Christmas revisited

Apart from all the horrible things that have been going on over Christmas we did enjoy ourselves sometimes. DD loved her presents & spent the day dressed in her Goal Keepers outfit. DH has enjoyed his Powerball & Family Guy Xbox game & DVD's.

I was totally spoilt. Firstly by DH who visited my Amazon wish list & bought me these:


Knitting books from DH

Plus this:


Lorna's Laces in Berry

DD bought me this with a HUGE hint from me:


Fleece Dog

I've got some rovings & felting needles from my trip to Wingham Wool Works earlier this year so will be playing soon.

Then I had another box of presents to open from my friend CL in Canada. As I opened the beautifully wrapped gifts I felt like a kid again:


Christmas presents from Canada

CL sent me so many things that I couldn't even get them all in the photo but above you can see:

Yarn - Andean Treasure in lilac, Essential in Petunia, Knit Picks Gloss in Concord Grape & Koigu Kersti Merino Crepe but I'm already playing with that so you can only see half of it. Plus some other Knit Picks goodies including a Wraps per Inch tool, their own Circular needles & a Canadian / American needle gauge which has already proven useful. Also included were some really cute Christmas ornaments, a tape measure with the Canadian flag on, some maple syrup sweets, Hersey chocolate for DD, candy canes, a Canadian key ring for DH as he was jealous of the other one that CL sent in her last parcel + more.

The yarn is so gorgeous - I can't convey how delighted I am with it all & the Andean Treasure is going to become a pair of beautifully soft lacey socks. I had sent CL some presents too which included a kilo of Cashmerino Super Chunky in purple, Baby Cashmerino in red, the first Baby Cashmerino book & some English chocolates & biscuits. Thank you so much CL - I really enjoyed choosing your gifts & get the feeling that you did too.

Christmas - bah humbug!

It seems that everything has been against us having a wonderful Christmas.

DH & I were both due to finish work on Wednesday which was also DD's last day of school however they were both violently ill with a sickness bug so I took the day off to care for them. They were both feverish & throwing up constantly It was at some point on this first day when I was doing yet another load of washing that I noticed that whenever I had the washing machine on water was coming back up into the sink but I couldn't deal with it then.

On the second day they weren't so bad & DD was up to sitting on the sofa under a blanket so I rang our Water provider & they recommended a company to look at our drains. Once booked for the following day (Friday) I tried to forget about the problem but it wasn't easy as we had a huge pool of mucky water in the garden & the kitchen sink often had the same in it

Friday came & went & still the drains weren't sorted. The drain company turned up & poked around a bit but then declared that they couldn't fix it as their big pump had just died but we weren't to worry they had another & it'd be with us later that afternoon. Not to be. The workmen also mentioned that they thought it was a problem with the public sewer & if so we shouldn't have to pay for it which sounded ok. DH researched the term they'd used & it looked right so he spent the evening on the phone & we were promised a solution the following morning - Hhmm!

Early on Saturday we received another call from the Water provider who had actually decided that our problem wasn't what the company had said the day before & the we did have to pay. We weren't too bothered about the money but we were concerned about the fact that we couldn't use the washing machine, dishwasher or kitchen sink. We were also avoiding the shower, bath & avoiding flushing the toilet too as we were worried that the toilet would overflow in the house Luckily MIL lives a few doors away so we ran down the street whenever we needed to 'go'!

Our confidence in that drain company was gone so we ended up ringing a local company who were on site within 30 minutes of DH making the phone call & the problem was fixed within 10 minutes - a cheque was very happily handed over plus a bit extra in cash as a tip. So now we could wash the clothes, pots & flush the loo

It seemed to go ok after that. DD was a good girl & stayed in bed until 7.30 on Christmas Day morning before she bounced in with her stocking. She loved her presents as did her mum I was throughly spoilt by DH & CL my friend in Canada but that deserves a post all on it's own. But as a teaser I'll just say books, lots of books & yarn - beautiful yarn!!!

However our nice Christmas really wasn't to be - poor DH fell ill again in the evening & after I witnessed him rolling around on the floor clutching his belly in absolute agony I rang the emergency doctor. MIL was called back to the house to look after DD - she'd only been gone half an hour as she had lunch with us & I took him to the surgery. Luckily I'd only had one glass of wine with my meal hours before so was ok to drive.

The diagnois - gastro problems caused by excess acid - DH admitted that he sometimes forgets to eat at work as he gets caught up in a problem & tends to have erratic meal times as he often works late. So temporarily armed with some chalky tablets until I can get his perscription medicine tomorrow (or later today as I've just noticed the time) he's now happily in bed.

I'm hoping that the rest of our time off work is more peaceful as we both really needed a break.

27/12/6 ETA: I've got a parking ticket now

No knitting going on

For a knitting blog this is getting rather sad as I'm hardly able to knit The offical diagnois is Tendonitis in both my forearms & I've still got a lot of related pain in my hands & wrists. I've been having treatment but it'll take time for the inflamation to go down. To make matters worse I'd signed up for an Afghan Squares swap on Swap-bot. One of my 4 squares is done but the others will be a bit late I'm afraid as I'm finding knitting painful at the moment

Housewise we still haven't sold ours; we've had another very interested viewer who came to a 2nd viewing only to submit an offer 20K under the asking price which we've obviously rejected. So all viewings are on hold until January as we need a break over the Christmas period.

DD has been growing like a weed over the past few months & we got a shock yesterday when we measured her - she's now 5ft 1 3/4" tall & turned 11 in October! She's 2" taller than my SIL who is gutted. None of her clothes fit her anymore including her school uniform so I need to get her kitted out again - last time was September