Here we are, safely back. We had a good time. My husband and I were bundled out yesterday so that Rachel and Cathy could close the house. They will leave this morning.  I was glad to be relieved of the house-closing, needless to say.

We had a good time at the Games. They now have their own very slick-looking website so you can get the general idea. My husband was persuaded, after all, to go, and is glad he did. I suspect that means he must be pressed harder to go to the wedding on November 1.

The experience was – how to put it? – pleasantly diminished, elegaic. Nobody ran a race, no knitting or vegetables or children's craft had been entered in the Home Industries Tent, nobody entered for the Pillow Fight or Musical Cars. We were a large party and mostly stood about talking to each other. Our niece came – the one I go walking with – and her daughter, and her sister F. from Glasgow who has been having cancer, with her family. Alexander and Ketki and their boys turned up unannounced. They didn't come back to the house with us, however, so there is no group picture, Alexander being the Official Photographer.

I'll have a few pics for you soon, the baronet leading the pipe band over the bridge to the Bannerfield, for instance. I love that bit.

F.'s treatment is finished, except for estrogen-suppressing pills which she has to go on taking. Her hair is growing back. Her face is fuzzy – a side-effect I didn't know about. She seems cheerful and energetic. She and her family have lost most of a year to suffering and anxiety – and all the suffering has been caused by the treatment, none by the disease. Long may it remain so, but it's bizarre.

Meanwhile, back on Mt Pelion, Mungo got A*'s for every single one of his GCSE's. Helen doesn't think Archie will worry about comparisons. I hope not. They get on well together. I'll see them soon – Archie will be here mid-week and I'll take him to school for the new term on Thursday. Then Mungo and his father David will arrive at the weekend, on their way to Mungo's new school. I will question all three about Helen's dog bite. I hope they have at least phoned the dog's owners again to ask how it is. If it was rabid on Tuesday, it won't be feeling at all well by now.

As for knitting, virtually none. I think I did one further stripe on the Carol Sunday scarf while we were away, and less than a complete round of the Rams&Yowes border back here last night.

But look at the link Kristie sent me! Oh, Shetland! What a happy memory that is! Burrastow is where we stayed -- Knitofacto found it for us, and then, at the last moment, cruelly, couldn't come along. I was worried about being based so far from Lerwick. I was wrong.