Late August Bank Holiday Weekend

Funny English people. Americans have Memorial Day and Labor Day. The English: June Bank Holiday and Late August Bank Holiday. Descriptive, I guess.

In the true tradition of the August Bank Holiday, it was chilly and breezy, with intermittent showers. John caught me splashing in a puddle. Some things never change!

He also caught some rather intrepid sailors, outside of Levington. Brrr.

 I caught a few silhouetted masts.

And a big, blowsy dahlia. I love the colours. Pink and yellow? Why, yes, I think I will!

I really like this one, too. Especially the little purple & yellow flower photobombing at the bottom left.

I think I'm on a Big Book kick - I went from The Magician's Apprentice (700+pp) to Gone With The Wind (clocks in at 1000-ish). Zoinks. So far, I like GWTW. Scarlett has just met Rhett for the first time (I don't think that's a spoiler, do you?) and I'm interested to see where the next 850 pages go.

Look what I found

I was in London for work this week, meeting up with some suppliers over from New York. I ended up on the 8pm train back out to the sticks, but before I got on the train, I stopped in WHSmith for some reading material. (I'd finished The Magician's Apprentice, by Trudi Canavan, on the way down, definitely recommend it.)

And what did I find? A copy of this month's Real Simple. WOOT! And not just a randomly lurking copy, either. Do you see that? Down at the bottom left?

Here, let me show you. It has a £ price printed on it. None of this silly overstickered price business. I couldn't find a subscription card in it, though, which was a little sad. Glad to know that I'm no longer beholden to random transatlantic visitors importing single copies for me!

I went horse riding

This is Chloe. She lives near Durham (and is my sister-in-law's). She was nice enough to let me ride her last weekend. Very sweet, although became slightly devious when she clocked that I am Not A Confident Horsewoman. I did manage not to fall off, and we even cantered (at the same time)! WOOT!

Summer cooking

It's Travis' birthday this week. No choice but to make a chocolate cake, then. James helped a lot, which was good. The ganache split a little bit, but not spectacularly badly. Cake tasted awesome, though.

After letting it gather rather more dust than is probably healthy, John and James discovered how fabulous the George Foreman Grill is at making panini. English supermarkets have relatively recently started selling "panini bread," which are basically little flat-ish rectangular loaves that fit nicely in the grill. The current favorite combo (which I highly recommend) is ham, cheddar, and jalapenos. Here's mine from yesterday. YUM.

I'm also the proud owner of a very awesome new mug. The only improvement would be if the spanners were knitting needles.

Blue & green baby quilt

I read Roger Deakin's Waterlog last week - it finally came in at the library. I thought it was a little slow getting started, but I really loved it. I really miss swimming outside (Lake Fairlee, do you hear me?), especially in non-chlorinated places. And cold ones, like the Messalonskee Lake in June - brrrr! We managed to catch the Alice Roberts BBC4 programme on Wild Swimming, which was inspired by Deakin's book. Where's my BBC film crew to follow me around, huh? StowmarKate, the TV series. Anyone? Harumph.

I've finally had a chance to take a picture of the finished baby quilt that's about to wing its way to New York. It's Halfpenny Home natural cotton with stacked charms from my Moda Verna jelly roll. I used up most of the greens and blues (and all of the browns for the binding). I love it - I hope it likes its new home!

I joined the zillions of people reading The Help, and loved it. I've even reserved Gone With the Wind (which, somehow, I've never read) from the library. It had the potential to veer into melodrama at a few points, but managed to stay on the right side of the line as far as I was concerned.