Wet Paint.

A small sample of chaos.

It is chaos in Mog Towers. The lad is painting the kitchen a lovely shade of olive green and everything that is usually in the kitchen has been stuffed in carefully selected leftover spaces in the living room. The overflow from the living room has flown into the study and the CDs in the study that should be in the attic are leaning in an ominous fashion towards the floor in the hall.  Food production has been halted except for the provision of pizza and breakfast cereal and the dirty dishes are currently in a basin on the living room floor being sniffed at by you know who. There is a cheese grater in the basin so I'm hoping that you know who doesn't get too carried away with his sniffs. We don't have time to go to the vet for nose reconstruction.

Nose. So far unharmed by cheesegrater.

I'm lurching between two emotions, three if you include the guilt induced by being too feeble to help out. I'm incredibly grateful to live with a chap who volunteers to paint things but at the same time I'm overwhelmed by all the disruption and have a sneaky temptation to run away and not come home till it is all over and the paint tins are stored upside down ( creates a seal and keeps the paint fresh ) in the shed. As it is, I'll stay on the sofa, knit a sock and make cups of tea on demand.

The gift of tadpoles.

In other news - I  performed a daring feat of lifesaving. For once the cat versus woodmouse tale had a happy ending. Cat was unimpressed, mouse was released unharmed in the woods.  We also received a pot of tadpoles last week from a chum. There are only boy frogs in our pond and every year they sing hopefully with no joyous reply. With any luck this new batch will turn out to be girls who can swell the throng..

Saved, put in a jar and forced to read George Orwell.

The shock of the cold

This is why I end up posting once in the bluest of moons. I wrote most of this  last week, fell asleep on Thursday and have been in my bed ever since. Sleeping Beauty has nothing on me.

It has been the weirdest spring. Last Wednesday I was wearing shorts and wondering about suncream, today I am resplendent in long-johns and a jumper. There were record breaking temperatures in Scotland a week ago,  now the cat and I are watching the snow plough ( or in our case, a wee tractor with a ploughing bit stuck on the front ) clear the road outside. If it wasn't a day or two late I'd think that the weather was playing an April Fool. No such luck, it might be the Easter holidays but I can hear the scrape of sledges as the children drag them to the park for an afternoon's chilly fun.

Tulips - didn't stand a chance.

 
The air is bitter and the snow has knocked seven bells out of my early tulips. I'm thankful that we have central heating and soup and supplies of birdfood, not to mention the swanky new Starling box that we put up to cover the hole in the house near the roof that the birds have been using as home for the last few years. Even if they don't yet have enough twigs organised for a nest at least they can shelter from the whatever the weather decides to throw at them.

Hellebores after the snow.

Hellebores in the sunshine, little knowing what would happen next.

Luckily the jumper I was knitting in the sunshine was finished in time for the snows. Mostly handspun, most of that being Blue Faced Leicester from my learn to spin aran weight experiments. The other skein ( the cool grey ) is Artisano Aran that was hanging around aimlessly and just happened to go with my colour scheme a whole lot better than the handspun Shetland that I'd planned to use. The Shetland is too crisp and too glaringly white for this project, I suspect it will turn into a cowl later on. After knitting laceweight for the last wee while, the aran yarn knitted up at the speed of light. The pattern is Vogue's Relaxed Pullover but I changed the neckline by picking up and knitting a 2x2 rib. I love it and Magnus appears to approve as well. Claws off,  fur face!

Dangerous pursuits.