again - New Year. Or, at least, it was a few days ago anyway, but work has been manic so I've not had time to update till today!
Christmas with the sin-laws was lovely, as always - far too much food and drink :-) but good company, good telly, and good presents, so you can't go wrong really! Had some lovely knit-related gifts too - two Rowan pattern books, and 4 balls of snuggly gorgeous Rowan yarn from my brother - excellent choice little bro! Also cooking gifts - the
Great British Book of Baking and a pretty bun tin from my uncle, also excellent choice - I've made bread using its recipe, which turned out great, and some Yorkshire Teacakes, which, um, less so! Nuff said on that front I think, but they did make a great bread and butter pud a couple of days later!
So, dog update... Well, Ike's doing well, although he has moulted like crazy over the last few weeks, which has left the house looking like it's snowed indoors. Good excuse for a new hoover in the sales before the VAT went up though! Otherwise, the fur is looking great. We've reduced his medication from yesterday on the vet's advice, so we'll see what happens now I suppose.
FOA continue to be over-run unfortunately - we're trying to reduce the number of dogs in kennels to bring costs down but there's so many furbabies coming in that it's proving rather difficult unfortunately. The pre-Christmas auction and raffle both raised a lot of money though, which is helping.
Knitting continues apace - I managed to finish 7 mini stockings for gift tags, so not everyone got one I'm afraid, which feels like a bit of a failure, but I reckon 7 in a week isn't bad going. I think for next year I'm going to start earlier, and knit a bunch in co-ordinated colours to make a garland. I'm about 4-6 inches away from finally finishing the
Stocking Stitch Shrug that I've been working on for ever and a day, hurrah! I laid it out on the sofa last night to measure it, and it does look big - no wonder it's taken a long time! If I'm well behaved and don't knit anything else, there's a chance it might be done for the end of next week, which will feel like a massive achievement! Over Christmas I also finished the first sock of
Circle Socks, which looks great, and I've done about half the leg of the second sock - this will get more attention when the shrug is finally finished, although it is much more portable that the shrug now so it's going out and about whereas the shrug is strictly home knitting only now.
And finally food (since there's been no music going on over Christmas)... As mentioned above, I had a bash at some more bread last week, which again turned out really well (no pics I'm afraid, I forgot!). The teacakes were decidedly less great. they didn't rise at all for some reason, I don't know what I did wrong... Finally cut into my Christmas cake last night though (pic to follow) and it tastes great but is a little bit dry, incredible really when you consider how much booze went into it... How strange. Other culinary delights over recent weeks have included bread and butter pud made with the flat and doughy teacakes, which was yummy, and a big batch of mince pies that went with us to the sin-laws, and went down really well, so can't have been that bad!
The bad news is that I'm restarting my diet from last year - my little brother is getting married at the end of July, and I will not be the fat unmarried older sister. I'll just be the unmarried older sister, which is bad enough, and more than enough ammunition for me to need much gin to get through the day with my grandparents telling me that I'm being left on the shelf, without them telling me I'm fat too! I'll still be doing cooking, just healthier stuff!
Over and out!
