Rats

I was treated to a lovely Christmas lunch by my parents today at their local pub, the Royal Oak. We are having a scaled down, minimalist version on the day itself but we thought it'd be nice celebratory roast at some point...and we didn't have to do any washing up. My supermarket delivery yesterday contained the first batch of cocktail sausages ready for the day; I've got 90 so far. I bought my parents a mini Nordman fir tree for their house and gave them a few knitted decorations to embellish their own collection:

Cute huh? I am making another Christmas pud from the Mini Christmas Knits book and I think I prefer it to the crocheted one, although like Nicky I have incorporated the top into the base rather than made an icing top for it. I'll post a pic tomorrow as my camera is a bit rubbish in dark conditions. I do have lights in my house, obviously, but they are all low-energy bulbs which are pleasantly 'muted' but not very good for photography.

I went to listen to my brother, father and niece perform their Christmas Concert with their local community orchestra. It was great fun and reminded me how much I enjoy classical music. I dug out my old clarinet which I learnt to play at school when I was 8. Our school was very keen on music and I also played the violin, very badly, for a year or so too. I can remember all the pieces I used to play but have had to download an app to remind me of the fingering! :-D I am sure my music-reading skills are pretty rusty as well even though I tried to learn piano a little while ago. I'm hopefully going to give the orchestra a go myself when they start back in January.

I picked more crab apples on my way back from the pub as I'd like to make some Mulled Wine Jelly as seen in the December issue of HomeFarmer magazine.

It's basically crab apples with spices and a tot of red wine, but I bet it'll be delicious with the cheeses and home-made bread we'll have on Christmas Day, and the mini sausages, if there are any left after Tristan's taken his portion.

I have a rat back in the compost heap. It is so difficult: I bring all the poultry into one area to save my lawn and it becomes a rodent restaurant. I am going to invest in a treadle feeder for the big hens as in addition to the rat family, the dunnocks keep helping themselves to my expensive Garvo Layers mash. Henry doesn't help either as he tips the bowl over to spread the food far and wide in his desire to provide sufficient food for all his ladies, which the feeder will put a stop to. There is a tunnel into the duck runs too so I am having to keep the water bowls empty overnight and I am sluicing the run as well to remove any traces of rat piddle.

Anyway, it's now Countryfile and I need to make myself a cup of tea and pick up the knitting. Happy Sunday evening everyone.

Christmas is Coming

We try to get our tree during the first week of December, as they are quite expensive and I like to get my money's worth out of it! We went over to Sharnfold Farm and came back with our 7' spruce:

We'll decorate it this evening when the girls get back from the Jacqueline Wilson book signing they have been taken to by their father. Judging by the texts I have had from the girls about their dad's reaction to the change of plans regarding Christmas Day, we will need a pleasantly distracting activity...I don't think baby goats on Countryfile is going to cut the mustard :-/

I have made a mini stocking from the book of 20 Mini Christmas Knits that I borrowed from Nicky:

Doing the picot edging with double strands of that bloomin' gold thread was a bit of a pain but I think it's quite effective. I also got round to stuffing my reindeer bauble, and whilst I was feeling grotty with a cold yesterday, I made a Debbie Bliss cashmerino aran version of Peggy the hen :

I think the resemblance is striking:

I want to make a set of the seven chickens I have, but I was looking at Henry today thinking I will have to use a bit of artistic license to save me ending up with a different colour strand for every stitch.

The white call ducks have been a bit wayward recently, and have a penchant for ending up nextdoor. They were rootling around in the leaves and mud by the front steps today:

You can see the road, plus a lot of people walk their dogs down our lane to get to the Cuckoo Trail so it really isn't a very good idea. I usually have a length of chicken wire across the gateway but I tend to pull it out of the way on Saturday nights so the poor Ocado driver has one less trip hazard to negotiate - I'm sure they draw lots at the depot to see who has the short straw of delivering to me through my unlit, muddy, flowerpot-strewn garden with its unhelpfully narrow concrete path and badly placed paving slabs. They earn their 99p delivery charge when they come to me!

I made cinnamon buns for breakfast and cooked a roast lunch but of course now Tristan is hungry again. I bought him 3 Conn Iggulden books to have for Christmas to follow on from the one he got for his birthday, but he has already finished the 2nd and 3rd ones so I have asked if I can at least wrap up the last one so he can open it and pretend it's a present, albeit rather early.

Right, I'd better go and hide all the decorations that I don't want the girls to put on my nice tree ;-)