More this weekend

I'm just doing a quick post now to let you know I haven't fallen off the face of the earth. Hopefully over the weekend I'll get my office totally put together so I can take photos for you. It has been a really busy week which included manning our booth at the Chamber Business Expo all day yesterday. Well worth doing but lots of work getting displays and materials ready!

More to come this weekend.

It happened again!

Just when I thought I was getting caught up on things, I realized I hadn't blogged in a week. Where are these weeks going? The summer is nearly gone and I know what that means - I'm already behind on Christmas knitting!

Rowan got a new polo shirt and jeans from the Baby Gap because his mommy couldn't resist. I've almost got his early fall sweater done (still needs buttons) and one matching sock. These small sizes whiz by pretty quickly. I get to go visit Rowan again at the end of this month when I go to see my dad. Short visits but at least I get a few baby cuddles in.

I got all the glassware put back though wish I'd had KnitTech and Roxie to help me and have some rum to celebrate :-) I'll take pictures one of these days. I put a storage cabinet together for the office today. Two hours of sweating and cursing created a fairly attractive addition to my office. Unfortunately, it won't hold my heavy duty printer so I may have to assemble one more piece.

I'm being lazy tonight when I should be reading one of those seven deadly boring solar energy proposals for the school district. I'll have myself for it tomorrow morning but I just can't focus. Much more fun to play on Facebook and knit.

Hope your day was a good one!

Where has the week gone?

I suddenly looked up and realized it had been a week since I blogged. How does that happen? I spent most of the weekend knitting and putting away glassware (almost done) so that was fun. This week has been a blur!

My partners are both busy this week and suddenly our geriatric care got busy. It has been wonderful getting to help people but totally not what I had planned for the week. Plus I had to get all of our accounting and billing caught up. I never can figure out why that takes so much time for such a small business. On the other hand, everything is entered, reconciled and paid.

I'm spending 18 hours this week evaluating solar energy proposals for the school district. No, I know nothing about solar energy. I was asked, as a school board representative, so that the committee would have people from all levels of the district. Solar is awesome - and I'm all for making our schools more "green" but we have to find a proposal that makes good financial sense as well. It keeps my brain spinning plus I get to eat lunch in the teacher's lunchroom every day :-)

Monday I started Weight Watchers online. I want to get healthier so I can keep up with Rowan. Someone asked me today if Weight Watchers works for me and I said "Yes, all three times". I'm always amazed at how little sense of portion control I have. Measuring food is such a shocker. "That really is 3 ounces of meat?" Um - I've been eating twice that much. We won't even go in to the chips and ice cream.

I've never done the online version but just couldn't see adding in another meeting during the week. I do everything else online (well not EVERYHING) so figured I'd give it a try. So far so good. I'll keep you posted.

Have to go work on Rowan's sweater. I might even get this done before the weather gets cold!

My office is done!

Last week we took a long weekend and visited our children and grandson in Iowa. Rowan continues to grow like crazy and was able to grab a toy for the first time. He and the Guitar Guy spent a lot of time enjoying each other's company (when I wasn't holding Rowan).














The day we got home, Nicole and Pat arrived to finish the office. While I still have a lot of work to do hanging art, putting glassware back and setting up office files, the big stuff is done.














You can see what a difference some paint and new furniture makes! Plus the amazingly decorative Ragdoll really adds to the room. I'm told I might get wood laminate on my floor for next year's present!

In addition to finishing the room, the dynamic duo hung a new ceiling fan in the family room, painted the kitchen ceiling, hung a new chandelier, hung track lighting in the kitchen and took all of their garbage to the landfill!

Part 2: Cleaning out the closet

None of us thought of sealing the cracks in the closet door so the office closet was covered in drywall dust. If you've ever dealt with drywall dust, you know how fine and tenacious the stuff is. It sticks to absolutely everything! All my out-of -season or out-of-size clothing was stored in that closet plus a hodgepodge of "don't know where else to stuff it".






Here is the clothing left after I threw 2 garbage bags full. I'm getting more brutal with my "thin" clothing. Even if I ever got back in to it, the styles are totally outdated.














After I pulled everything else out of the closet, this was some of the mess I had left. I finally pitched 3 paint by number horse pictures my Gramps painted in 1963. They've totally yellowed and I'll never hang them. Took pictures for posterity and in the trash can they went. (I'm currently reading a book called The Boomer Burden which is about cleaning out the mess parents leave behind. It is making me less sentimental and more ruthless with my stuff)














This is all of the glassware that has to be washed and put back in the next couple of weeks. It has taken over Guitar Guy's studio/amp workshop/library. Thankfully he's not building anything right now. Hopefully he doesn't need any of the guitars stuck back in the corner before I'm done














A parting Rowan shot while on vacation in Colorado. I love this one because you can see how long his eyelashes are. My son had beautiful eyelashes too. Why boys seem to get them is one of life's great mysteries!

Now I'm back to work on the bedroom. The painting crew arrives tomorrow - hurray!

Remodel in progress

For your viewing pleasure (and at Roxie's request) I'm documenting the remodel of the office. What a mess! My darling Nicole and her boyfriend worked long hours to get the room ready to be painted. He spent most of Tuesday sanding down the walls since we decided not to retexture. They are now wonderfully smooth.





Step 1 was to remove the wallpaper. The steamer did a great job - much better than the paste dissolving fluid I've used before.
Step 2 involved cleaning up the initial mess and preparing to put drywall mud on all of the walls.














Meriadoc had to check out the crinkling plastic while the workers were on a break.
Step 3 involved covering the walls with the mud to provide an even foundation for the paint.
Step 4 After the walls dried overnight, Pat spent many hours sanding. By the time he was done he was coated in white powder from head to toe.

I didn't get any pictures of Nicole sanding baseboards but there are more still to do! We also had multiple trips to Lowe's, Home Depot and assorted hardware stores for paint and supplies.
We stayed up way to late talking, went out to eat several times and laughed a lot. Hopefully my remodeling crew will return next Sunday to begin painting. I'm so excited!

(If my pictures jump out of alignment it isn't my doing. Blogger is being difficult again!)

Quick update

Just got back from watching two international soccer matches in Phoenix. The tickets were Guitar Guy's anniversary present since he loves soccer. Got to see our daughter, eat at Red Lobster and spend a relaxing weekend together.

My daughter-in-law posted a picture with her February Lady sweater I wanted to share with you.





She also posted a photo of my grandson Rowan wearing the socks knitted for him by no otherthan Amy Lane. They are so cute! For those on Facebook you can visit a video of Rowan smiling while wearing his new socks on my profile page. We were all touched that Amy found the time to add to Rowan's hand knit collection!