I Can Crochet Update

I can definitely crochet. 

At least I can make granny squares, join them together with a crocheted seam, work a border around them and then neatly finish off the edge with double crochet. 

So here's the great unveiling of my very first completed crochet project.

I must admit to being quite pleased with the end result and it will go to my mother-in-law in the nursing home in Bridgend as a gift for her Christmas Eve birthday. I'm going to press it gently and then wrap it so its all ready for when I need to post it. One less thing to do later in the year.

I'm now looking forward to starting on another project since I've been concentrating on this one for a while. Or perhaps I could attempt to finish off my hexie quilt. Or should I start on something completely new? Or make more bags?  Decisions, decisions. I think a delve into my magazine stash for inspiration is the order of the day. Any excuse to spend a few hours looking at lovely crafty stuff.

In other news, on the strength of her performance as Mary Magdalene in Jesus Christ Superstar, DD3 has been asked to perform in a play at the Marlowe Theatre in Canterbury. She will play the possessed daughter of one of the characters in a production called Horror Box at the end of September. I'm not sure whether I shall go to see it as she says its really scary.  Despite my enjoying True Blood and Penny Dreadful and such like on TV, I'm not so sure I can stomach that kind of horror on stage, especially as it looks like the audience might be involved in the action. I'm sure her brothers and sisters will enjoy it though. She's also in the local dramatic society's pantomime of Snow White, although she doesn't know what role she'll have yet. Now that's far more my kind of thing these days. She's also been asked to sing again at the Town Hall later this year in another 'music from the musicals' event. She'll be singing 5 songs this time including a duet with her boyfriend and another with the guy who played Judas in JCS. As she also has a full time job she's going to be rather busy with work and rehearsals over the next few months.

Since today is Thursday, we had our regular sandwich dinner tonight. Sandwich Night originated a few months ago when it was only DS1 still living at home. He would go to his Anime club on a Thursday night so DH and I would just have sandwiches and sometimes soup or salad for dinner. Since DS2 moved back home and the Anime club is on a break over the summer, I now make a bit more of an effort for the 4 of us, but we still have something bread-related for Thursday dinner. For tonight I made cheese-topped finger rolls, grilled pork sausages and fried onions. 

The rolls were made with bread flour from Approved Foods and yeast from Aldi, and just a couple of ounces of extra strong cheddar on offer in Morrisons. The sausages were 99p for 8 from Aldi and these are our favourite ordinary pork sausages as they are nice and firm and don't shrink much. The onions were also from Aldi.

I also made a tray of brownies as a treat for dessert to serve with vanilla ice cream. 

My greedy lot wolfed everything down so quickly it was only at the last minute I manage to snap a few pictures.

As I'm trying hard to stick to my diet lately and stay off the bread and cake, I had Quorn sausages, eggs fried using Frylight spray and baked beans, and a yogurt for dessert (although a few brownie crumbs might have snuck into my mouth when I was cutting them into pieces). 

Talking of my weight...guess who got her 4 1/2 st award this week?  I've had a surge of determination during the past few weeks and have lost 5 lbs over a 3 week period despite having 2 birthdays to celebrate. I've also raised my target by a few pounds so I now only have 4 1/2 lbs to lose. I decided to settle for a slightly higher target weight and will try to stay a couple of pounds below it rather than aim for lower and have trouble maintaining, which is what has happened in the past.

Right, I think that's all I have for now. Hope the weather is better where you are than it is here in Dover. Whatever happened to our summer?