Tag Archive | renovations

FO Friday: All the things

The upside to blogging so rarely is that by the time I have the motivation, I have plenty of things to share! I have so many finished things today, which is a relief after months of works in progress. Let’s start with the house: I’m calling it finished, even though we’re still waiting for the new gutter to be installed on the back of the house. It’s supposed to happen today and that’s close enough.

We got the downstairs floors and stairs refinished last week and they’re so gorgeous, better than I ever expected. I even bought new curtains for the music room to jazz up the “boring” gray walls, and new curtains and an area rug for the living room. This is the probably the fanciest we’ve ever been — I feel like we finally have a nice, grown-up house!

Yes, as many people have asked, it does make us think differently about the house. We’ve been saying for ages that we want to sell it and move on ASAP, but now that its potential is finally being realized, we’re starting to ponder. The house still has some issues we want to fix — upstairs bathroom renovation is a big one — and it has some issues we can’t easily/affordably fix — the downstairs bathroom is uncomfortably tiny, the street we’re on is noisy, the husband can’t build a workshop as big as he’d like. So we’re trying to figure things out. I’d like to figure it out soon, but I’m also a little more content staying here while we work on it.

I also have some finished knitting to share! My knitting time has slowly been coming back, thank goodness, though I’m still mostly focused on simple things like socks.

The completed pair used a skein of speckled purple from Mothy & the Squid and I LOVE her yarn. Wish she wasn’t overseas! The shawl is my Peacock’s Tail, a fun one-skein project that might have used a yarn from Blissful Knits. (Keeping track of yarns used is not a high priority at the moment, sorry.) The single sock was started last weekend as the husband and I took off for an anniversary weekend getaway (more on that another day). I got all but the toe done while we were gone, then it took me three more days to get around to the toe! I pulled a languishing skein of sock yarn from Colorful Eclectic Dyeworks from the stash for that one.

I’d really like to get back to my rainbow sweater project so that I have a new sweater to wear when fall arrives. Surely it won’t take too long to knit sleeves, right?

Happy Friday, friends!

Weekend Adventure

Apr20

Whew, I’m tired, guys. The husband and I went on a quick weekend road trip to visit the girl in Colorado and watch her perform her junior flute recital. We packed two days full of adventure and good food and vaccinated hugs, and it was all fantastic.

Of course I had to visit a yarn store in Fort Collins! And Longmont! Plus the husband found me the perfect travel mug at a kitchen store. So I came home with yarn goodies and a finished sock.

But there was a day of driving on either end, and we came home to minor renovation-related electrical issues, two dogs coming home from boarding full of craziness, one upset dog stomach, one damaged car bumper from an altercation with a curb, plus the usual unpacking etc. Fortunately, the clever husband blocked the gaps in the fence with some temporary fencing, so we’re able to take the dogs to the backyard when the workmen aren’t here. That helps so much! They’ve made amazing progress on the demolition; now they’ll move on to cleaning up the side of the house. The extra wiring and light fixtures will go away, the two upper doors will become windows, and the wall sections will be replaced with clapboard siding. No idea how long it’ll all take, but I’m hoping no more than a couple of weeks. Three dogs and limited backyard access is not fun!

Now if you’ll excuse me, I’m off to take a nap before dinner! Happy Tuesday, friends.

The Joys of a Fixer Upper

Jun18

Summer in Missouri often means thunderstorms. Spring brings tornadoes; summer brings thunder and lightning, hail and strong winds. You put those against a giant old tree, and sometimes the thunderstorm wins. We had just turned off our lights at 9:30 pm Thursday evening (we’re getting old, we get tired early) and were listening to the wind beat hail against our windows when suddenly we heard a crack and a loud bang. We jumped out of bed and were heading downstairs when we realized the power was out. Thanks to the flashlight on the phone, we could make out a large limb laying across our back yard, and while we couldn’t really see the power lines, obviously the tree had pulled them down. We called the power company and they came out within an hour or so. It was hot and stuffy inside, and too quiet at first, since we sleep with a ceiling fan and white noise. Then as the guys started working, it was too loud. It was a long, mostly sleepless night for me. I was up around 5:30, going out to investigate. This is what I saw:

Yikes, right? It had pulled down the lines, which in turn pulled down at least one pole, so they had to replace the pole, plus chop away some of the branches to free the lines. At least four of our neighbors were out of power too. I could shower, but not blow-dry or straighten my hair. I could eat cereal, but not make tea. It was an interesting morning. The dogs were quite delighted with their new stick, though.

So, yeah. That’s fun. Even now, it still surprises me a little when I look out and see it out there. It’s just so … incongruent. We’ve contacted someone to haul away the broken limbs and are going to get an arborist out to see if we can save the tree. It really is a magnificent tree, and I’d hate to lose it. Plus, well, that would be damn expensive and I’d rather avoid it if possible.

Really, this house is doing its best to bring me down. Before this tree incident, we had a smaller tree lose some limbs, we’ve had raccoons in the attic, we’ve had birds and/or squirrels in the soffits, and we found out the addition in the back of the house needs significant work, like possibly even demo and rebuild. I am discouraged. I love the potential this house has; I think it has gorgeous bones. I love its history. Here’s a photo we just got of our house in 1925, when it was a mere five years old.

How wonderful it would be if we could restore it to its former glory! But there’s just so much. The back of the house needs renovating, the floors ALL need repair/refinishing, the windows need work, the exterior badly needs to be painted, the porch and stairs need to be fixed/replaced. The landscaping needs to be redone. The upstairs bathroom needs to be gutted and redone. And those are just the big jobs; there are tons of little ones that add up and overwhelm me if I think about them. Lately I’ve just been seeing this house as a money pit and wondering how long I can put up with it.

I’ve been told not to worry, told that if I’m overwhelmed, it’s because my depression has crept back into my brain and I just need to deal with that. (Which I am. Better living through drugs. They’re helping quite a bit.) But I disagree. Yes, I have recognized that my anxiety has been stronger/quicker lately, and I’m trying different ways to manage it. And I know the depression/anxiety don’t help me deal with the worries. But the truth is that I would worry nonetheless. I am a worrier. Always have been, always will be. Is it really that unusual, to be overwhelmed by a large number of big/expensive list of projects?

I do agree that being overwhelmed can make one stagnant. It’s hard to tackle that list if you don’t know where to start. So we’ve picked a starting point: the front stairs. They’re cracked, sagging, and peeling, and we see them every day when we come home. Plus they’re not totally stable. We just need to find a good contractor and get a bid, and hope that we have enough money to pay for it once we pay for this darn fallen tree thing. And maybe once we fix one thing, it will motivate us to keep going, and we’ll just slowly go one job at a time. Bird by bird, right? And someday maybe we’ll get the house close to as beautiful as it used to be.

Sorry, this post was a bit more of a downer than I set out to write. I’ll finish with something happier: new socks! Apparently I can make two socks per week, so I have one easy one for travel knitting, and one more complicated one for home.

This is the easy one, just finished this morning. Pattern is Vanilla Latte Socks, yarn is Plymouth Yarns Stiletto. I love the little metallic glint!

I really love this one! Pattern is Sylphrena Socks, yarn is Done Roving Yarns Frolicking Feet, which is so squishy and marvelous. I’ll definitely take better photos once I get the second sock done.

And speaking of second socks, I have two to make! I better get to casting on!

More Rehab on the House

Sep22

My weekend was not knitting related at all. When we bought this big old house that needs all this work, I guess we resigned ourselves to weekends of manual labor for the rest of time. We’re still working on the fence. It’s slow going when you can only work one to two days a week, but I keep reminding myself of how much money we’re saving by doing it ourselves. And we’re getting SO close! I spent early Saturday digging up weed roots along the fence line, and took great joy in knocking down this stupid rickety old trellis.That afternoon, we strung the line and measured for fence posts.Sunday morning, we went to work with the rented auger and it went much more smoothly than I anticipated. We have a huge yard, around 300 square feet, and with mostly 8′ sections, that’s a lot of post holes. There were maybe four or five where we hit root, and we’ll have to go back and dig by hand. The rest we got done in half a day. The worst were the ones were we’d get down maybe two feet and then hit the thick, dense clay. We’d have to pull the auger out, clean off the mud, and try again, and several of them took four tries before we got down to 30 inches. But we did it, and I’m encouraged! We might actually get a fence this fall. The best part was when one of the neighbors stopped and told us how nice it was to see us working on this house. It’s been neglected for a long time, and I’m loving the fact that making it pretty again will bring joy to the neighborhood, not just us.

I also moved my daughter’s desk down from the attic into the sitting room. She’s been doing her homework at the kitchen table, which isn’t ideal for any of us. Plus this desk, which my fantastically talented husband built, is gorgeous and I wanted to be able to see it. I love it here in front of the window. (Side note: I cannot WAIT to refinish these floors. I know the water damage won’t go away completely, but man, this wood will be gorgeous after being sanded and refinished. I’m just not brave enough to do it by myself.) Anyway, yes, love the desk here and am in fact sitting here as I write this, loving the view and being downstairs with the puppies. And the girl seemed to appreciate it last night. It’s much more comfortable than the attic room, and she doesn’t have to move everything when it’s time for dinner.I haven’t completely neglected my yarn. I did manage to get another Yoda hat knit, so I have five hats done. Last night I got three sets of ears knit. Just a couple more hours and they’ll be ready to go, either to sell on Etsy or for my craft show next month. And I do have a finished object to share, even if it is from last week. This is the Bit of Lace Hemp Triangle, and I used some shimmery purple Merletto. I love this project. I love the big hook and the skinny yarn. I love the loose lacy fabric it creates. I love how fast it works up. I love the versatility of the finished piece, how it can be a shawlette or a scarf. I’ve got enough left to make another one just like this, so I’ll be able to keep one and sell one. I should be able to get some knitting done later today, but first I get to have lunch with two wonderful ladies from my Coldwater Creek days. Should be a good day all around!