You Wait Three Weeks for a Blog Post

And two come along at once.

Really, I'm just aware that I need to get back into the swing of things so I think you deserve an update. This will be a little bit personal-ly though so feel free to switch off. No offers or new wool or patterns around here. That will have to wait until the party (and October apparently when everything's being released - don't they know I have a party to stock for?!).

Anyway, I've been very much in my own belly button of late. The shop has been so busy in the day and I haven't really been expecting it given the time of year and the weather so I've been tootling back home and not doing much. Also, Toni moved in to Chris's house so we're spending more time socialising (in a relaxed, hanging around knitting in our pj's kind of way) when usually me and Chris would be doing our own thing but near eachother. Does that make sense?

So, I'll start with the garden.

I think I mentioned that Chris and his dad spent some time redoing the roof on the outhouse at the end of his garden a few weeks ago? The whole thing was falling apart and leaking and ugh which meant that we couldn't paint that end and because we couldn't paint we couldn't do anything else and the whole end of that garden was just a bit..... blurgh. So I was really pleased that they did it:

But, can you see all the mess in the rest of the garden? Well, that was there for like a week and a half and my tomatoes were overrun! The one thing I know about gardening is that you're supposed to take off the shoots on your tomatoes that don't have flowers or fruit on them so that's what I do. Every day when I'm there I have a right good root through. But I couldn't get to them which meant they overran everything including my aubergine which really suffered and I don't think it will get better. Still. Better a small aubergine than no aubergine at all. That's what they say isn't it?

My sweetcorn is coming on a pace!








That's the photo I took of the top of the sweetcorn when I was sure that that's where the corn was coming from. Turns out it comes from the sides like little off shooty things but I still haven't got a photo of it. There's one big stick of a plant and then a slightly smaller one and they each have two sweetcorn things on. Ha. How good am I at gardening?!

You'll be pleased to know that my pumpkins are coming through? I would have thought they'd have started earlier but they're only starting to pop out little gobstopper looking pumpkins right about now and none of them have flowers on so I can't do my usual sex-you-you-up-with-an-ear-bud thing that I do. You'll also be pleased to know that one of the 'pumpkins' was actually a MARROW! I got my marrow afterall! I was going to save it for an entry into the country fair/show thing I'm going to be a judge at in Radcliffe-on-Trent (you'll be relieved to know it's in the knitting category, not gardening) but then some plants that I thought weren't tomatoes turned out to be tomatoes when I actually looked at them so they needed sorting out - taking off the shoots and supporting them and the whole thing was a mess and I couldn't get in because the marrow plant and the beautiful marrow was in the way so I picked it all and put that into the compost so I could deal with the tomatoes... Which led to the compost being overrun:

 

 And that's the story of my garden so far. Lots of tomatoes to come hopefully so I'm sure there'll be more thrilling installments.

Separately from this, I am a domestic goddess, making delicious and intricate cakes such as: 

 

 Rice crispie crunch. The best thing is, I was inspired to make this by GBBO. Haha. Who watches GBBO and then thinks, 'I can do that! I can make delicious and difficult cakes! I'm gonna melt some chocolate and pour some rice crispies in!'?! Haha. I do apparently. It was a mix of milk and dark chocolate though (because that's all we had in) so I suppose that's something?

In other domestic goddess news:

 

 Two delicious crumbles. Two because, not really being a domestic goddess, the cupboard was too much of a mess for me to be bothered to find the right size tray.... What a prat. But it was delicious. And that was made out of the blackberries left over from this: 

 

Which I've made super big so you can see it. That is blackberry sauce for my BLACKBERRY WINE! OH YEAH! Last year I made marrow rum which was delicious but not boozey enough so this time I am going to get booze boozey boozey with my blackberries. It looks and smells delicious but I've got a few months to work out whether it will taste delicious.

And that segways nicely into this beautiful selfie:

 

Which was us collecting blackberries the other day. We got LOADS on the first bush and then less and less and less and had to go miles to get a reasonable amount. Chris was pleased about this and I wasn't. Can you tell? 

Which leads me to talk a little more about my bike: 

 

This was the first set up for my first solo bike ride. I was going from Chris's house to the QMC and back which I would say is about 4 miles round? Maybe 5? Involves no hills, and very few roads and I did it much quicker than I thought so it's a good thing I took my knitting and a snack with me. And if you remember my operation from just after Christmas? WELL I NO LONGER HAVE A HOLE IN MY EAR! Boom! Apparently my eardrum looks very strange and delicate so I have to treat it as if it still has a hole in it and it might never be right but at least I can go swimming! Boom! Although now I've started cycling I'm not so excited about swimming. But I will go, maybe I'll ride my bike to the pool. Mwahaha.

And that picture, with plenty of knitting, takes us to the onesies. The dreaded bloody onesies. This is all Toni's fault. She decided that she wanted a onesie whilst spending the day in the shop a couple of weeks ago so I decided I'd do one too. Why? Nobody knows. Anyway, we're two weeks and three days in and I've just about finished the legs, arms and button bands and now I have the bumflap to deal with. I'm planning to do that fairisle and because I'm ahead of Toni I'm going to take my time working out what I want to do - maybe my name??? Toni has the legs and a sleeve done and is maybe half way down the second sleeve and she did a random button band. She's away at the moment so I'm not entirely sure. But anyway, here they were a few days ago:

 

Toni's. If you've met her you'll know how much smaller she is than me and how well and fast she knits so I've been really kept on my toes over this!

And mine. That is not my pants!

And finalllllllllllly. I've discovered the best ice lolly evah.

Solero mojito ice lollies with real booze. I'm about to have one when I've clicked publish on here and sorted the till out which I've been avoiding all day. Wish me luck.

Love Eleanor. xxxxx

P.s. I've got no simple knitting on the go and without it I can't stomach reading my own writing so you'll have to coco with spelling mistakes etc. Sorry!