Good evening, Mr Bond …

Happy New Year!

Whether the last week has been a celebration for you or not, I hope you were warm and safe and surrounded by people who love you – and hope that 2025 brings you everything you need and desire! xx

We’ve been surprisingly busy over the Christmas and New Year week with family get-togethers and time out doing things.  Today is the first day we seem to have had to do not very much at all, and I thought it would be a good time to sit down and chat to you, and show you the few photos I have from the last week.

It’s got much colder over the last couple of days.  We had a rainy Christmas (I think I can only remember two proper white Christmases in my lifetime), then there was a storm warning and it rained and rained at New Year and there has been some terrible flooding (I hope it hasn’t affected you) and now the temperature has dropped and there’s snow forecast.  Crazy weather!

We went out to Delamere Forest, a large Forest England-managed forest about half an hour’s drive away from us, on Christmas Eve to get some fresh air before we dived into a few days of too much chocolate and turkey.  We were lucky that it was dry when we were there and we had a lovely time – just the four of us and the dog.

The pools around the trees were more full than the last time we’d been because of all the rain, but it was so still that the reflections were beautiful.

Big daughter stayed at her house with her boyfriend on Christmas Eve as is the right thing to do – but it was very strange not to have her with us first thing on Christmas morning!  She came over quite early though, her boyfriend called in for a brew on the way to his Mum’s house and we had a jolly day of suiting ourselves.  I cooked Christmas dinner in my pyjamas and I can highly recommend the freedom of doing that if you feel like it! 🙂

It’s been so wet and rainy that the dog has not been keen to go out at all, but I persuaded him that he might like a walk across the fields yesterday as it had been frosty and I thought the ground might be a bit drier.

On the way home, I happened to look back and there, through the trees, was a fragment of a rainbow.  Can you see it?  It’s so low down that you could miss it … although if you could find the end then there would surely be a pot of gold there!

On Friday, not so small daughter and I went into Liverpool to watch at favourite film at FACT, a gallery and cinema which shows arthouse films as well as new releases – my film student has spent a lot of her time there watching films that are definitely not mainstream, much as you’d expect from a film student!

This was the film we went to see …

We’ve lost count of the number times we’ve watched this on video and then later, DVD, and we jumped at the chance of watching it on a big screen – and we weren’t disappointed!  The cinema was cold, though, and we wished we’d taken a couple of blankets with us! 🙂

The Christmas socks for not so small daughter and her boyfriend didn’t get finished.  I managed to finish one of not so small daughter’s and was half way down her boyfriend’s first sock when I realised I’d have to gift them on the needles as they were, so that’s what I did.  My IOU letter came in handy!  I don’t have a decent photo of them even half-finished so I’ll make sure that I take one of those to show you later.  I’m making them with Winwick Mum yarns so they may well be my Winter Haven KAL project to get them finished off!

What I have been trying my best to finish over Christmas (now that the pressure of the Christmas socks is off, although I really must get them done soon) is the Kate Davies mystery knit-along shawl that I started last year.  It’s been a mammoth task and not my favourite knit of the year.  Still, it’s been an interesting process and I’ve learnt a few things – plus it’s been a good opportunity for me to practice my Continental knitting with all the garter stitch.  I am not a fan of garter stitch at all so maybe that should have been the sign I needed not to start, but I was keen to join in as I’ve never done anything like this before.

I’m onto the last section – section four of four – and it’s short row segments with slip stitch lines that make it look a little bit like tartan.  I’m further on than this photo now; this is the first segment of five and I’m now on the fourth segment.  Despite my Continental knitting improving, I’m still not very fast so it’s been fairly slow going, plus I ended up taking the segment you can see out shortly after this photo as I’d managed to go wrong on the short rows.  I was a more than a bit frustrated, but it’s been easy knitting (once I got going and thought to use a stitch marker to help me) so has been quite a good thing to have had in my hands over the last week.  I just want it done now, though; I’ve got plans for this year and this shawl is not one of them! 🙂

The first of those plans is the Winter Haven KAL which will start next Friday, 10 January 2025.  I’m going to post the “heads up” post tomorrow so that you have got time to see what’s involved and whether you might like to join in, and decide which pattern you might want to knit and whether you can use stash or need to go shopping.  There’s going to be a new pattern out on the blog next week (Thursday 9 January) especially for the KAL, or you can use another Winwick Mum pattern and/or Winwick Mum yarn to join in – I’ll put all the details in the post for tomorrow so do come back and check if you think you’d like to take part!

Before I leave you today, Hattie and Astrid have a few words of wisdom for the New Year.

Hattie says that you should always look after yourself first because self-care is never selfish and if what feels good to you is the equivalent of sitting in a paper bag some days, then you should do it.

Astrid says she’s been expecting you …

and that taking on the world with confidence and a hard stare might be just what you need to make 2025 the best year yet – after all, would you mess with that face?!

She was very good at Cluedo, we’re going to teach her poker next 🤣

PS  I’ve Googled and it looks like the phrase “Good evening, Mr Bond … I’ve been expecting you” might be one of those “legend” phrases that never actually got said in a film.  It suits Astrid, though 🙂