Opal-licious

How could I have forgotten?

My wonderful mum has sent me some GORGEOUS Opal, bought from her LYS in Byron Bay. I sincerely hope that she didn't pay $20 odd for it, cause that's how much I have seen it for and it is way too much.

Her birthday is coming up and I think I might make her the infamous Clapotis - someone on the knitty board mentioned they were going to make it for their own mum so I can't take all the credit for such a brilliant idea. I'm thinking of making it in Noro silk Garden number 228 as she has red hair and is wearing lots of olive lately (that is she HAD red hair last time I saw her, in fact I don't think I've ever seen my mum's natural hair colour).. What do ya think?

We had the roof man come around today to check out the roof insulation situation - apparently only half of the house is insulated.... mmmm clever. Did they think that the half that was done was gonna stay warm with all the hot air escaping through the part that wasn't done? I can see this quote is gonna be more than our landlord will want to pay, because from past experience, landlords are stingy by nature. I think what happens is when you plonk the money down for the investment property all responsibility for it flies out the window. For example in our last house, we had a very dodgy deck - the nails in it were sticking up it was so bad. And standing around putting clothes on the line with a rusty nail in my foot is not my idea of a good time. We had pointed out this problem before we moved in and were assured that it would be fixed. WHEN it would be fixed I guess is something they neglected to tell us, because after over 2 years of living there they 'fixed' it.. by chopping that half of the deck off. Another surprise on this deck chopping day was our landlord saying 'oh no we won't be building for another year or so, so you're fine to stay' (yes another part of this sorry tale was the housing plans that went into the council that we discovered through our neighbour. Gee would be nice if maybe, uh I don't know, the AGENCY could inform us of these happenings).

Yes a surprise it was, even more of a surprise when we are given 2 months notice a week later. Another YEAR you say Mr Landlord? I think you might have been telling us small porkies...

Oh yes, the MJ! I almost forgot, I finished a sleeve!! I was TOTALLY panicking when I finished it, holding it up to DH's arm and thinking, hmmm this STILL looks too short. But hey, it's a rib, it has a lot of give, and I'll block it (see, 'blocking phobia' has given way to 'blocking SAVIOR').