Weekend activities

These included an allotment visit, to see which seeds had dared to germinate this cold month ... the carrots and beetroot were happily defiant; the peas had poked tentatively up, only to be chomped by rain-fuelled slugs; and the parsnips were clearly hedging their bets. Still, it was a lovely day, and I came away with flowers to arrange (er, stick in a vase) and herbs to cook with (lovage, mint and chives). This is a warts-and-all photo: the brown bottle is the cat's laxative ...

I aired bedding, and admired my new just-for-sewing ironing board, set up right next to the trusty old Husqvarna inherited from my grandmother:

I made use of the sewing machine to stitch one of the items in my rather full mending basket, a charity shop print dress which my oldest daughter wanted the hem taking up on and the neck ruffle removed from (she does floral but not frilly). Other items included younger daughter's coat (ripped lining) and other half's new-to-him hat, which is a lovely one, but with an inner band which itched something awful apparently, till I covered it with a wee strip of soft black and white polka dot cotton.

NB It is EXTREMELY unusual for anything to resurface from my mending basket in less than a fairly large number of months. When they were younger, the children had an annoying tendency to outgrow things before I got to them ...