Apron strings

Hooray, I am getting my hair turned back to one colour rather than this grey on top brown below number I am currently sporting. Oh the joys of growing old!

I was supposed to be starting a diet with a proper diet lady in Wimbledon but she keeps changing the dates so this is just never going to happen. I can't really be bothered anyway. I'll stay fat for now and have a cupcake that looks like a little sheep.

Due to wall to wall football on the telly I made a brilliant apron yesterday evening. It's doggie. In fact I made two. Even Mr Smith thought they were quite jolly with their nice red tape that arrived yesterday - enough for 74 aprons but it was a good deal on eBay.

Cut glass accents

The Student son failed his driving test which is good news for the Apprentice son as they share a car. To be honest, I am not the least bit surprised but then I don't think anyone in the whole world should pass a driving test, especially not Mr Smith who squashes cyclists and berates all other road users at all times. Oh driving with him is a load of jolly japes, I can tell you.

Mondays are stained glass class days. I've decided I hate Stained Glass. I not only hate the class, the teacher, the other bonkers students, the glass the lead and everything else but I don't actually like stained glass unless it is very fine and in a church. I am beginning to dislike Mondays.

The Apprentice and I went to Spitalfields Market to the Crafts Council show which was fabulous - Oh makers are so so clever. This has restored my faith in all things hand made and why we bother. Lovely.

All bunged up

The student is taking his driving test tomorrow. In order to ward off the dreaded lurgy and ensure the child is well for his test I bought something to shove up the boys' noses. No, not tissues though I did get some of those too. It's an assuringly expensive spray for virus prevention. As they have watched me get iller and iller they have been snorting more diligently than a couple of cocaine addicts. It seems to work ... a bit ... though we're not sure it doesn't give you slight coldy symptoms, much sneezing etc. Maybe it is cocaine.

Off to stained glass class today ... at which I am useless.

I cooked Mr Smith his favourite pudding last night - treacle sponge. He has just got the newspaper stuck to the table. Must get a cloth before I am exterminated ... again.

In recovery

Tried setting up a Paypal account lately? Impossible. Maybe this is because neither the Apprentice nor I have on-line banking - so no eBay buys for us. Oh woe. Well, actually, we negotiated other forms of payment (such as Mr Smith's credit card). My purchase is a mile of red apron string so everyone can have a lovely apron made by me and not spill their Christmas dinners down their fronts and the Apprentice seems to have bought something electronic ... and expensive.

My cold is much better - it's now a cough. I am thinking of venturing out in search of knitting yarn for the knitted dogs and walk our real dog. I am still pretty knackered from this vile germ and definitely not up for Zumba or a giant walk. I am more up for a bit of languishing on the sofa catching up on X Factor. Mr Smith came in half way through last night marring my enjoyment by asking constantly "Where's Cheryl". Oh Malaria Mary, we're bored with her. Mr Smith rubbishes all the contestants hoping I'll change channel - Simon Cowell is compassionate in comparison.

When in doubt make a cupcake.

Internet Dating Jane and Jack, her dog, popped round for tea and biccies before dashing off for her flying lesson. Next week she is going to Scotland with her latest Internet Date. A date in the West Highlands. I wonder if they'll meet any West Highland terriers. I wonder whether he will wear a kilt. I wonder if he's nice. So much to wonder about.

In a desperate bid to feel better I have a batch of cupcakes in the oven. These probably smell divine - no idea, can't smell anything as still so bunged up with cold. I am in a good mood today and feel well enough to walk the dog and crack on with my Canadian quilt - that one that is Mighty Tricky. It involves lots of applique and frankly I am a bit rubbish at applique but I'm getting better. And of course I have to make my House of the Day.

The student son is an expensive toy. He needs constant wodges of money. Today he has to pay a driving instructor £300 for intensive driving and a test on Tuesday. I am so deliriously happy not to have to take him out I will pay the money. I thought I had carefully delegated the task to Mr Smith but he is doing a different kind of driving altogether on the golf course. All day. And it's not raining. Flaming shirker.

Housing project

My little quilty houses are going very well; I have managed a whole village, soon to be a town. On the other hand I have failed to finish any of the nine hundred other projects I have on the go. I started my Canadian quilt a couple of weeks ago but it is so damned difficult you really have to be in the mood and feel quite well which I, with this awful snuffling cold, am definitely not.

Fabulous book on knitted dogs has arrived. I feel a poodle coming on. Need yarn - something white and poodly.

I am sure Mr Smith would like to go away on golf tour or something so I can make things without him tutting. I like making things, I don't like tutting. He has handed me a VERY IMPORTANT financial letter which I am pretending I've read. I did try to read it but I got a bit lost at ISAs and bonds and things. Surely he knows what I keep him for; so I don't have to look at boring bits of incomprehensible financial scary stuff. I feel an apron coming on with nice red ties and dogs on the pocket.

The Big Tissue

God, I am fed up with this awful cold.

The house that Jill built

I felt so horribly ill yesterday I had to cancel my scheduled walk with the Dynamic Denise and stay in bed for the morning. This restorative rest was interupted at frequent intervals by the postman delivering me all my recent internet buys. God, the rubbish one orders when not paying attention. I got the wrong lightbulbs, the wrong dental flossers and the wrong attachment for my new clover iron (a teeny iron for pressing seams). I settled down to Arabella Wier's new book which was disappointingly not as good as I had hoped. Oh well, it wiled away some ill time between nose blows. I think shopping in shops is probably a less hazardous way of making purchases; I just couldn't be arsed to go there.

I made my first house but it's not quite what I had in mind .... a bit too perfect. I'm aiming at something a bit scruffier. Back to the drawing board.

Social housing

Just had a brilliant idea whilst blowing my nose for the eightieth time in the last minute. That is apart from killing Mr Smith for giving me this stinky cold. He went to the optician this morning, or rather the opthalmic optometrist at the eye clinic, and is now wandering around the house in a pair of prescription sunglasses avoiding sunlight looking like a vampirish Stevie Wonder but less charismatic.

Now about the idea: I want to make a quilt of hundreds of little houses. I realise this might take some time, not just an afternoon, so I have apportioned the task and I now plan a House a Day. Every day I will make a little house and show it to you (technology permitting). Then, at the end of a few months or years I will have made enough to cover a bed. This could be fun when travelling as I will have to make my houses out of scrap materials I find or cut up my clothes or Mr Smith's clothes. I feel it ought to tell a story - preferably not of divorce or death by scissors.

I went to my first stained glass making class yesterday. I was rubbish. It's mighty tricky getting the glass to break in exactly the right place. The other students seem to be certifiably insane - I fit in well.

Atishoo

I have a cold, the dog also has a cold - we caught it from Mr Smith. "Don't say I never give you anything" says Mr Smith. His generosity knows no bounds.

Mood map

The Apprentice and I went to the British Library to see a fabulous exhibition of maps. It was the penultimate day before the end of this exhib so it was a bit argy bargy but with sharp elbows and a few excuse mes we got to see more than the backs of people's heads. Many mappa mundi later we felt a bit mapped out and could hardly bear to look at the tube map to get home - the mainline was being engineered.

Mr Smith was in a bait. This was because I wasn't there to wait on him when he came home from golf and he had to walk the dog. He has a cold which I know he will charmingly pass on to me. I refused to cook his dinner. This is because I didn't want to perform a roast chicken with all the paraphenalia and washing up; I wanted to watch X Factor and have a sausage in a bun for dinner. He cooked sausages but only for himself. He is beginning to get me down a bit - time for a seaside jaunt methinks only I seem to be getting a cold.

Home making

Gosh, so busy mostly doing nothing much. I am getting a bit fed up with the Apprentice sitting around the house all day driving me bonkers. He is supposedly building the Shed. He is taking architectural courses, buying architectural books, downloading architectural drawing programs all for a bleeding garden shed that comes in a kit! I despair. He has just bought himself a new computer to help with his shed building. I don't know why he can't bugger off to work like everyone else. I'm finding his presence puts me of my stride in staring into space.

I am currently making my Canadian patchwork quilt which involves applique. This involves much calling Mary Clare, my patchwork teacher friend, to glean knowledge over the blower - mighty tricky when it's something you need to be shown; think of teaching someone to knit over the phone, or worse, learning. Anyway progress is being made; I have a million little bits and nobody can get to the iron. I am hoping to rationalise it a bit today and stop making such a dreadful mess before Mr Smith has a darleck moment.

Gifted

Gosh, everyone bought me presents. Mr Smith bought me lillies which I added to the lillies Dynamic Denise not only presented me with but then arranged in a very clever way with the crinkly cellophane in the bottom of the vase. Quite magnificent. Then the boys turned up with fabulous gifts - a book on cupcakes for the Cupcake Queen, me, and a pack of maps of London walks. I was just thinking of putting on my walking boots again so this was perfect timing. They also bought DVDs for Mr Smith so we can watch films ... together. Well, we don't walk together as he strides ahead and makes it all woefully competitive and he hasn't shown much interest in the cakes department as yet.

I cooked an Anniversary feast of lamb, ratatouille and an experimental potato thing. Mr Smith complained the rat was too watery. Oh well, I tried. We finished with choux pastry swans. I was too tired to focus. Next big effort meal will definitely need a bit more forethought, i.e. make some of it the day before, and don't perform aqua zumba, shopping and cupcake masterclass prior to the event.

Twenty Six

Mr Smith and I have been married for 26 years today. Quite an achievement even if we do say so ourselves. We would throw a big party and invite you all round but we haven't quite recovered from the one we had last year.

My friend Dynamic Denise came round for a cupcake masterclass. She is an expert cook and very creative. I felt rather smug knowing that bit more than her and realising I hadn't acquired it all in a couple of hours at a mate's house. I imparted some of my pearls of, mostly self-taught, wisdom kindly not ommitting the vital parts. Really cupcakery is just an expensive hobby that you can eat. Actually, it's much less expensive than Mr Smith's hobby of wine; a really expensive hobby you can drink, or golf, a really really expensive hobby you can bore on about for twenty six years.

Learning curves

I went to sign on for a patchwork course but met a friend at the college who persuaded me to do stained glass instead. This could be fun - do you think it involves oxycetylin torches? I have visions of beautiful Burne Jones church windows but will probably make a teeny little star and be terribly proud of it.

I've got toothache. I think if I ignore it it might go away. It might.

Fish for dinner - brain food

Since I am the only person in this house even vaguely on British Time, I had a very efficient day. I wrote a list of tasks then crossed them off one by one. The offspring emerged from their beds at about midday wanting to know what was for lunch. One of my tasks involved a trip to Waitrose to top up our fish supply for tonight's fish pie as I felt the one meagre cod steak would not stretch to four people. When I got back the student anounced he was going out! Oh the trials of being a mother/b&b owner/restaurant manager/chef etc.

I decided to tackle the horribly complicated patchwork quilt kit I bought in Canada. I now have several options open to me. I could put it down as a bad buy and bin it or give it away, sign on for a hideously expensive course or slog on regardless. All the above will annoy Mr Smith. I have chosen to persevere. My God, it's tricky. I had to go to a printer to get the pattern enlarged. The printer was as flummoxed as me. I have laid it all out on my cutting table in the ironing room but now Mr Smith wants to iron so I will have to put it all away again. We need a larger house... and a sewing lady. And a cook.

Honey Kruller, I'm home

We were on the motorway on the way to the airport when the doors of a Tim Horton's donut lorry in front of us flew open and all the donuts landed on our car so we had to stop so I could lick them all off .... then I woke up and found we were landing at Heathrow. It was a lovely dream. I think I need therapy to overcome my Canadian donut addiction. Of course I could proceed to Krispy Kremes to make a comparison.

I am not too jet lagged. I am a bit tired but have got back to British time quite quickly unlike Mr Smith who slept all morning as did the Apprentice. How lazy. I did spend the morning in bed but that was different, I was reading and occupying my mind.

Mr Smith has just found me the most heavenly dogs to knit. See Best in Show at www.muirandosborne.co.uk. I have ordered the pattern book, so stand by for Christmas when you will all be getting a knitted dog.

Pack up your troubles

My kit bag is suddenly very small and I am trying to ram Canada into it as sadly this is the last day of our great Canadian holiday.

What I have loved in Canada: - absolutely everything especially the gorgeous light and fluffy donuts, the delicious lobsters and Canadian breakfasts of pancakes and maple syrup.

What I didn't like: Wallmart - it's identical to ASDA. It was like a bad dream where I woke up back in England before my holiday had finished.

And now I'm off to an all night party on an uncomfortable British Airways flight home. I think I'll start planning my next holiday right away.

O O Ottawa

Mr Smith and I drove off to Ottawa, thinking it was a little trip down the road. Five hours later we were still driving in the pouring rain - a little bit further than we anticipated. It was worth it as it is a great city. Once again we stayed in hotel posh. I swam in the art deco pool and felt virtuous then hit the donut shop. The art gallery was quite superb. The weather cheered up and we wandered along the Rideau Canal and admired the sites being good tourists.

To to Toronto

Mr Smith and I Torontoed. We stayed at a very grand hotel and felt swanky. Having sent the Apprentice son off to meet a friend, I met Lovely Lauren, my niece, and mosied around a couple of museums and learnt how to explore Toronto; the subway is super easy. Mr Smith and I then had an excellent two days on our own spending much money and seeing many a site.

The weather suddenly changed from scorching to freezing - well very rainy - overnight. We went Amish hunting at the farmer's market. We found some pretty bonneted girls behind their strawberries but I became a bit suspicious of their supposedly frugal lifestyles as they were selling imported fruit from the States and there seemed little evidence of horse and cart; perhaps they had flown to market in their private jet?