Harmoniously done

Here's what's been happening in the last few days:
Sunday was not the best of days for me - you know when you put up a front of being cheerful but really there's nothing at all behind the facade? That was me. Sunny and full of poppy seeds on the outside, but hollow like the sound a baked-to-perfection kitke bread makes when tapped. Just one of those days. We did enjoy taking a meal around to Andreas and Danielle and combining it with whatever they found around the house - it was a fine spread of chicken casserole (had been slow-cooking all day), rice, peas, pineapple and biltong.
On Monday Nick wanted to clean the garage - I found a half hour slot to help him between coming home from work and going to the school for the boys. Er...this is the 'after' shot. Yes, really...it looked much worse than this 'before'!! The boys are thrilled to have the tent up again and will be sleeping in the garage this weekend when we have the Bucklands visiting. We consolidated and resorted a few of our 'oh-dear-what-do-we-do-with-this-thing-let's-put-it-in-the-garage' boxes and Nick resurrected his hands-free harmonica arrangement. He was standing in the kitchen playing it with his hands in his pockets...you NEVER stand around with your hands idle in my kitchen unless you're a house guest or an invalid!! I tasked him up. The boys thought the harmonica arrangement intriguing.
Tea was something different, which ran late because I was baking at the same time...not such a good idea but I suddenly felt a kitchen urge at 4.20 or thereabouts which found an outlet in a batch of cheese straws and spice and nut biscuits, along with ham steaks topped with pear and mustard sauce. The sauce sounded amazing in theory, but the boys and I were sweating and gagging on the spicy mustard...Nick loved it! I'll try it again but with a quarter of the recipe's suggested 30ml. If successful at the second sitting I'll post it to the blog.
Today, Tuesday, I was back to usual Lynnyness despite the weather which has turned south (that is to say, a southerly has blown in along with clouds, and it's been cold and windy today). I baked chocolate-chocolate cookies and currant and sesame oaty cookies before heading off to work which was, as always, just wonderful. Every day there is just a little more progress made toward the bigger picture stuff which is very satisfying, and also something new to learn or discover or enjoy. I also played about with polymer clay, having received via courier a pasta machine which will be used exclusively for clay - super handy for rolling out flat sheets from which shapes can be punched or cut. Nick has been hard at work with more wood chopping; he's had some chunks drying out on the garage roof which the boys helped him get down this evening.
And lastly, violin wars! Caleb is progressing quickly through his book - it's really helped that he's been taking piano, so dots on lines are not an unfamiliar concept. I've been getting a bit ahead of him which gets his goat in a big way, so tonight he did a bit of catching up. I was playing when he wanted to practice...I had to relinquish the instrument to its rightful player! Looks like we might each need one...