Knitting on

Although I have been busy, I have still been knitting. I started a shawl for no other reason than wanting to do it. I was a mystery knit, so I had no idea what it was I was making at the time I started. I have about 12 rows to do until I cast off, and I am a little bored with the final part. The pattern is not all that exciting when looking at the rest of the shawl. I will complete it, probably this weekend as it is a holiday weekend and I am off work for 4 days.

I am using Patons Fab DK in Petrol (shade 02342) and Stylecraft DK in Silver (shade 1203).

I am also making a baby blanket for a workmate. I have not told him I am making it as I thought it would be a nice surprise for him. I am using Special Stylecraft for Babies DK in Baby Cream (shade 1245). The blanket is made up of 48 individually knitted squares and a separate border that are all sewn together. His baby is due in July, so I have no need to rush, and have made 10 squares so far, only 38 to go.

Once I have finished these two items I will be making a couple of hats and an enormous blanket that is over 7 foot wide. If you are a follower and regular reader you will know that I am most happy when I am making large complex items. The hats are “Rosalind Franklin Hats” by Mat Kladney, and the blanket will be revealed as I make it, the yarn of which will be over 4.5 times the height length of the Burj Khalifa, so I will be like a pig in mud.

I’m Still Here…

Not that you would know half the time. I keep meaning to post but never seem to do it. Apathy applies? Oh most definitely. I have things to say, but sometimes I am just not in the mood to put fingers to keys, and after a long week working, then I just cannot be arsed with anything. I know, how rude? I know people read my posts, so I know I have an audience, but I seem to be losing my “voice”. Now, I know that I could post all the time as there is always something going on or a project on my needles, and years ago I used to blog/post many times a day, but these days I think I am in old age mode and happy to sit in front of the telebox and vegetate after work.

The long winter is a bind that has not given me any inspiration to do anything, not that I have been lazy. I have replaced the floors in both bedrooms on the top floor. We have three bedrooms, one on the main floor and two upstairs in the attic. Now, the floors had not been touched since 1973 according to a newspaper I found under the boards in the main room, and 1980 for the smaller room. My home was built in the 1800s and some things have not been touched or replaced from this era. Whilst walking about it sounds like an old ship with all the creaking. In the main room, the floor had failed due to the window in the roof leaking for some time, this was leaking long before we moved in. We discovered the leak one night in bed during a rainstorm, when we were wakened to dripping on the bed, needless to say, I had to do something about it, but unknown to be at that point it had caused the floor to slowly rot. Due to M’s disability, we moved to the downstairs bedroom, so over the years the floor had slowly failed, and one day, M was upstairs and called me to say that the floor seemed spongy, I thought nothing too much about it, and years later it finally started giving away, so I had to fix it. This was one of the major hobs that I had to do this year. I am not a carpenter by any means, but I did manage to do a good job of it. well, I thought so, and M approved, so that was all I needed to know. Once the main room was done, I had the job of doing the second room, although we have no idea why that floor was failing at the time. I lifted up the carpet which I have never replaced as I treat this room as a junk room. I discovered that it had failed due to a previous owner of many years back installing a small hatch that I can only think of was for inspecting electrics that are now redundant. The opening was so shoddily done that it had fallen through, thus causing the rest of the floor to break. It was like biscuits so needed doing. However, once I had lifted the carpet up I did not feel like doing it, so left it for over a week, then one day felt I had the gumption to do the job, and within 3 hours it was complete. The only problem with the second floor was that think I managed to knock my pliers into the void and not noticed and had screwed the two 1m x 2m sheets of interlocking wood down in many places. I have had them for over 20 years, so maybe time for a new pair.

Main Room, 64 square feet of flooring replaced in the end.
Room 2 after lifting the floor. The sad blue carpet you see is part of the floor that lifts up which is a “dead man’s drop” that is used to lower coffins down the main floor (as you cannot get them down the spiral staircase). This is also used to take furniture upstairs too.

I have also been doing the kitchen up. The kitchen I think was modelled on that featured in Noah’s Ark. We have many cupboards which were brown wood originally and not great looking. I had painted them in the past a few times but never been happy with the end result. However, this time I am happy with it all as I also changed the tiles and the worktops. We had a new boiler fitted as ours was over 30 years old and although it worked, it was not economical, and we have only had a tepid home for many years rather than a warm home, needless to say, it can be like a hothouse in a very short time which is rather nice. One part of the kitchen is a small alcove where a fireplace used to be and where we had a small drinks fridge, however, I decided that the fridge needed to go and I got an imitation log burner (electric) fire, built a platform for it, and added an unfinished sleeper (only carved flat two sides) as the front edge to the fireplace. I still have bits to finished off as well as do the tiling there, but all in all, I am happy with the look. I am sure you will agree that the before and after are quite different, although the before is when we first moved in back in 2003 and had not even taken a breath, never mind thought about decoration/renovation.

So, forgive my absence as I have been working hard.