Reasons to be cheerful...

It's not much fun having SPD/PGP, so I thought I'd distract myself by writing about some much nicer things...

1. Finding a Christmas present for H in a charity shop, a Djeco vintage-style wooden puzzle. American bloggers sound so much more hip when they say 'thifted'!

2. Making a funny monkey, another present for H. I've been reading a book called 'Radical Homemakers', about reclaiming the home, not being a consumer. I'm not sure that its particularly radical, but I do like lots of the ideas. I can definitely relate to it since giving up work to be a mummy. When you work full time you do spend more money; for example, after work you might be too tired to cook so you buy a takeaway or a ready meal. At the end of a hard week, you might feel you deserve a nice new dress. I dont want to buy H plasticy toys made in sweatshops halfway round the world. The book talks about making toys for children, but you cant really avoid consumerism altogether, I mean I still had to buy the wool and the stuffing... The pattern was from Ravelry.

3. Making some lovely crocheted socks, just for me! I'm always making things for other people or for etsy, its sometimes nice to have a project that's just mine. Cosy socks for cosy evenings at home. They're made following this pattern.

4. What a horrible word 'weaning' is! H is 7 months old, and eating us out of house and home, and its nice that now we can all have bowls of porridge, just like the three bears. Mine has brown sugar, cinnamon, seeds and a sprinkling of bran.

5. Carving a Halloween pumpkin, then hiding upstairs with the lights off because we're scared of trick or treaters! We made spicy pumpkin soup the next day.

6. Best of all, my brother and his girlfriend had a baby girl, no name yet, but she was 2 weeks late and weighed 9lb 10!