Hmmmm, I've been quite quiet lately, I haven't posted since the 12th.

OK, so since then I have celebrated my 35th birthday, remembered my dad who died 3 years ago on the same day - it was doubly hard this year as my birthday was also father's day.

I also did a lot of discount in my shop that day and much to my disappointment I only sold one braid of fibre - shame, I've recently started stocking merino/bamboo fibre and SW merino yarn - both are really fluffy and soft!

I've had an ongoing battle with my squeaky wheel - the squeak was awful and I just couldn't get rid of it. Majacraft were adamant it was the treadle hinges, I was just as adamant that it wasn't. Sometimes the creak would completely disappear, but within minutes it would be back. It got louder and louder and the creaks were longer and longer.

In the end - just to shut them up - I followed Majacraft's advice and disassembled my wheel. I took off the foot plate - no difference. Then I removed the crank assembly from the drive wheel - no difference. I put talc on the green sponge things that attach the rods to the treadle - no difference. I took the treadle hinges off, cleaned them and put them back on - no difference. The noise was definitely coming from somewhere around the crank assembly!

I removed the nut that holds the drive wheel in place (I've had trouble keeping that sucker on too - it has a bad habit of coming undone while I'm spinning!) - it still squeaked, I removed the crank assembly (again!) - I turned the wheel by hand and it still squeaked, I took my little felted bag off the knob on the front and removed the wooden knob on the front - the squeak stopped!

I triple checked and then got Alex to listen, there was definitely no squeak. I put the wooden knob back on, rehung the bag, put the nut back on, reattached crank assembly and still no squeak.

Yay me, I thought then decided to spin some of the corriedale fleece I've been carding lately. It spun absolutely fine then the drive band popped off. I got up to check and - sure enough - the nut was undoing itself and the wheel was coming apart as I was spinning. I tightened the nut up and started spinning again and the squeak was back!

I've loosened the nut very slightly, I shall have to test it to find that spot where the nut doesn't undo but the wheel doesn't squeak when in use!

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Late last night - well, 2am this morning actually, I went on one of my mad cleaning binges and blitzed the kitchen because the mess was doing my head in again. It was spotless when I went to bed and I was very pleased with myself. This morning, I got up, dyed some yarn for Kerry and decided to have a shower while that was cooking.

Naturally the shower was clogged - it's always clogged! I went at it with a plunger, cleared it as much as possible then had a shower myself.

I came back downstairs to get dressed and get on with the day. I was sitting here in my chair listening to the drain outside and moaning to Alex about the amount of time it takes the shower to drain (personally I think there may be a kink in the waste pipe, but the plumber disagrees!).

I went out to turn the steamer off to find a flood in my kitchen! There was water literally pouring through the kitchen ceiling, it was all over the floor and the breakfast bar. I ran straight back upstairs thinking that my enthusiasm with the plunger had somehow caused the waste water pipe to disconnect, but the shower was empty. There was also the sound of running water coming from behind the shower!

I panicked, I've never had to deal with anything like this before! I ran next door and woke mum up (she works nights) and we ran round the house trying to find out which stopcock would shut off the torrent. In the end I went outside to turn the supply to the entire house.

I couldn't turn the tap and ran to the pub to drag a man back to do it for me in the end LOL.

We had called Graham, but he wasn't around although we were assured he would be told immediately on his return home.

I surveyed the damage; my lovely clean tidy kitchen was absolutely swimming and I had no dry towels! I had washed some the night before and had another load in the machine, we found what little we had, raided mum's house too and mopped up as best we could.

I suppose it's really a good job I blitzed it last night - imagine how bad it would've been if there'd been stuff all over the breakfast bar like there normally is!

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Alex and I walked the dogs tonight and we saw these strange lights in the sky, there was no discernable sound of a motor and they were really shifting. Unfortunately, I only had my iPhone but I did try to record them!

What do you think? Are we being invaded?