1. The cats – our three and next door’s two – all come to see me while I’m working in the garden.

1b. I spend a couple of hours wrestling the tomato plants in the green house. They leave their mark on my skin (and in my hair). The water in the shower turns a curious lime green as I wash away the dust.

2. I crochet on the balcony – as I say on twitter, making the most of a lovely summer evening to prepare for winter.

3. Tilda goes through phases of sitting with us on the sofa (usually until her pattern is disrupted by INTERLOPERS [ie our friends visiting]). I enjoy them while they last.

1. An extending cherry picker arm suddenly appears overhead. It stretches higher and higher, then retracts, turns and stretches out again.

2. The heft of a dense book.

3. Kaufman has been around all evening – asleep in his usual spot on top of the cat tree – but at bedtime, he suddenly wants some attention. He stomps all over me and the sleeping bump under the duvet.

1. Lily has been antsy all morning – one of her pack is missing (John is at the office) and she has to protect the household – but as soon as I pick her up and place her beside me on the sofa, she calms down and goes to sleep, happy to relinquish being in charge.

2. We meet the tiniest little dog on the way back home – a 16 week old chihuahua. Her owners laugh over my giddiness.

3. Dinner at Salvo’s in Leeds. Good old Salvo’s. We both moan with delight over our main meals: John’s lamb is perfectly cooked and I’m dazzled by the super smooth potato and the rich gravy on top. We can’t quite put our finger on what they’ve done to make it so good.

3b. The couple beside us are clearly on a first date. The man is loud and hogs the conversation so I have no choice but to overhear what he’s saying. I’m reminded, once again, how glad I am not to be on the dating scene.

1. Next door’s party marquee is still up. The rich, colourful cloths – adorning the ceiling and covering up the vertical supports – ripple in the breeze.

2. When I look more closely, there are lots of winter squash hiding under the vines.

2b. Two very heavy bags of produce.

2c. The heavy rain starts just as I reach the blind bend – if only I’d left the allotment a minute earlier. Still though, at least I didn’t leave the allotment five minutes later.

3. I usually make “dead veg and Polish sausage soup” – whatever veg is languishing in the bottom of the fridge – but today it is very much alive veg: the garlic, onions, runner beans, mange tout, courgette and three colours of carrots were all in the ground or on the vine just a couple of hours before.

1. I’m working on a new (granny stripe) blanket and every new colour makes me coo with delight. (It’s just cheap acrylic yarn, which I use for most of my blankets since they need to be hardwearing/easily washe), but the more muted colours from the range, and they go together beautifully.) John gets bored of me enjoying them so much.

2. I repeat the “plooooooop” noise my phone makes whenever I lock or unlock the screen.

2b. I look up from my crochet to see the grey sky and rush outside to gather in the washing. The downpour suddenly starts just – to the second – after I step back inside with the full basket.

2c. Because of humidity then dog-walk-wetness, we both end up bare legged in the later afternoon.

3. Chatty cats – Strange launches into a monologue when she comes home at lunchtime (I don’t think we’d seen each other much the previous day so we had things to share) and while Tilda makes cheeky little “oi! oi! look at me!” mew as I walk up the stairs.

1. The muggy weather leaves me feeling awful – I can do little other than slump on the sofa. I feel so much better when it finally rains.

1b. John hands me an umbrella for the short dash to the door.

2. They go off on one so we take charge and decide what we’re having.

2b. The gelato delivery is late and a little melted when it arrives but, you know, it’s still gelato delivered to our door at 11pm at night, so it’s still pretty awesome.

2c. We try a new game – one based on the X Files. We’re all confused to start with – the instructions are long and not always clear – but once we learn the basics, we enjoy the scheming and game play mechanics. (It also gives me hope that we might return to another couple of games we previously abandoned for being too complicated.)

3. The fox stands in the road looking at us, then takes off towards the grassy bank.