Canberra's best kept secret

The parents took me out to dinner last night. Despite the tantalising salad (!) in the 'fridge and the rapidly deteriorating bucket of plums on the kitchen floor, I readily agreed to an invitation to dinner at the Yacht Club.

As it turned out, it was fish and chips from the takeaway at the bottom of the Yacht Club, eaten outside, and overlooking Lake Burley Griffin. The food was ordinary - good chips, not good potato cakes, reasonable fish - but the drinks were at club prices, and it was cool and the breeze stiff enough to blow the flies away. We sat and enjoyed the view of the lake to Black Mountain. The last of the sailing boats were heading in after a day's sailing and the swans and ducks were floating in a aquatic ballet that was mesmerising. Not a bad way to end the day.

It was, however, only a brief respite from the tyranny of the plums. 16 kilos down and need to finish this morning, as they won't hold any longer.

Knitting has taken second place to all this culinary drudgery. I'm at the point where the sock needs to turn on its heel and as it's my first ever sock, need to sit with some uninterrupted time to get it right. In fact none of the OTN projects are at the easy, no-brain knitting stage, so at midnight last night, I sat down and started a baby beanie.

The baby stash is completely depleted (unless we have a crop of premmies). The pink and blue baby cardies are about to unravelled because the bands are hideous in cotton and will not hold their shape. The yarn can become booties or some such. There are 3 BC babies due soon, and some non-gender specific yellow and mint green baby yarn surfaced in the post-Christmas stash cleanup. The bri-nylon is not bad to knit with and certainly easier for the new mum's to care for than my preferred wool.

It's our first Sunday arvo Stitch 'n' Bitch this afternoon and I'm looking forward to it no-end. The trading basket is stuffed with yarn and patterns, there are FOs to show and tell, and bags of patterns and needles to lend or return to various of our intrepid knitters.