Architectural detail on a building in Newark, NJ
Gerry’s making me a turkey burger, the kids are engaged and I’m knitting. Fever is down, so even though I’m hot, I’m not HOT. Or maybe I am and that’s why I’m getting the turkey burger…
I tell you, there’s nothing like working on worsted weight merino wool in the sticky, humid heat. I feel so bad for the poor sheep now, and from this point will take personal delight in their haircuts.
The projects I’m finishing are going slower than I’d hoped – partly because I lost most of this past weekend to kneeling in unattractive positions, but also because I’m doing a lot of ripping out and re-designing as I knit. Oh, THAT’S productive…
I’m finishing up a beautiful body skimming Malabrigo merino sweater. I hadn’t intended for it to be this close fitting – I meant for it to be an oversized sweater. But the yarn is so soft and incredibly yummy (it almost feels like alpaca), and every time I’d put it on the mannekin the drape kept trying to cling to the body – definitely a case of the knitted fabric telling me what it wanted. So I ripped, ripped, ripped and reworked the pattern as a more close fitting garment. Well, I will say that it’s definitely more romantic!
And I finished one of the corsets for the book (there will be 2) and I’m pretty happy with it. I have to remove the sleeves and rework them so they fall more forward, but the fit (as seen in this VERY high contrast photo – sorry) is good and flattering. I used Berroco Touché for this, and it was a real delight to work up!
Have I mentioned that Hannah and Max’s pocket’s are bulging with the quarters they’ve earned by rolling balls of yarn for me? At this rate I’ll be asking them to pay for the move themselves!
Minneapolis
Speaking of move, we’re trying to arrange a week long trip out to MN this summer so the family doesn’t feel like I’m selling them a pig in a poke. I’m leaning toward flying out (I can use frequent flyer miles for at least one ticket) renting a car and landing someplace for a week. Gerry was wondering if there might be someplace we could rent for a week (either in or out of the Twin Cities area – we don’t mind driving) and I told him I’d mention it on my blog. If anyone knows about a place for rent for a week in August, it would be folks who read my blog!
We’ve hired a painter to replaster and paint almost the entire interior of the house. Even with G and I painting 3 rooms (but not the trim or ceiling – that’s for the painters) the estimate is $7,400. Yikes. A friend with a house twice our size paid $20,000 several years ago to do the inside of her house, but that was with a LOT of plaster work. Another friend paid $3,000 to paint the entire inside of her house, but she has a more modern house with no molding (and no plaster work to re-do, no wallpaper to be removed…) It was a stop and gulp moment, but that’s why we took out a line of credit on the house a few years ago – so we could take care of maintenance and keep the house in good shape. We just keep telling each other, “$7K now will mean an additional $20K when someone falls in love with the house in ‘move in condition'” Yeah, right…
And even having said that, we’re still not 100% committed to moving. I think we’re 70% there (I’m 100%) but the rest of the family will need to SEE MN to fall in love. There are, however, things about Jersey that we’ll miss so much.