Broody Hen

Our little white hen has gone broody. Happily, she seems quite content to be broody without sitting on any eggs, although we do have to pick her up occasionally to make sure that she's not snuck a couple of eggs under when we're not looking. While we're not anti more chickens (particularly given we only have two hens), this would be the wrong time of year for chicks. We'd also need to rehome at least one of the boys.

We're waiting for some parcels. I bought a slow cooker this week and a bread maker. The slow cooker was from Amazon as they don't exist here (loads of pressure cookers, but no slow cookers). I can't think that we'll be in a position to think about the kitchen for a while yet, so it seemed a good compromise for the winter. While our gas cooker is OK, it is really only like a glorified camping stove with two heat settings - on and off, so a slow cooker will allow us to cook stews and things without having to watch them for burning. The bread maker may seem a strange purchase, however we eat a lot of bread (not having a kitchen and having an outdoor sink means that we steer clear of meals with a lot of food prep) hence bread and cheese is often a favoured option (or bread and meatballs for Ian, who could quite happily live on meatballs it appears). So we thought that making our own bread would give us a bit more variation.

It appears that my monitor has dried out without any problems so I don't need a new one yet, so instead I'm thinking about getting a dishwasher. We'd budgeted for one in the new kitchen, however getting it now might be useful and certainly more convenient than standing outside to do the washing up!

I've been taking part in the BBC Brain Train experiment. So far my results have gone down rather than up, which wasn't the result I was hoping for - however early days....

Rain

Well, we had a day of storms. Windy and wet.

....and sadly my workshop roof leaked, which was disappointing. I guess, however that we'll just have to live with this level of leaks. It is better than it has been and I think that the strong wind probably blew the rain under the tiles which would have made it worse. But what did happen, was the water dripped onto my computer monitor and obviously something happened in side, because the top is melted. We can use it, but I think I'll use it as an excuse to get a modern flat screen monitor. Mine is a cast off from Ian, who couldn't use it as the colours are dodgey, which - of course - is bad for his print work.

Today it is sunny again though, and the weather is much warmer again now. It is getting colder at night, though. So much so that I dyed a blanket for the bedroom. Thinking about it, trying to dry a wet wool blanket is probably what signified the start of the rain.

Been finishing off my Halloween projects for About.com, including these cone witches that Mum helped me with when she was here :



The project is here - Cone Witch People and a round up of my Halloween projects is here - Halloween. I'll next be turning my attention to Christmas projects. I've a few done and ready to write up.

FreeNeedle still doing well and MakeForBaby and MakeForChristmas have been relaunched. I'll be working on MakeForBusiness this week with a view to getting that launched mid-November.

I'm ready for my close up meow!

I just got back from the pilar and filling up our water container to find Tibs making her presence known from the roof of the barn. I had my camera with me as I always take it with me when filling up with water in case the pilar should be looking particularly photogenic. Today it looked particularly green.

I saved Tibs her blushes and haven't posted the three pictures that immediately followed this one as she slid cartoon cat style down the door in an only slightly controlled descent.

I'm starting to think that Kate's purchase of the camera was an attempt to get me posting on the blog more. I do believe this makes two this year.

She's also bought me a pro account on Flickr this week which she said I could use to add images to the blog. I haven't set it up yet, but don't be surprised if you see another blog post from me this side of Christmas.

MakeForBaby

When I said that we've been disappointed with the performance of MakeForBaby, perhaps I was expecting some form of miracle, as we noticed that we didn't have advertising on many pages - hence the fact it didn't generate much (any) revenue. So this has been relaunched too, with the new page layout and more prominent ads.

Initial figs from FreeNeedle have been excellent. We don't seem to have lost any visitors because of the more blatant advertising and the advertising revenue has increased significantly. I'm going to leave it a week to do any proper analysis, however so far so good.

New MakeForBaby is here - http://www.makeforbaby.com/

New FreeNeedle

The new FreeNeedle site has been relaunched - FreeNeedle. It's doing really well at the moment, and after two approaches recently from people wanting to buy it, we've decided that if we're not going to sell it, which we're not, then it is worth putting some effort in to it.

You will notice that the adverts are more prominent, which we thought long and hard about. However it is supposed to be a commercial site and advertising is an accepted way of funding websites, hence the change.

We've also decided on the next FreeNeedle-alike. It's going to be CraftBusinessInformation and it's going to be a directory of information for people selling crafts. This is a huge area and one that is growing, so a good directory of information should have a wide audience. The search facility and the database that Ian has built means that we can include information pertinent to specific countries as well as generic information (for instance include links to information on UK tax for small businesses as well as US, Canada, Australia etc in addition to generic tax information...). People can then refine their search based on their country.

Hopefully it won't take us long to get it off the ground as we will just reuse the FreeNeedle model. This is the beauty of the concept, we can just copy it as many times as we have ideas for. However, we've been disappointed with the performance of MakeForBaby so the model isn't necessarily a sure fire success.

At the moment we are having creative differences over the design of the new site. I think that a sock monkey would be an excellent logo. Ian, needless to say, doesn't.

I fear I am fighting a losing battle.

Ian and Fibs

Noone can say that we don't have fun. Or perhaps, noone can say that we don't give the cats a never ending supply of amusement. Today we were trying to take pics of a paper chandelier, which is a project I am just winding up. Fibs was unimpressed (so was Ian by the look on his face). Hopefully neither Ian nor Fibs will end up in the final version.

Clever

I use the British Council website sometimes in my English classes. There is a wide range of games that are educational. However, today I came across this - http://www.britishcouncil.org/kids-games-magic-monkey.htm.

Try it and then think how to explain to an amazed 14 year old how it works. BECAUSE IT DOES didn't seem to answer his questions and he seemed not to believe that the computer could read his mind. On the plus side, it did render him speechless.

Gosh, is it that time of year already?

Thought perhaps I should confirm my existence by posting on the blog once again. Fortunately, following my birthday I've not been spending time with sheep or a knitting machine, but have been learning more about the camera that Kate bought me. It was a surprise to say the least, but I'm having some fun with it.

Whilst sitting in the health centre this morning I was able to read about flash compensation and so avoid eye contact and any prospect of conversation though obviously it doesn't work like that here. I spent a few minutes looking blankly at a couple of ladies who were talking at me and was relieved that my turn came up. I can only imagine the conversation I left behind.

Lady #1 "I've no idea how he's going to explain what he wants to the doctor."

Lady #2 "Oh don't worry about that. We saw him in the supermarket once miming a courgette. He's really rather good."

Lady #1 "Oh yes, I remember now. He wanted a couple of large onions too I recall."

As mentioned below, the van has gone, but I did get to use it one last time on Friday. I took the picture below while sat on the top of the van to get a view over our back wall.

What's Missing?

The van was taken for scrap. The scrap man kept saying he would 'make it disappear'. We kept assuring him that it was legal (we scrapped it in the UK a couple of years ago), but he seemed to prefer the thought that he was going to do a disappearing act with it. It was sad to see it go!

The car passed its ITV (MOT) today too. Ian just came back with a big grin. First time it passed first time...

The Weather is Getting Cooler

We know it is getting cooler as Tinks starts to search out Basil to lie on!

Early Morning Photo Session

Last Sunday we got up early to watch the sun rise and take pictures. Here's mine.