Welcome to … just an ordinary afternoon with the Family of Cats Hollow. I come home and find my husband and our son in his reading corner, Mike completely absorbed in a book and Henry utterly fascinated by his play gym.

The two of them are spending a quiet boys’ afternoon together while I can hear Mewriel pottering around in the kitchen. I find her tidying up and perch on the counter for a little chat. She joins me and tells me all about what she’s been doing with the children today and — of course — that we have the best-behaved children in the entire world.

Then the door opens and my sister-in-law comes in, looking for a cup of hot coffee. Unfortunately, without success, so she has no choice but to take matters into her own hands. Kindly, she pours a cup for all of us, and just like that we’re right in the middle of a Cats Hollow afternoon chat.

Eventually the children join us and things get louder. Chaos finally takes complete control when Lottie and Arthur turn up and join the conversation as well. Snatches of conversation, dishes clattering, laughter, the children getting up to their usual mischief… I love this kind of bustle.

There’s a very specific reason for my little room tour this week, because we’ve converted one wing on the ground floor of our house for Lottie and Arthur, who have moved in with us. They had been living right next door all this time, but could no longer afford the rent — and since they were already having dinner with us almost every evening anyway, it somehow just developed from there. Family, I suppose.

So I moved a few walls around and voilà — one big family house. My studio and Sayokii’s room used to be in this part of the house. Her room is upstairs now, and I’ll probably move my studio into the basement. Or perhaps I’ll build myself a house for it… after all, I do have an entire town to choose the perfect spot from. 😊

To go with our little family reunion, I used ChatGPT to help me bring together the family photos we’d taken over the past few weeks into one big family portrait — and I LOVE it. All my favourite people in one big picture. It really doesn’t get much better than that.

Ava and I spent a cosy afternoon at her place as autumn was beginning to settle in. Cat, dog, book, tea, sisters… nothing more needs to be said.

And once again, we ended the week with Mass at Omerta. The children didn’t want to come along this week, so it was just Mike, Ava and me.

And, as always, it was a beautiful little pocket of quiet, one of those moments when I feel as though I’ve somehow slipped slightly out of time.

Oh, and our brand-new family photos made it onto the wall!

With that, I wish you all a lovely week.

Yours,
Annie