This time last week we were thinking about halloween parties. Jim and Viv were planning a party for the younger members of the family - and everyone was invited to bring some food for the meal. We made green slime sandwhiches, eyeballs, ghost crispies etc, however strangely none of the children ate anything green at all, and it was left to a couple of brave adults to eat the green slime sandwhiches. I have a horrible feeling that Basil might have been fed something - or helped himself, as there were some pretty evil smells coming from his rear end later that night.

The halloween games included apple bobbing, pin the nose on the witch, fining things in a bowl of cold green spagetti and decorating a witch biscuit competition which Ian had to judge. At the sight of a number of expectant faces looking at him with their works of art in front of them was too much for Ian and he was about to hyperventilate and throw himself on the floor feigning a heart attack, when Viv took pitty on him and judged them all as winners.

The mystery shopping has continued to go well, I have looked at my quota of three cash machines, signed up to mystery shop a electrical superstore (I have to stand by a washing machine and see how long it takes for an assistant to come up to me), I have an assignment at a bank asking about current accounts and of course there is the O2 thing, which is now tomorrow. I won't get rich but it is quite interesting and an easy way to make some money to keep the dogs in chews. I had some feedback on the cash machine audit. 2000 machines had been checked in phase one and 25% were non compliant. I thought this sounded high, but perhaps it was machines that charge not showing the fee structure properly, the machines I went to were non-fee charging. The other thing it could have been is that the operator of the mchine should be shown - so for instance Bristol and West Link machines are operated by Bank of Ireland and this should be shown, and perhaps this always isn't the case. Anyway, quite a high figure.

I've done some dyeing of small wool samples for my website (to illustrate the 'dye your own wool' course) and have been pleased by the outcome. I have also scanned the wool rather than photograph it and this has been effective giving a much better and clearer picture. I'll do this all the time in future for this sort of thing.

Lastly, I have been quite excited as I have been commissioned by GMC Publications http://www.thegmcgroup.com (Guild of Master Craftsmen - not General Medical Council) to write a book on crocheted jewellery. So far I have submitted a full outline which was presented at a commissioning meeting and had a brief corresepondence with their managing editor saying they wish to proceed, but have to wait another couple of weeks for details. So I don't know whether they want to go with my brief or whether they want a different focus. My outline was for a book which was part inspiration and part instruction, with 15 projects and which would appeal to jewellers, beaders, knitters/crocheters, not to one particular discipline, so it will be interesting to see. In my outline I also suggested a gallery section, and I am looking forward to putting this together (assuming that this would be my reasponsibility).

Oh - and one last thing, I have made some hand knitted undies which I am selling on Ebay. Amanzingly they have not sold yet, but I do have 6 people 'watching my underwear', so to speak. I don't think I will be making my million from hand knitted underwear - but you never know, Mr Marks and Mr Spencer had to start somewhere....