I found two adorable hand-knit sweaters for Matthew in a charity shop near me last week. For the paltry sum of £1 each.
I always buy handknit clothes for my children when I see any in charity shops. I can't bear the idea that something which was made with so much loving care will end up in the wrong hands.
I wasn't expecting The Shawshank Redemption. I'd seen the first SATC film and I wasn't expecting anything in the way of plot or characterisation.
But, my God, SATC2 was terrible.
Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker) has a fantastic figure for designer clothe, moves beautifully and is well groomed. But she needs all the help she can get in the make-up and lighting departments - and, boy, she was let down. At some points, she looked like a horse with false eyelashes and a wig.
Carrie is supposed to be an expert about sex and relationships. So why does she behave like a daft teenager about Aiden? Any grown woman knows that you don't go out on a date with your ex unless you want sparks to fly.
She got her wish and married Big in the first film. Then - boo hoo - he preferred nights in with his slippers on while she still wanted to go out on the town. That's what happens when you marry an older man.
I just kept thinking - Stop complaining, Carrie! You married the man of your dreams AND he earns enough for you to have a dressing room that looks like the posh Village bit at Westfield? I'll put up with a TV in the bedroom and takeaway sushi for that!
And am I supposed to feel a shred of sympathy for Charlotte, who doesn't seem to work, yet has married well enough to be able to afford a full-time nanny for her two kids so that she can do lunch with her friends at a moment's notice.
I didn't find it empowering to listen to Samantha's sexual exploits. It came across as desperate - just as it would if a fiftysomething man kept bragging about his sexual exploits and what medication he needed to keep him going.
The last TV series of SATC ended on a high. Everyone got what they wanted, and in retrospect that should have been the end of that.
I'd like to think that we won't see Carrie, Charlotte, Miranda and Samantha on the big screen again. There's nowhere else for their characters to go but downwards. They are all in their mid forties (at least) and the sight of them acting as if they're too young to know any better is wearing a bit thin.
But I bet that the studios (and the actresses) won't be able to resist another fat pay cheque.
I had a rare evening to myself yesterday. I finished yet another cardigan for baby number two in front of "An Education" which was showing on Sky Movies.
I enjoyed this film hugely, not least because it is set in Twickenham, a London suburb where I lived for a couple of years in the 1990s.
Once the film was finished I couldn't face the dross that was on TV, so I decamped upstairs to see if there was anything worth watching on BBC iPlayer.
Friends and colleagues of mine have raved about a show called Outnumbered. The British sitcom about a middle-class couple and their precocious kids has been showered with praise and awards since it started a couple of years ago.
I was expecting big things. I hated it. The three children are horrid brats and their parents are so spineless that I'm surprised they can stand up straight. If this is what modern parents are supposed to aspire to, then I'm not surprised that so many children have never heard the word 'no' and are running rings round their ineffectual parents. Rant over!
It's the Little Star sweater from Adorable Knits by Zoe Mellor.
I did make one major change to the sweater. Several Ravellers said that the neckline in the original pattern was too tight. As I came to knit the neckline, I could see that there would be no way that it would fit over Matthew's head.
So I knit the green ribbed section straight (as opposed to in the round) and added snap fasteners.
The join between the navy and turquoise yarns was too loose, so I went over them again with some of the stray ends of yarn that any intarsia project accumulates.
Intarsia is deceptive. You get hooked in because you think 'how hard can a star motif be?'. Before you know it, there are several yarn trails that you constantly have to stop and untangle - and don't get me started on the number of ends I had to weave in.
I haven't been hibernating!
It's been a busy month, and the pace isn't going to let up.
I'm having another baby which is due in September and we're also trying to sell our house and find somewhere else to live. Knowing my luck, I'll end up giving birth and having to move in the same week.
After months of chopping and changing knitting patterns, I've frogged quite a few and settled on a shrug in last week's edition of The Knitter:
and a Little Star cotton sweater for Matthew:
