It could be that we have a new website.

I hope so.

Of course I will have no idea if we haven’t, because you won’t be able to send me a message to say No, I couldn’t see your webpage, you will just search for it in vain and be mildly puzzled for a few minutes before forgetting all about it and getting on with your day.

If so, then I apologise, not that you will ever know.

In the meantime, I must own up that I forgot all about Mother’s Day.

I had, of course, some vague idea that it was a possible event, the shops have been filled with nauseating pink cards with squiggly writing ever since the Valentine’s cards were taken down, but I had ignored them as being a trivial detail on the seasonal commercial landscape, in much the same way as spray-on cobwebs seem to become a must-have purchase in October. I am sure some people purchase them but they don’t really impinge upon my consideration when I am rushing into Booths for apples and yoghurt and the sort of chocolate that doesn’t make me fat because it is so bitter I can’t eat very much of it.

I wasn’t even especially aware that it was Sunday. The first I knew of any celebratory responsibility came when my brother sent me a message whilst we were having coffee in bed this morning, thoughtfully reminding me that I might like to call my mother.

After a thoughtful moment whilst I worked this out, I remembered with some horror, and immediately telephoned to make my excuses.

I didn’t really have any excuses if you don’t count a complete lack of interest in current retailing events, but my mother put some considerable effort and expense into my upbringing, and, I felt, probably deserved some appreciation.

Not that a card with a picture of big-eyed playful rabbits bedecked with pink handwriting is an especially desirable token of appreciation by any decently tasteful standards, but I suppose it is the principle of the thing.

My mother told me kindly that it was perfectly all right, and I need not worry about it in the least because my brother and sister had both remembered, so she was being well-cared for.

Mark called his mother then, but she had forgotten as well.

My own children were reminded, presumably by Facebook and one another, to send messages at intervals during the day, and then to my complete astonishment a box of flowers appeared on the doorstep in the middle of the afternoon, sent by Oliver. I was surprised by this, because he had been running in the Bath Half Marathon this morning, and so I had not expected any communication beyond incomprehensible details about checkpoints and leaderboards, but pleased all the same, although it did highlight that I am on my own with Mother’s Day failings, unless you count Mark.

We got up eventually, resigned to our own filial shortcomings, and set about the day. Mark has gone away now, he is on a course in Newcastle for the next couple of days, and so I am by myself. I packed his things whilst he set up the compressor for me. This is part of my new upholstery project, and which I am finding so thrilling that I had to stop watching YouTube videos on the topic last night, because they were giving me heart palpitations.

I am very pleased to announce that I have made some buttons. I finally got to it yesterday afternoon, and they are perfectly perfect, velvety and splendid. I faffed about for ages, trying to work out how to cut the fabric to exactly the right size, and then had an inspiration and drew a circle around the bottom of the pressing mould, which fitted perfectly.

I cut them out of some sample fabric pieces I had, because I have not yet opened the large roll that is propped up at the bottom of Oliver’s stairs in case of some shocking misfortune like paw prints or spilled coffee, so I have only made twenty so far. I hardly dared poke them into the pressing machine, because I was so worried that they would come out wrong and be wasted, but in the end I screwed my courage to the sticking point, and I did not fail. Button after button popped out, perfectly wrapped in dark blue velvet, and making me so very pleased I could hardly put them down, and stood by the window, admiring them, happily, for ages.

I have put them all in a special Button Box, and am now on the lookout for anyone who might feel themselves in urgent need of some buttons, because I would very much like to make some more.

I will need more for the Upholstery Project. Mark has assembled everything I will need in the conservatory and shown me, several times just to be sure, how to switch the compressor on, and so I will be able to start as soon as I have got some spare time. This might not be in the next couple of days, but it does not matter.

It is an Exciting Thing in my future, and I am looking forward to it.