What a Week!

The sun is shining, the daffodils are out, D and I have had our first picnic of the year and at last spring really is on the way.

This last week has been a pretty momentous week in my world, particularly with the arrival of little baby Bobbin, who from now on will be known as Flora. Congratulations to Jenny and Pete – I can't wait to come on over and meet little Flora. Also, congratulations go out to D's twin, who got a new job teaching as a head of department at a particularly fine school just over the county line in Dorset. This means that he and his family will be moving closer, which will be all together lovely. M stayed with us the night before the interview and the night after and he found out that he'd got the job on Saturday morning, so we drove the short twenty miles to check out the town that he will be living in, stopped for a celebratory cup of tea at a really nice café/bookshop and checked out the local estate agents' windows.

That evening I went to my friend Claire's Hen Party, where we ate Claudia's amazing canapés and drank lots and lots of pink fizz. Throughout the course of the evening Claire had to answer a number of tricky questions including, "What really happened in the tree house...?" Great fun was had by all and there was none of the traditional tackiness!

Sunday was a momentous day indeed and heralded our first picnic of the season. Truth be told, it was still a little chilly, but there was quiche and potato salad left over from the party and an outdoor exhibition of plant photography at Lacock Abbey that I really, really wanted to see. The International Garden Photographer of the Year competition is held annually by the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in partnership with the National Trust and it's well worth a visit if you happen to be in Wiltshire. The National Trust museum also celebrates the art of photography and had a wonderful exhibition of pinhole photography by Jesseca Ferguson called Handmade Pictures.

On the needles, I have cast on for Coraline. I'm using 4ply so it may well take the rest of the year but I'm really pleased to be knitting something that I will really want to wear, with a pattern that's nicely challenging but not daunting (very important combination) and with a wool that is a pleasure to knit with.

I've also just finished a truly moving book, The Hand that First Held Mine by Maggie O'Farrell. It's a sad and beautiful book with a poignancy and inevitability that made me want to savour it as much as I wanted to race through to the end. I'm now off to buy some more of her books to keep me entertained on my forthcoming holiday in Cornwall. Wonderful!