Decisions, decisions ...

I'm changing stuff up all over in the condo these days. Since Boy-child opted out of college and it seems unlikely he'll be coming back for any significant period of time, I'm turning the condo into mine - a bachelorette's place :)  

The floors are done - thanks for the comments. The kitchen countertops have been replaced (photos coming).  And since Girl-child took Boy-child's bed I've gotten a futon for Boy-child's room ... seemed like a good idea as he can easily take it with him later and in the meantime I'll have a presentable guest/craft room.

The cover fabric is called "hypnotic" (see below).   Perhaps the pattern will help with sleep.  A number of people have told me that sleeping on futons is dreadful.  Based on various comments and the sources of the comments, I have decided that any house guest older than I am will have my room, and I will sleep on the futon. Any house guest who is younger can sleep on the futon and I'll keep my room.   In the case of multiple house guests I will sleep on the fold-out in the living room and distribute the guests in the bedrooms as best suits my needs.

I do have to decide on rugs. I have to get one more.  I was thinking it would be good if they were all interchangeable between the living room, dining room and guest room.  This is what the fish bowl looks like in the living room:

The hypnotic pattern on the futon will probably require a very plain rug.  No rush though.  In the meantime I'll just keep moving the fishbowl back and forth until I've tired of it :D

Odds and Ends

A knit-tag I made ages ago has finally found a home :-D

The Family continues to thrive:

I have been knitting, but not a lot and not very well.  These Christmas socks turned out ok though:

And this is a new pair I started for myself, because I need vanilla socks on the needles.  Yarn: Miss Babs in Deep Sea Jellyfish, purchased at Fibre Space in Alexandria, Virginia.

And a note on talismans and good-luck charms, or "signaling" if you prefer.  I usually wear this when I am flying Delta.  It's a 15-year "pin" from Northwest Airlines.  Sometimes the crew recognize it.  Good things sometimes happen when they do:

This was our gift for the 25th Yarnover; it's a needle gauge.  When I was at Fibre Space it was noticed and jealously admired:

This is a good-luck symbol that I purchased in Istanbul.  I tried to use it for good luck today when I went to American Rug Laundry, but alas, I did not find anything I liked.  I'm in the process of redecorating Boy-child's room.  Since I'm in no rush I find no need to purchase anything unless I love it.

Which reminds me.  Last time I went to American Rug Laundry I found a very unusual round rug.

I call it the fish bowl.  For obvious reasons.

That's it for today.  I have new countertops going in this week.  Wish me luck!

Floors

I am, at my core, a glutton for punishment. This would explain why I get into projects like my floor project (started over a year ago). This weekend and last were both spent moving furniture. First, everything from the bedrooms into the living room and dining room so that the floors in the bedrooms could be done, and currently everything from the living and dining into the bedrooms. 

Amazingly, most of it fit into Boy-child's room:

The books, while time consuming, were not the hardest part.  The sofa was among the most difficult pieces. 

Now the rooms are empty and ready for the cement guys to return.

I'm calling the finished, polished concrete "rustic, urban chic" :-D

I am knitting, albeit not much, and with many, many, stupid mistakes.  These socks, for Girl-child this Christmas, are passable, but not without their issues.  Other socks have had to be ripped out.

Note the difference between the dull, stained concrete above and the high-gloss rustic, urban chic below ...

Last weekend I went to Open Streets with The Girls and The Babies for a break.

  It was entertaining, but very hot.

We had a good time, and it was a break from moving furniture.

Girl-child has special talents with tubes, both horizontally,

and vertically.

Nothing like street food whilst sitting in the street.

This weekend The Girls took me (and The Babies) to Sunday Assembly, which definitely has potential.

Floor

So, Pato used to say I had a thing about floors, and I have to admit he had a point.  

I'm going to rip out the carpet in the condo this summer and maybe get cork flooring.   I'm dragging my feet because it is going to be very expensive and a lot of work.

In the meantime, The Girls used leftover paint to prettify the floor in the upstairs of their house. They had ripped out the carpet too, and did this to the particle board sub-flooring.

It sure is tempting to do something like this. Except maybe I can't get away with as much as the twenty-something-hippy-lesbian-crowd can get away with.

Although it sure is tempting.  They are so clever!

Office Decorating

Girl-child was giving me a hard time after visiting me at the new place of employ because I hadn't decorated enough.  (I think she's pretty horrified at how happy I am to be back in cubicle land.)  Just thought I would show that I've decorated a bit now. 

Cat/dog salt and pepper shaker from Suzie.  Owl coffee sleeve made by Rose The Gypsy.  Library of Congress coffee mug.

Photos of the children at favorite graffiti points (boy at Cadillac Ranch and girl in London).  Sock monkey buddies, postcard encouraging knitters to make socks for the soldiers in WWI.  Card from Sue who thought the bouquet looked like yarn :-)

Favorite photos of the children - several of them were Christmas cards.  On the left is one of the kids in Toledo, Spain - May 2000.  The wire photo holder was a gift from Carol - the holders are in the shape of shoes.  Also a wire bicycle from Fede which is remarkably still in one piece 33 years later.

Librarian, bookish and library photo corner including the librarian action figure comic strip (published when I was in grad school), card with photo of what's probably a bookstore, the public library in Vicuña, Chile, The Brooklyn Art Library and The Morgan Library.  Since I work with an electronic collection I thought it would be good to have some images of physical books.

Equinox Events

The snow is finally starting to melt, albeit slowly. Remember that I love snow, but I'm kinda done with it this year.  I do like it when I pass by something like this; it reminds me that snow is fun.

Decorating at Cemetery Way continues. Since I'm living here now (Auntie is much better, thank you), I decided to go ahead and get barstools. It's the perfect place to breakfast, and visitors can chat with the cook, which I like very much. Yes, they're orange.

We celebrated Easter early as Boy-child is home for Spring break.

In knitting, I finished the Linen Stitch Scarf.  I used leftovers mostly of Mountain Colors Bearfoot.  I like it well enough, although the bind-off is kind of wonky.  I'm hoping blocking will help tame it.

Blocking happens on Boy-child's bed, so not 'till next weekend.  If it doesn't work I can always rip out the bind-off and re-do it, although with a 450 stitch row, that'll take some commitment.

I seem to be really busy, although I'm not sure with what.  Lots of little stuff, I guess.

Day of Memories

I spent the afternoon going through pictures, and then I watched the movie Argo. It was an intense day of memories.

My collage of individual photos - most of the frames were found at Saver's this afternoon.

Old family photos - not put together yet because I have to get copies made - with a shot of candles from the Cathedral in Mexico City.  A bit hard to tell here, but I think it'll work:

My paternal grandmother crocheting an afghan:

My mother in better times:

I was living in Spain at the time the hostages were taken in Tehran.

It was a difficult time to be an American abroad.

One of my literature professors asked the Americans in the class if we weren’t angry with the French student in the class. “Why?”, we asked. Well, he said, it was the French who gave the Ayatollah Khomeini refuge all of those years, allowing him to muster forces and go back to Iran.

If anyone understands that individuals are not responsible for their nation’s actions, we told him, it is Americans. We didn’t blame her for anything.

There were times that year when I claimed to be some nationality other than American. I was Canadian, Swedish, and Venezuelan at different times.

A young man from Iran was studying in Salamanca that year too. People used to wonder that we were friends, given that our countries were having such troubles. Again, the individual prevailed. When I returned to Salamanca with Pato a couple of years later, Monseur was still there, but he wasn’t a student any more. He was selling jewelry and stuff from a table just outside the Plaza Mayor. He was from somewhere near the Iraq boarder, and because of the Iran-Iraq War (remember that one?), he had not heard from his family in a couple of years.

The movie also reminded me of the invasion of Afghanistan by the Soviets. I was traveling in Germany, Switzerland and Austria at the time with my boyfriend. We didn’t really know what Afghanistan was. I’m sure there are no 19-20 year olds in the U.S. now who haven’t heard of Afghanistan.

That made me also remember that when I was in Edinburgh in 1974, touring Holyrood palace.  The tour group was kicked out because the Shah of Iran had arrived, and that was where he was being put up.

We didn’t know who the Shah of Iran was.

Little did we know how much of a ruckus he would cause when we put him up at some hospital in the U.S. just five years later.

Ixnay to the Drapes

My kids laugh at me because I hate drapes.

The drapes that came with the condo were awful even to people who like drapes.

Really, it wasn't just me.

Today, the window coverings from The Little Blind Spot were delivered and installed.

 The hideous drapes are gone.

 Panel blind for the balcony in teal cement.

 Roman shade teal circles for my room, and Roman shade teal cement for Boy-child.

The drapes, along with all the hardware, went to Savers today.

I've been doing a lot of little stuff over the past two months, but this is the first big thing since the bookcases.

Hooray for getting rid of the horrid drapes!

Too bad it's impossible to take an accurate (color) picture at the condo in the afternoon.

Books

I just finished reading my first free-copy-from-LibraryThing book, Interloper at Glencoe.  It was a fun read.  I like historical fiction, and time travel is always entertaining.  This book combined the two well, and the historical event was both obscure and interesting to me.  It is only available in electronic format, I believe.  Check here if you're interested in learning more.


On the home front, I had my windows measured for blinds.  Can't wait to get rid of the hideous drapes (they are truly, spectacularly ugly).  The woman who came to measure said, "I see you're a knitter.  My daughter is a knitter.  She recently moved home because she's going back to school, and when I saw all that yarn I said, 'No more yarn purchases until you use some of this up!'"  I just smiled.

Boy-child is home and helping with the bookcases and unpacking the books.  I even skipped Drunken Knit Night I was so excited to be making such great progress.  The place actually feels like it's mine now.

Those big boxes in the middle toward the left are glass doors.  I'm leaning away from the doors at this point; I think I'll take them back.  I'll have more room for growth that way, and it will be an uninterrupted wall of books :-)


I was at a training seminar for work last week.  They had those blue mints that you used to see in the 1960s, if I remember right.  It was kind of cool.

Cool mints.  Get it?  Really though, it was weirdly nostalgic.

Book Progress

You know how sometimes it has to get worse before it gets better?

First there were boxes of books... there are a lot of them, but we managed to have a small Thanksgiving dinner around the dining room table no problem.  Everything was under control.

Then you add a few more boxes from Ikea and you've got to put the dining room table in Boy-child's bedroom.

'Cause now you've got boxes to go with the boxes.

Then you put a few bookcases together and you have to move the boxes of books out of the way in order to get the bookshelves in place so that you can unpack the books.

Uff da, I'm tired!  Final stages yet to happen.  Thank goodness Boy will be home soon to schlep boxes of books around.