Animation on the big screen and blackberry picking

Last night we went to see a showing of ds1's animation at a local cinema. The screening is a showcase of the minifilms and other productions created during a week of workshops for local children and teenagers. During two days of workshops Ds1 had worked on an animation called 'Hot hot hot' with a group of children, in which the sun melts the earth and is then put back together by 'Magnet Man'. The kids had had great fun using some software to 'melt' pictures of world landmarks. The remaining animation had been made with plasticine figures, hand-drawn backdrops and stop-frame animation.

Not quite Blackberry and Apple Crumble...yet

Yesterday I picked a whole bundle of blackberries from the garden, in the jungle that used to be a neat line of raspberry canes and a tidy bramble bush. It seems very early to be picking blackberries. Seems earlier each year, or perhaps I've just been sucked into all the global warming gloom. The blackberry bush was lethal and I came out all prickled and itchy. I really must dig it up next year and move it to the allotment where it will have space to do what bramble bushes do best - sprawl all over the place! Apart from a few tiny windfalls (enough to fill a kid's bucket), the apples haven't caught up, so not really enough for blackberry and apple crumble yet. I'll put the blackberries in the freezer for a month or so and by then I'll have so many blooming apples I'll spend all waking hours peeling, chopping and cooking the things!

Picked the first two tomatoes yesterday too. I'm hoping this year's crop will be better than last year's when the tomatoes suffered so badly from blight in the wet weather that we hardly salvaged anything. Must remember to make up some tomato feed: at the allotment I've got some rotting seaweed in a sack that I haven't dared open up (I can smell it from 10 feet away!) which would make a good feed if I diluted it. It's been there almost a year and should have stewed nicely by now. A bit too nicely. Of course the coward's way out would be to go and buy some commercial tomato feed, but that wouldn't be very 'organic' or frugal. Maybe I'll just wait until I have a bad cold and can't smell anything!

Finally managed to get to my sewing machine and finish a cushion cover. Looks great on the sofa, though the dogs seem to have a fondness for it and it didn't take them long to cover it in dog hairs. Just another 7 cushion covers to go...