Sunday 23 November 2008

Sunday smiles

On a rainy Sunday, when you've been feeling a bit so-so, you need things to make you smile. Well, I do, anyway. Maybe you've been smiling at stuff all day.

I present the final installment in Sean's birthday stuff. These delightful wormy cupcakes were made by the lovely Kuka and presented to Sean along with a worm farm from Kuka, her partner and George and her family.

worms
Cute huh? 

The afternoon of the worm farm (from which I will save you all from photos!) was a long time coming because George had asked me some time earlier this year if a worm farm would be a good gift for Sean's 40th. I said of course it was, because he's been wanting to get one forever.

Something we didn't factor in was how to prevent him going out to buy one. This required some incredibly creative excuse making on my part. One day, in front of Kuka, he even said, when we were discussing compost and worms, 'You are so mean. I don't know why you have such a problem with getting a worm farm.'

Sigh.

There's only so long you can keep putting someone off by saying 'I need to do some research before we buy one.' I think that wore thin and in the end, he was just convinced I really didn't want one.

He has one now and we love checking them, to see how they're munching through the scraps which are mushed up because, as George said, 'worms have no eyes and small mouths' (spot the mum of a small person!). 

When the hundreds of worms arrived, it was declared by George that my job was to knit them all little matching beanies. Needless to say I have not done that, but George is welcome to help me out any time!!!

Many, many thanks to Kuka, George et al. The worm farm was generous and thoughtful and deeply appreciated.

And here's another smiley thing. We drove out to Young yesterday - home of Sean's family. I sat in the back with our 8 year old niece who, while I knitted, fed me pretzels and 'nutrient water' (what the hell is that? The label sure didn't sound like there was a lot of nutrient in it). When I was knitting this, a Fetching mitt remodelled to suit a man's hand, she asked me what it was.

boyfetching

I explained it was a fingerless mitten for a man. She looked thoughtful for a moment and said, 'Is he a poor guy?'

I laughed and laughed. No, the intended recipient isn't a poor guy, and neither is he homeless. I can't imagine where she got such a notion from but it's amused me today when I've been knitting #2 and imagining them on the recipient's hands.

Finally, I leave you with this. We harvested the remainder of our crop of broad beans today. It's been lovely having them but those plants are definitely outstaying their welcome. We need the space! So we watched an episode of Northern Exposure, shelled them all (amounting to 1.8kg of shelled beans!) and blanched and froze all but a few. The few we kept aside were turned into a Moroccan broad bean dip, which we are snacking on now. Yum.

And so the weekend ends. Bring on the roast lamb and red wine, I say.

Bells