Ospreys 'n' Knitting

I've been very remiss about keeping you up-to-date with the ospreys. A lot has happened. The female has stuck with the new male who turned up, and he has been a dab hand at turning up with fish. She laid three eggs, which is the usual osprey clutch, and they have all hatched.

The dad was seen with a length of fishing line attached to him, about 40 feet of it, which caused some anxiety for a while, but it seems to have fallen off and he is back on maximum fish duty. There's lots of feeding going on, and lots of chirping.The chicks are growing stronger by the day, visibly, and things appear at the moment to be going well.

When I was watching this last year, I was optimistic and possibly a little casual about it all, but none of last year's chicks made it - one died in the nest with a fair amount of help from the family, one disappeared over the ocean on the way to Africa, and the last one disappeared just as she was about to return earlier this year - so this year I am a bit more on edge.

Knitting
I was thinking that the pain I had in my right hand was down to excessive mousing, but I realized on Monday that it was probably down to excessive lace knitting, so I tore myself away, with considerable difficulty, from the off-blog project and have picked up the Silk Garden Lara again. This means I have a great heavy pile of mohair and lambswool on my lap during the hottest days of the year, but then that's what knitting is all about, isn't it?


I am doing the decreases using Fiona's method for getting smooth edges instead of steps. I saw it last year when she posted it, bookmarked it, and was able to find it again when I needed it, amazingly enough. It is absolutely brilliant.

A kind friend gave me a couple more balls of the yarn for my birthday and I think this may see it to the end, or to within about half an inch of the end if my luck is as usual. The colours really are gorgeous, and the greens are even brighter than they look here. And yes, one of the dark blues does match my nail polish, how did you know?

Politics
And to finish, the current theme song of the UK House of Commons -