A little show and tell

For today's version of the photo blog, I give you the following:

My dad put up 2 levels of stair railings ready for my mom's first home visit last week. He and I spent much of Friday night/Saturday morning making the lower level living quarters look nice for my mom's arrival (figuring she would not see the rest of the house until a further weekend visit). You should have seen him blanch when after lunch she announced that the first level of stairs had gone so well, she wanted to do the second set so that we could all eat dinner in the kitchen.

Those are cranberry streusel muffins so see (they're from Bonnie Stern's Lighthearted Cooking cookbook so I am maintaining my belief that they are healthy). They came to a potluck brunch with me.

The Snowbeast (big white thing has a name) is continually growing: 14 inches long at the last measurement! And I completed my grey fuzzy hat. It's a gift but oh, so tempting to keep (see how good it looks on my head?).