catching up

I'm sitting at my desk this quiet Monday morning, trying to catch up after a very busy weekend helping people at Stash Needle Art Lounge in Inglewood.  This is the darling little yarn shop I talk about from time to time, which has just relocated right onto the main thoroughfare of the district - 9th Avenue, into a converted old house.  They have done a smashing job of re-defining the space.  And they are busy let me tell you!  They opened at this space 2 weeks ago, right after our Thanksgiving weekend and the knitters are pouring in.

From my point of view, it is great to be back in the business.  This is like reading the best parts of the book - I get to help people, talk about yarn and knitting and crochet (which I happen to know a bit about) touch all the new stuff, help organize the new space, and then hand it all over to someone else to adminster.  And I'm doing it part time only and I'm doing some teaching.  It doesn't get better than that!  Next up on the teaching roster for me is the Felted Christmas Sock which should be great fun and runs November 2nd, 9th and 16th.  I'll post a tutorial on the fine art of knitting and fulling while making a Christmas sock in a few days.There is still lots of time to knit the sock and dude it up in time to hang by the chimney with care.


Yesterday we had our first blizzard of the season (sigh).
Today the back garden looks like this:  All those foot prints are courtesy of Libby the Border Collie who as we know, loves snow.

 What a difference a day makes!  Yesterday we watched the storm through the shop windows while we helped cold people pick out warm cozy and soft yarns to knit toques, scarves, cowls and mittens.  I like snow, although not as much as Libby does.  What I'm not so fond of is scraping the windshield of the car and pushing the snow off the car roof.

According to the weather guru's though, this is all going to melt and the warmer temperatures will be back in time for Hallowe'en night so all the little ghosties and goblins won't have to wear their parkas and mittens over their costumes.  We'll see.

Autumn Colours

The light is mellow and soft this autumn, reflecting the yellow, oranges and reds of the falling leaves.

The air is crisp, like a juicy apple

All the flowers and leaves appear to be glowing

It really is a lovely time this year. 

HAPPY THANKS GIVING!

It's Thanks Giving Weekend.  I love this holiday - I think it is my favourite time of the year. There is much to be thankful for.   The harvest is in.  The farmers are happy.  I'm putting the garden to bed for the winter.  and the turkey is in the oven.  Later we will meet for a Pot Luck feast to celebrate.
I wish you all a very Happy Thanks Giving.  Enjoy the feast. 

It Continues...

I'm pleased to say this Bathroom Renovation, which has been consuming me for the past two weeks, and turning the house upside down, is almost complete.  The leaky problems have been fixed, thanks to our Angel, Gary from Rona, and I now have a delightful soaker tub hooked up to hot water, and drainage.  I had my first soak in it last night complete with candle and book.

And...the gorgeous vessel sink which started this whole thing, is in place, hooked up and in use in front of the new mirror.. 

No paint is on the walls yet...but the paint chips are being scrutinized, eliminated, and we are close to picking out a final colour which, hopefully will compliment the sink.

I love paint names.  They are so poetic don't you think?  Names on these little Benjamin Moore chips are Forget me not, arctic blue, Birds Egg, China blue, Tear Drop Blue - that's a good one.  Who thinks up these amazing names?  Do paint companies hire English Majors?  Or Creative writing majors?
 I'm sort of waffling between Forget me not and Arctic Blue at the moment but that could change.

Still to be done besides painting the walls and installing the new light, is grouting, and sealing the grout around the tub.  This will be my job for tomorrow...I hope.

The old bathroom gak has now gone to the dump, and the deck has been scraped and sanded clean of old paint , ready for some weather proofing stain to be applied.  I hope winter holds off long enough to finish the last of the outside garden chores here.  Keep the snow away I say!

So,  I focused on my goal - the bathroom renovation.  I identified the core activities and made a list of what was needed and then purchased it.  I created the certainty of success and other than the pesky leaks, there have been surprisingly few glitches so far,. I stayed within my self imposed budget...more or less - the leaky delays threw us off a bit. And we're almost at the finish line.  The bathroom is usable and I really enjoyed creating the tiled bathtub enclosure.  It's sort of a free form entralac design which was probably a bit ambitious for my first big tile job, but me and my trusty tile cutter won the day. 

And, so it goes.

It Started with a Sink

-a beautiful vessel sink to be precise that reminded me of the inside of an abalone shell with its soft aqua marine swirls.  I fell in love with it.  We knew a bathroom reno was in the cards when we had the budget.  And so the sink stayed in it's box.  It's been two years.  And now, the game is on.
Bathroom renovations being what they are, everything had to come out of course.

We started gathering up supplies - a new soaker tub, a new vanity and vanity top (still in the box) for the gorgeous sink to rest on, new taps both for the tub, shower, and sink, and we set to work first de-constructing, and then re-constructing the space.

  That's my contractor and best friend Gerry in the picture staring at the wall in front of the old tired tub. The tile work is my department and I have really been enjoying doing it. My tiling station is the dining room table.  I'm having a love affair with my tile cutter.  Who knew.  The green glass tiles were a find at the second hand store and they match the sink. The tile design is mine and is sort of ...ummm...organic.  See...everything is about the sink.  And the walls will be a pale shade of that aqua - banishing "tasteful" grey forever from my house and my life.

Everything was going along swimmingly until we hit the plumbing snag a couple of days ago.   We had the tub in, then out then in, then out again.  We had the hardiboard wall up over the shower and tap, then off again. Tiling came to a dead halt.  We had the water off, then on, then off again while we tried to find the pesky leak and solder the copper pipes together for once and all so we could install the lovely soaker tub that is still resting on its side in the hallway.

There is a look of frustration on that face isn't there?
And, time was being eaten up while we fought with this - time we really didn't have.  We had given ourselves a deadline that the project had to be completed by the 6th or 7th at the latest - that's a 10 day jo and that's all the time Gerry had to give me.  By yesterday the tub should have been in, the tiling finished, the old vanity out, and the new one in, complete with top and plumbing, the outdated medicine cabinet out, and the new mirror hung.  That was the plan and it was a good one - until the tub plumbing problems began and threw everything into a cocked hat.
Finally, last night we called for help, and help came in the form our our Rona angel, Gary who had sold us our supplies, and who volunteered to come over after his shift and fix our leaky problem.  So, here we all were at 10 p.m. last night, me running up and down the stairs turning the water on and off, and the guys on their knees in the tub enclosure soldering - except we couldn't stop the leak.   So...we will try again this afternoon with new pipe and solder joins.  Angel Gary has promised to come back with his tools and grim determination.  One way or another the tub is going in today. 
To be continued.....