Oh my goodness, followup, summer, bike, baking, childminding, sore eye, leaving, BIG SECRET

Oh my goodness! It truly has been a while, hasn't it?! I'm sorry. I'm so very sorry. I've neglected this space all summer, and now I have so much to write! I'm not sure how I'll get through it all...!

So last time I posted it was very shortly after my last surgery, which went pretty well. I did get very swollen indeed, right up to my eyeballs which unfortunately left me not really eating and struggling to read a little. But since the pain only tends to last a few days after surgery, I wasn't actually hurting, just uncomfortable, and I was back in work about a week after the surgery, albeit with no teeth in and green patches all over my face from the bruising which suddenly popped back up as the swelling went down! I have a few pictures...

Me shortly after surgery on the same day...

...A coupla days later...

...And another coupla days after that, with the swelling going down and the bruising coming up...

But all in all I was pretty okay. I went back after a fortnight to have the stitches removed, but as it turned out a few untied themselves and came out before the appointment, and when I was there the dentist simply said that they were designed to untie and dissolve and he wasn't going to remove any of them right now. So that all fixed itself and my stitches steadily undid themselves, with a little help in some cases, because they'd become uncomfortable and were hurting me.

So that's all fine, and aside from that I've had a delightful final summer with the friends. I've spent lots of time with the wife mainly, partly because she's so close, but also partly because I care about her more than the rest really in some ways. I have been for coffee with C, however, which was nice, and we discussed lots of lotsness, and so I think neither of us is sure yet if we'll stay in touch anymore, but it's a bit more hopeful than it was before when both he and I sort of said that right now we didn't even know each other anymore. And I've been for Chinese with the group, and a couple of pub trips, which have all been nice. My mood hasn't been great really, and I'm not sure why, but I can't manage a whole night somehow without sort of feeling like I'd quite like to go home and be left alone about halfway through. However, H has dealt with me, making me feel better again and putting up with it a lot! So it has still been pretty nice.

I've had my bike fixed this morning by my wonderful dad - the back brake seemed to permanently be on, and it made cycling very hard work indeed. And so we sorted that out yesterday only to find that on the front wheel the inner tube had a tear along the edge of the pump bit so we had to buy a new inner this morning. But now it's all fixed and ridable and the tyres are both pumped up and it's good to go, so I'll be cycling to work later!

I've also been baking, as per usual. I made some carrot cupcakes for the wife to take up to uni with her, since she hates carrots but likes carrot cake. I thought cupcakes would be easy to share and use to make friends. I'm planning to make some more for home this afternoon, and some banana bread too because we have about 3 black bananas and I've been meaning to make it for about a week!

I've had a few days of childminding last week, and 3 more this week coming with 2 gorgeous little girls of 2 and 5. It's very fun and not taxing at all, although the 2 year old has had a cold, so that's been showing in the nappies...! But I don't mind really, it's all part of it! I'm quite looking forward to it next week, although part of me feels it won't be as fun, because last week I was doing it with the wife, and now of course she's gone to uni so I'll be doing it alone. It's okay, it'll still be fun, but I don't know what I'll do in the hour-and-a-half nap the 2 year old takes, since H and I read together last week.

I have an owiee, by the way. I've been quite clumsy recently, having walked into a shelf in work and given myself a 3 inch bruise round my thigh, and having acquired a blister on one knuckle and cuts on another finger from sewing! Now I have a sore eye. I think it's just an eyelash infection thingy really but it's very sore at the moment. I've boiled it a couple of times, sort of. By that I mean that I've paid special attention to it with a hot flannel whilst washing my face. I blame the amount of crying I've been doing recently as the cause of it. The 2 events must be connected!! I cried at my boos yesterday, which unnerved him I think. It was ,mostly bad timing on his part because I was emotional anyway, but he tried to tell me off for doing something when actually it was his fault that I'd had to do it, a fact I clearly explained to him before bursting into tears. It was just a bad choice of day really, choosing to tell me off the same day H was leaving for uni!

It's hard right now, everyone's leaving for uni. H left yesterday, which was perhaps the most emotional for me, D's leaving today, most people left last week or the week before even. I've cried everyday for about 4 days over the wife leaving. I know it's silly and ridiculous, but I'm just gonna miss that girl so damn much, and it's the knowledge that she isn't just 10 minutes away up the road that really gets me. There hasn't been a week gone by for about a year when we haven't seen each other. I love her dearly, as dearly as one can love a friend, and part of me's busy feeling sorry for me because I don't have access to her in ym life just like anymore, and another part of me's really worried about her up in Newcastle on her own and feels really sorry that I'm not up there with her to look after her. I got her lots of little bits and bobs to help her up there, and to try to help me deal with the fact of her leaving. But I'm not sure how much it actually helped me. We did have a cheerful goodbye, no tears the night before while she was in the house. I'm jsut a big ball of emotion really, soppy and wet to the last little flannel corner. I bought her some clear diamond nail varnish to help her with growing her nails, somehing she's been doing for a coupla months maybe. I also gave her a book I've had for years and years, since I was in primary school. It's The Snow Spider Trilogy by Jenny Nimmo. I gave her that book with a page folded under which had the word 'akimbo' on it. This may not make sense to most people, but she didn't think it was a real word, so I thought that constant reminder that it was a real word might remind of who's always right in her life! ;) And I bought her some new socks because most of hers are worn through. I even took the pairs apart and mixed them up because I don't know anyone who has so many odd socks as her!! When I gave them to her, she lifted one of her feet for me to inspect and tell her if the sock on it was worn or not, and it was. Quick as a flash I yanked it off her foot and ran away with it and a pair of scissors, her in hot pursuit... and, well, that sock won't keep anyone's toes warm anymore!!

I also gave her one other present. A big present. A great big, huge, secret present which she never knew was happening. It's partly why a couple of times recently I've been about to post on here, then I haven't because there's been this big secret which I wanted to talk about but didn't dare. Almost nobody knew about it, I was so desperate that nobody would find out and lead to her knowing about it. Both our mums knew, but that's about it aside from a few members of my family. I made her a great huge giant patchwork quilt - but wait! that's not the best thing about it! I found a way of printing photos onto fabric using an inkjet printer, and so I made some of the patches pictures of her, and pictures of the both of us, and that sort of thing! It was amazing:

The finished quilt...

... And the centre square...

I wrapped it up and left it for her in the spare room. When she unwrapped it first I left it with the label up so she could read it. Then she suddenly went, 'Is this... a... quilt?' And we pulled it out completely and the screaming started! It was a complete surprise to her and as far as I could tell she loved it! It was amazing to see her face as she looked at it, and knowing that it really was a complete surprise and that nobody had been able to let it slip to her was incredible, because that moment of discovery was utterly worth it. Her face and reaction made all the time and the cost totally worth it. I'll go into the making of it in more detail in another post, maybe tomorrow, or the day after. I'm not sure, but soon!

That's all for now, you can tell I left the best news for last! I'm gonna miss that girl like crazy, but hopefully I've given her a leaving gift to look after for years and to make things easier at her end when she's feeling lonely. That's what I'd like to think, anyhow! Her gift to me was pretty incredible too: she gave me a ring she'd had since she was little, on a chain to wear as a necklace with the undertsanding that I would look after for her while she was at uni, and that she'd be collecting it in 3 years or so. This may not seem like much, but it comes as the proof that she won't forget me while she's at uni, because she'll have to remember me to come back for this at some point! And that promise, and the understanding of what the ring means to her means a lot to me.

Love love xx

ps. I did very well in my exams indeed, and I'm incredibly happy with my results :)

Quilt fabric, onesies, butternut squash soup, bread making, grandma oat-cake, cycling, pact, success board, dentist, cat

So! Have I been busy or what recently folks! So much to tell! Okay, so not so much to tell, but some lovely photos of what I've been up to.

So I have some lovely photos of fabric for you, like this:




and this:



These are the fabrics I've been choosing for the quilt I'm going to make. I know, there are a lot of dark fabrics in there, but I have a plan, or an idea, at least, in my head of what i want. I'm intending to pair all the blues and greens with the pale cream in the top picture - it's very difficult to get a photo of it, so no justice has been done in that one - and then use the cream as a base for setting squares, and possibly for the back as well, although I'm still working my head round kinks of what I want to do with the back of it. But yeah. By using cream and then bright blues and greens, I'm hoping to get a really lovely quilt that goes with my room and looks bright and fresh at the same time.

I also have this fabric, which I'm planning to try to turn into baby onesies. I believe i mentioned in my last post that I was considering doing this, and setting up an online shop. Well, I'm taking a tentative step further forward, and I'm going to try making a couple of onesies. I've looked at various patterns online, and in magazines, and I'm going to try some mish-mashes of them and see what I prefer, and what parents of babies think, like next door. I think getting feedback from them will be really helpful, since they have a new baby girl who's a few months old and so perfect for what I'm looking at right now.



These are the fabrics I have for playing with right now, as well as the remnants of the jungle animals I made sleep bags out of before. They are both white, and you can see, one of them is brighter, with pink and purple bows on, and the other is more subtle, with pale flowers on. I know they're both a bit girly, but for now that's okay, since these will be experiments. Plus, the animals I have is gender neutral, so that's okay!

I think another thing I mentioned in my last post was an interest in making butternut squash soup. Well, I did! I even took the liberty of photographing my efforts at different stages of cooking:

Coating the vegetables in oil and cooking them through a bit...

... Stock added, and left to simmer for a while...

... Finished soup!

For the record, it was yummy. And the parents enjoyed it, too. There wasn't as much flavour as I'd hoped for, but it was still delicious. And, when I had another bowl the next day, I added a sprinkle of mild chili powder to it before heating it up, and there was all the flavour I'd been missing! Definitely a recipe to keep hold of, I think. Plus, the knowledge that I can make soup is very reassuring. It's not something I've done before, but I would definitely do it again!

I made bread the other day. Nothing special, just standard bread, white loaf. I kind of wanted to make wholemeal, but we didn't have the flour for it. Something to put on the shopping list (as well as more sun dried tomatoes!) Our bread maker is not the best. I think it as a relatively cheap one that my parents bought, and that was a long time ago, at least eight years. We recently replaced the pan in it, because the old one was warped... but the new one was as much of a problem, because it left huge deposits of flour in the corners of the tin. To combat this, we'd been scraping the corners out ten minutes into mixing. I, however, forget to do this on this particular occasion... I was quietly hopeful, however, when I saw how beautiful the dough looked in the tin, all smooth, not too wet, not too dry...

See? I almost didn't want to tip it, out, it looked so perfect! But needs must, and I tipped it out to reveal a clean tin inside! So the frustration of forgetting to tend to the corners, for nothing! Of course, I was in love with this gorgeous dough - maybe it was just the right day for bread making? - and when I kneaded it in a bit, it looked pretty in a whole new way. SO I took another photo of it:



All twisted and pretty, you know? And then of course I sectioned it off and turned it into a loaf and some rolls. Still pretty. Just not as pretty as pre-cooking:




The other bit of baking I did was with my dad. Or rather, he did the baking with me. I was merely there to supervise, offer advice and so on. We made grandma oat-cake, which is a family thing. When we used to go and visit grandma, my dad's mum, she always had a huge store of these heavenly, delicious cakey slices of gooey sweetness that we called grandma oat-cakes. They're basically just shortcrust pastry with a layer of jam and then a layer of flapjack on top, nothing special. But they're ever so slightly oily, and sticky, and moist and sweet and the brown sugar adds a darkness that mixes perfectly with homemade raspberry jam...



This stuff is like the manna of heaven, it really is. And okay, so we haven't quite got the recipe down yet, it was a little too sticky and I think there weren't enough oats in the flapjack. But each bite is like a tasty memory of fishing those slices out of the drawer at grandma's. The flavour is absolutely huge, the flapjack and jam crashing against each other in an awesome balance of sweet, heavy, sticky versus sharp, tangy. And the pastry adds a crunch to the gooey inside. Plus some structure, of course. You wouldn't wanna try to eat it without the pastry to hold the rest. But yeah. Not something you want too much of all at once, because it is very strong in flavour, and rather sticky in the throat. But it's soo good with it!

So that was Tuesday, all baking and yumminess. Yesterday H cycled round to mine. It's not a really long way, about twenty minutes cycling. But she burst through the door when she arrived, 'I... am... never... cycling... again!!' Panting for breath, grabbing a glass and filling it with water, she showed me the bike. This is not your bog standard push bike, easy to ride, fun to cycle. This is a bike built for the road. Skinny little tyres, upwardly curved handlebars, a speedometer!! I tried to ride it: I couldn't. It tips your body downward so all your weight is on your hands, and the brakes are really awkward to try and find when cycling. But H explained, 'it was the only bike we had that was whole. Most of the others are missing a wheel.' Well of course, that explains it. After all, who doesn't keep bikes once they have only one wheel and are less useful than unicycles?

The point of this story though, is that H dropped by, where we watched some more Tribe (yay!) and did lots of chatting, and caught each other up in the brief space of time before she's off on holiday again. And we made a pact. Backstory needed here: H and I are going o London in August to watch Wicked. This was originally meant to be a group trip for about five of us, but since the others never provided me with money to book the trip, H and I got to the stage where we just went, sack it off let's go just the two of us. Other bit of backstory is that I have a horrible stress habit to do with my OCD tendencies, where I scratch my arms and dig my nail into my skin. I do this because I see lots of little flaws on my skin, you know, the little tiny dots where the hairs come out of your arms. And in scratching and digging my nails in, I do a lot of damage to my arms and make the problem worse. Vicious cycle, people. Not something where just stopping is easy, because the holes for the hairs will always be there, and I'll always be aware of them. But having this awful habit stresses me out too, because aside from it making the problem worse, it makes my arms look disgusting and makes me uncomfortable about baring them. So I made a pact with H. I do my best to stop scratching my arms, and if I can keep it to a minimum until we go to London, she will let me wax her legs. She doesn't like having her legs waxed, because she had it done once before and it hurt. I have mine waxed because it's less hassle than shaving, and by the third time it doesn't really hurt anymore. So that's the deal. If my arms get a chance to heal, her legs get a break from the razor. And, to help motivate myself, like a geek I've made myself a 'success' chart where I can count down to London, and check off each day of no scratching at the same time. And it gave me a chance to experiment and make little samples of lots of techniques for card-making:



See? I have favourite squares, I do. But I love it all. It was really fun to make. It also counts me down to next Wednesday when I'm having my next bit of surgery with the dentist. It's one of the big ones, he's placing the rods in my jaw and giving me a granulated bone graft. So yeah! It's craft central here, for the rest of today I'm going to clean the kitchen floor and get making a onesie. And I'm gonna leave you with a cute picture of my cat, because I think I don't take enough photos of her, and she'll be dead before I realise how much she means to me.




Isn't she just beautiful? Posing for the camera there, too!

Love love xx