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Thursday 20 December 2012

Happy Xmas Everyone

December has ambled along. The weather went from fiercely cold and icy to dismally wet and rainy. We hate the rain because it trickles down the walls on the third floor. The chimney rebuild was a great success! They are the best chimneys in the street, but the assumption that "the flashing looked OK so it was OK" has turned out to be erroneous. Obviously the flashing that we can't see is not OK. More work is now needed and so the scaffolding will go up again in January. Old houses have atmosphere and interesting features but they also exhibit the wear and tear of ages specially on the outside where the weather hits the roof.

Tinker entertains herself during the inclement weather by climbing the stairs instead of her out-door climbing frame. She found this wool in the stash on the top landing and liberated it.
It was a left over ball of white angora and probably had a more interesting aroma than the rest. She brought it down to the ground floor and then bit through the middle. Two very small things will now have to be knitted from the remains. I can't bear to throw it away. It was the only angora in the stash!
I do lots of cooking when I'm rained indoors. Here is a boiled fruit cake I made. You boil up the fruit with sugar, butter and in this case, fresh pineapple, juice and walnuts.
Then cool it and add the flour and eggs. Then you bake it. Oops!
But it tasted really good and we have nearly finished it all.
Just to go on a bit more about the gloomy weather and because it's the shortest day of the year tomorrow, I thought I'd include this pic of the workmen nearby using spotlights at 9.30 am so that they could get on with their work. It should amuse folks in Oz who rarely get up in the dark. 

Still it's not as bad as Siberia. Birds can freeze solid if they attempt to fly across the road in winter and they fall to the ground like a stone. No! don't ask me what they were doing there in the first place, they should have migrated. I just read it somewhere in a book and have carried a picture of it in my mind ever since
Cheers to all for the festive season.
Gillian

3 comments:

Lyn said...

Merry Christmas to you and yours xxx

love those cupcakes said...

Might have to give your boiled fruit cake a try (once the Christmas cake has been polished off, of course).

Wishing you a very merry Christmas.

carol said...

Yummy looking cake; cat with attitude... Happy happy 2013. I'm looking forward to your photographic record already.