We’ve had a full-on month with two big, highly successful, shows and an eye operation for me. The first Knitting and Stitching Show in Belfast was a real humdinger, the best show we have ever done. Loads of people came up from the south as the Dublin Show was poleaxed by Brexit so we were the recipients of considerable pent-up demand.
Lots of walking into the city centre, which was very pleasant given all the pedestrian walkways and bridges. There were plenty of good restaurants and pubs with five million whiskeys behind the bar. One of the most memorable was a crazy pudding in a tasting menu. There was a chocolate pave, a titchy piece of deep fried Mars bar and an Irn Bru sorbet, weird but delicious.
Just over a week later we were heading for Harrogate which was also good. We ran out of two colours in the superfine double knit whilst our sock stock and hand dyed yarns were perilously low. It was icy cold and as our stand is right by the door many layers were required. Eventually Storm Bert arrived and we woke up to silent, snowy streets. Not for long though, it soon melted in the warm air.
Back at home the storm ripped our big farm sign off the barn, laid waste to a fence but all the trees and alpacas were still standing.
Then I had my eye operation to look forward to, not! This was a cataract removal and an omni procedure for glaucoma at the West of England Eye Hospital in Exeter. It was rammed. At some point a nurse asked everyone who was not a patient to stand up. Half the room were on their feet so she chucked them out so that the actual patients could sit down.
My blood pressure was through the roof but by the time it was all over and I was back at home, it was normal. I am a scaredy cat but actually it was painless and fine.
The aftermath is a lot more tedious, 28 days of many eye drops and no heavy lifting. Hay bales, feed buckets, shopping bags are all banned. And after that, the other eye.