Lytteltonwitch went and picked up the embroidery from the framer yesterday, and brought it round last night to show me her choice of frame and mat: I think it came out really well (and the fact that the mat colour is called “raspberry” is definitely a bonus!). It’s all wrapped up now and back in…

I’m sure there’s some sort of conspiracy going on to make sure we never get plums off our tree: this is the fourth year in a row that just as the plum tree has come out in a mass of blossom we’ve had huge winds that have blown it all off again 🙁 The weather…

I tend to treat cross-stitch patterns as more of a guideline than something I have to strictly follow, and like to add my own personal touches, especially when I’m making a gift. And this secret project was no exception. Here’s the photo from the magazine I took the pattern from: As you can see, I…

At 11.15 last night, to be exact. It took a bit longer than I expected, having planned to finish it last weekend, but Sunday’s visitors, then a headache brought on by a combination of a strong nor’wester and lack of sleep (%$&# daylight savings!) knocked out Monday evening, so it was a rush job the…

Just thought I should get the rant out of the way first 🙂 I see absolutely no point in it. Yes, it gives you an extra hour of daylight in the evenings, but the payoff is it’s darker in the mornings. And I hate getting up in the dark. It’s only recently started to be…

I’ve finished the cross-stitch, and now there’s just the backstitch and a few french knots to go! (which is not as close to finished as it sounds, though, because the backstitch is horribly fiddly – lots of lines that start in the middle of stitches and funny angles – so it’ll take me ages)

Who says we never finish any projects around the house? A bit under three years ago, we decided to set up the spare room as a proper study/computer room, but at the time could only afford one proper desk. So my computer was put temporarily on an old table, with plans to replace it with…

…other than that I’ve been reasonably successful with keeping up a steady stream of releases for the rest of the week, mostly around the university, and mostly having fun with themed releases: Tuesday Ondine by Jean Giraudoux in the French Department Talk Language by Allan Pease and Alan Garner in the Linguistics Department Wednesday The…

Now that I’ve got a good stock of books to release (not that I’ve actually finished registering them all – that might take a couple of weekends!), I’ve been re-inspired to get releasing on a regular basis again. So I popped a few books in my bag to release on my way in to work…

Just back from a very pleasant afternoon spent with Kimi and MrKimi. They were passing through Christchurch, and rang to say they were at Mona Vale, so we quickly hopped on a bus to join them there. I’d said I’d ring when we got there so we could find each other, but as I searched…