Day Too Many: Couches!!

  Today was the day when we finally got the furniture we ordered back on July 26th.  They arrived earlier in the day than the estimated time frame, which was nice.  The delivery people took a look at where they were going to be putting them and said that there was no way they were going to fit down the stairs.  Bill told them to leave the large couch in the kitchen after they asked if we wanted to send them back.  The delivery people were going to leave both in the kitchen, but Bill got them to try and move the smaller one down and it was easy to do.  As the delivery people were leaving they kept insisting that we were going to have to take the banister off.

  Once Bill was able to get off his work calls we tried to move the larger one down.  We went the wrong way the first time, but were able to get it back up the stairs and rotate it.  The second time we got it to the bottom of the stairs and almost got ourselves stuck in a corner.  We had it on it's side at the bottom of the stairs and Bill had wedged himself to the same side I was on.  Luckily I was able to squeeze between the couch and the stairs and get to the other side.  We then lifted and rotated and it went right over.  It was pretty easy to do.

  I'm so glad that I still like them!  It's been so long that I was forgetting what they looked like and was starting to get nervous that I wouldn't like them when they arrived.  They have a velvet feeling fabric and go with the color theme.  That's something I never thought I would say.

  We still need to finish the other section of shelves for the rest of the DVDs and Blu-rays.  Right now it look like I will either have to move the smaller couch back some, or just have a bit less space to work with when I play Just Dance.  I'll have to test to see if the couch matters when playing the game so we will know if we have to move it completely out of the way once we can have people over again and have more people playing.  When I tested it before I was able to go all the way to the other side of the stairs and had more problems seeing than the sensor did picking up my movements.

  I asked Bill about a coffee table and while I think it would be handy, he doesn't seem to think we will need one.  I guess people are just going to have to hold their drinks and snacks.  Or we could bring down some TV trays and set those up when needed.

  I've also sold enough of the patterns I have on eBay that was able to move some things around in my craft room.  It's still a bit too cluttered, but I'm working on it.  I'm also down to just one large bin of yarn to give away, though there is always the chance that I will change my mind about some yarn and decide to donate more.

The New Googly Sploot

  You probably would have thought that I would have gotten tired of this pattern because of how many I had to make while testing the pattern.  I was just so curious how the pattern would work with a more variated yarn.  I actually really like it.  I saw the apology letter on Ravelry, so for now the pattern is still only on Ravelry.  I like how they are working with people to try and make is accessible to everyone again.  I do wish they had just gone back to the old one with the new one being the option, especially since they are working on the newer one and will (hopefully) make some changes.

  I finished the first blanket for the new couches for the basement.  Right now we have them ordered, but they have not shown up yet.  The blanket is about 71" square.  It was supposed to just be the spiral in the inside, but since it wasn't as big as I was hoping, I added the boarder.  I actually really like it and I'm glad I had to add more.  The pattern is Solid Spiral Granny Square, though I'm still me, so I didn't totally follow the pattern.  I did a smaller center area and only put one treble-crochet in the corner in the 3-cluster.

  I have started making something new for my Etsy Shop.  I was watching a video of someone showing off their cute accessories and he had on a set of the googly eyeball rings.

  I have loved those things since I was little, but I never kept one around to wear regularly.  Since I've been trying to mix up my wardrobe I figured I could get some for me to wear with my lolita dresses, or maybe some of the circle skirts I plan to sew.  I showed my friend them and she asked if I got them to wear as is, or to make something out of them.

  I've been following FloppyCatCreations on both Instagram and Etsy.  I have been really loving his Stitch Punks and have been wanting to make something similar of my own.  Right now my sewing machines are still pretty buried, so I haven't been able to make anything.  I also haven't been able to find the time to sketch what I would want mine to be.

  While I was falling asleep the night that I got the rings, the idea for these popped into my head.  I had to pull my phone out and start typing up the pattern before I fell asleep and might have forgotten it.  I've gone through a few different prototypes, but I think I have it down now.  I've mostly been working on Halloween themed ones, but I have some Christmas ones too.

  They are called Googly Sploots.  I'm not the best at thinking of names for things, so I put it out to the internet.  First I asked Krissy and got some ideas, but my other friend, Bri wasn't a big fan of what I came up with from there.  We worked off of my idea for the Googly part and one of Krissy's other ideas and came up with Sploot to show how they look a bit like they are melting or got dropped and splatted a little.

  Now the hard part about them.  I have mostly Halloween colors, but I need more for other holidays.  I was hoping to find some red because that would cover Christmas, Valentine's Day, and the 4th of July.  We have a lot of red holidays.  I found some at both Party City and Wal*Mart.  However, they are a slightly smaller size and while they look fine, I like the slightly larger ones better.  I think it's because the eyes are wider apart.  I can try to see if I could heat and bend the plastic of the band, but I'd also rather not put that much work into that part of them.

  I have a bunch of red, white, and blue yarn set aside to make hats for TAPS, but I'm thinking that I should make a bunch of these as well.  I bet the kids would love them, I know I do.

Flood

  We had had a bit of water coming in from the recent rain storms, but nothing too bad.  Today however, it got bad.  Zoom in on the window if you dare.

  This is the after.  The rain even lightened up for this picture, how nice of it.

  Let me tell you about the middle part now.  I saw the water coming in the window, snapped a picture, threw a bunch of towels on the floor, and ran out with no idea what to do.  That small piece of wood wasn't long enough to fit on the metal semi-circle, so with all the heavy rain, it fell in and brought the tarp in with it.  This caused the tarp to funnel water in.  I got it mostly covered and ran inside for a bucket.  By the time I was back out it had caved in again, so I got to bailing.  I got about 12 or so bucket's full out of it and started trying to cover it again.

  I tried to put the tarp over the top and the wood to hold it down, but since the tarp doesn't have any structure, it kept caving in.  I got it to mostly stay with the two longer skinny pieces of wood under and the shorter one on top, but since part of the tarp wasn't bein supported it partially caved in again before too long.

  This time I grabbed one of Bill's extra pieces of wood that was already warped and slapped that down.  I then put one of the skinnier pieces down to help cover more of the opening.  I scrunched the tarp against the house and put the second skinny piece on top.  Since there was a tiny bit of tarp without wood under it I put the smaller piece on to help defect the rain.  After I went in and changed my cloths again (I changed before I got the bucket so I wouldn't drip all over the house) I used the towels to get more water up and set up our box fan.

  By the time I went out to get a picture the rain had let up and the pooling waters had started to recede.  The section of ground had about seven inches of water before this that I had to stand in.  While I do admit that there was a lot of whining involved, I think I did pretty well at handling everything.  I did call Bill about it at one point and told him what was going on with the water in a way that probably made it sound like there were no spaces in-between my words, but it was okay in the end.

  In much softer and nicer news, I started the second blanket for the basement!  It is a crochet corner to corner and I'm going to follow the Three Mandala Thrill pattern to make it a rectangle.  Hopefully I will have enough yarn, and if I don't then I'll figure it out.  I'm not used to making things that I know I'll keep and want to have be certain dimensions.  Usually I just wing it with what I have and call that good enough.

The Door to Another Hat

  My Woven Lattice Hat pattern is available in my Ravelry store right now!  Some people have been reporting issues using the new website layout because of the change in the colors.  It has been giving some people migraines and a few people have even had seizures.  I'm wondering if I should start listing my patterns on my Etsy shop along with my Ravelry shop.  I'm not sure yet, but I'm thinking it over.
 The reason why it took so long to get this out was that I was having the pattern tested soon before states started to close down and people were told to shelter in place.  This threw a lot of chaos into people's lives and one of my testers wasn't able to test it after all.  This actually worked in our favor because I slightly changed the decreases for the XS hat.  It was a bit too pointy for me and since I gave each size it's own page, I figured why not change it a bit.  It's still a tiny bit pointy, but a lot less than before.

  I think I have all the crafting materials out of the storage unit.  Does this mean I'm done putting my craft room together and can have a grand reveal?  It does not.  I still have things in there that need to be figured out and there is also all the things that got left around the house while everything was going on.  I did manage to empty out a few project bags, so I've started to chip away at the things in the house.

  We thought that we hadn't gotten the door delivered to us, but it turns out that they just leaned it up against the side of the house and threw a tarp on it.  We're hoping that it won't rust from all the rain and humidity in the air since we still haven't scheduled an install date, not that the delivery people would have known that.

  This is Carrot Cake.  He/she got a name other than Teeny because I'm pretty sure that I caught him/her about 3 times.  I thought it was far enough away to take them to the forest near my house, but I think he came back.  Bill wanted to know how he/she was so dumb to get caught so many times.  Well, this trap was in a drawer, so no need to tangle with the kitties, I never acted threateningly, and there was always a bit of Carrot Cake Oreo in there.  That's where the name came from.

  Here you can see Carrot Cake and I going to the park.  It was only about a mile away and the internet said I should have aimed for 3-5.  That was on Saturday, and no far he/she hasn't come back, so I think we are good.  I was in a competition with the kitties on who could catch more mice.  I also didn't want to have to find more smelly mouse bodies in Fiona's room.  Two was enough for me.  I got one away from Tank and set it free.  They came in because Bill threw out the grain in the garage that they had been feasting on.  I'm hoping we got them all out now.

Hats, Hats, Hats!

  Bill's door was supposed to arrive back on the seventh, but we haven't heard when they will install it and they haven't come by yet.  Here is the picture I promised with all three crown styles.  I didn't group them by style or anything, I just laid them out so they would fit into the picture.
  It's been so strange to me to return to going into work after working from home for the past few months.  I still need to find a face mask design that I can easily wear for a few hours without the elastic giving me a headache or sliding down my head.  I would rather be able to stay home more and then be able to move more things into my craft room, but not much I can do about that.  I also have a mask or two I need to try out that my friends have made for me.  I would like to start making some of my own to donate, but I need to get to my sewing machines and oil at least one of them.
  I'm looking forward to the day when the K&CC can meet again and I can pass on the many bags of yarn I have been putting aside for them.  I've already made one drop off, but the storage until they have is pretty full.
  Don't worry, I'm not getting rid of all of it.  I want to down size so when I see other people knitting with new yarn, I might be able to get some and not feel bad.  Bill has also said that I have been cleared to keep some yarn in the attic, so I don't need to make it all fit, but I would like to be able to get as much as I can within easy reach.

  Bill has his work benches in and some of the metal peg board up.  He needs to order more or they would be up already.  We also got one of the silver shelving units in that we had been using down there before we started the remodel.
  We had some movers help with the last big thing we need to move down there.  They made it look so easy but disagreed on how to proceed when they reached the base of the stairs.  The one wanted to rotate it and keep the dolly on the side they used to go downstairs, but the more experienced guy kept trying to tell him that it wouldn't work and that they were hitting the banister.  When the lead guy went to get a moving blanket the second guy kept trying his idea and ended up scuffing the wall a bit.  When the lead guy saw that he asked for something to wipe the wall down with and it came off well enough.

  I think I'm going at a pretty good pace to have the craft bins out of the storage unit by the end of the month.  It was requested that I post a picture of my craft room mid-organizing.  I have many projects that will have to happen once I get most of the rest of the house and storage unit cleared out.  One of with is the many sewing patterns that I will never use that I need to list online.  Part of my brain is worried that I have already put too much into the room, but then I remember that once I sell an extra pattern, it will be gone and won't be returning.  I don't know if they will sell well or not, but I can try.  I still have quite a way to go before I can do that, but I will let everyone here know when I do.

Our Hard Work Starts Now.

  The table looks really good right there in the center as you open the double doors, but that isn't where it is going to stay once the last wall is done in that room.  Everyone will just have to remember as it is now, open and impressive looking.  I want to wait until they get the last wall done before I move too much into the room.  That way they can access everything.
  I'm glad to be able to use this table because it comes with a pretty fun story.  My dad actually dragged this drafting table out of a dumpster at Mugu in California.  They had probably used it for about 20 years and had fixed it up until the front brackets snapped off.  My dad got them welded back on and he decided to use it.  He found the one person in LA who could add some special drafting table linoleum to the top.  He fit it into his tiny Fiot Spider and drove it to the person and back again in about a week when he was done.  This all happened before I was born, so this table is quiet old.  As of a few days ago, you can find ones very similar to this, but missing the drawers for $500.  Here's to hoping I can take as good of care of it so I can use it many more years.

  Almost everything is on.  Bill isn't sure where one of his books are and there are a few more games that he has KickStarted that still need to come in at some point.  He keeps saying that he might have a problem, but I just look at how cool everything is and how much easier it will be when we want to have a game night to find everything.

  Our Roomba, Garmelie, is a very sassy robot.  He has run a few learning sessions and was having a hard time finding his dock last night.  He has gotten stuck in a few corners in the past and was trying to get onto his docking station for over 10 minutes before Bill just put him back on it last night.  Bill left him training today and I came home to him in his docking station just fine and the Goggle Home unplugged.  Bill and I didn't do it, so it only left Garmelie.  I hope these two can get along in the future.

Basement Day 61: Clean at Last

  The cleaners came in and made quick work of the basement.  They asked to borrow one of our vacuums because they wanted to have two going at once.  I almost wanted to apologize for how old ours was and how it doesn't work very well.
  Tank has already managed to get himself closed into a room.  I was taking a video for a basement project I have planned and had opened the utility closet.  He must have come down and gone in while I was in another area because I didn't see him.  When I was back down later I heard some sad meowing and found him in there.

  Our iRobot Roomba has a birthday, and that day is today.  Now I just have to figure out how to convince the cats to ride it.  I have also named him Garmelie after the Critical Role character because the first thing he did was to draw a dick in the carpet and then not too long after he got lost and couldn't figure out how to get past a corner and back to his docking station.

  Since it was such a pain to pick out and we weren't sure if it was what we wanted in the end, so I wanted to be the first one to try out the tub.  The water has a slight blue tint and I'm not sure if that is the water, the tub, or something else.  It is odd because when you feel the water out of the faucet it feels cooler than it does in the tub.
  Bill has also started moving things down there, but it isn't ready to be seen yet.  You'll have to wait until he gets it done and you won't get any progress pictures.  He keeps muttering that he thinks he has a problem, but I think it just looks like a lot of fun nights to come once he builds the big gaming table.

Remodel Day 60: Mostly Clean

  It made me feel like my house was a museum or something with all the plastic on it.  They didn't even use any tape or anything fancy to paint the ceiling, just a brush and roller.  It looks so good and you can't see any rouge paint spots anywhere.
  Other than painting the ceiling, today was a cleaning day.  They got all of their tools out from the basement and most of their stuff from the outside.  There are still a few things, but it would be easy enough to just roll in and grab them.  Next week will be used to do a few last minute touch-ups and then they will be done.  José gave us his number in case we have any small jobs we need done in the future.
  We can even start moving things in this weekend once the cleaning people are done.  This means that the hard part for the workers is done and the hard part for us is just beginning.  I'm really glad it has slowed down at work so I have more time to work on getting things sorted, looked at, and figure out where they go.

  The speakers and TV are in.  You can see the various levels of different speakers and things.  The sub-woofer on the floor, three speakers on the wall, and there are also six speakers on the ceiling.  Bill turned the TV on and my first reaction was that it felt like I was in a movie theater.  Bill thought that was super amusing.

  We had our most thorough inspector in today too.  He checked all the corners and even rubbed up against a few to check to make sure they were structurally sound.  He checked the closet a few times to make sure there was nothing scary hiding in there.

  He was so nervous to be down there because Bill was down there too.  He used to get yelled at for sneaking down because we didn't want him stepping on any of the carpet tacks or getting sick from the mold down there.
  He explored the side Bill wasn't on a few times, at one point trying to walk under the shelves but not being able to fit because he walks with his tail straight up.  When he saw Bill he ran back to the other side even though he wanted to go see all the rooms.  Bill went upstairs and he was able to go into the media area and the bathroom.  Bill went to go see what he was doing but then Tank ran upstairs so he wouldn't get in trouble.  Bill even tried carrying him down, but he was still convinced it was a trap and that he was going to get in trouble.  At some point he will get used to being able to go down there with Bill down there too.

Remodel Day 59: Egress Ahead!

  So it looks like they just shaved a bit off the shelf to get it to work with the door to the water shut off.  This is a bit annoying, since it means that we will have to take everything off the shelf and unscrew the shelf from the brackets to get to it.  Luckily we have only had to get at it a handful of times since we moved in, so it probably won't be a problem.

  The plastic protecting the carpet is gone!  You can feel the oddities in the floor if you know where to walk, but overall it feels pretty plush and soft.  It's a bit cooler than I was hoping it would be, but that will be nice in the summer and I can wear slippers in the winter.  I've already tried laying down on it, and it feels nice, so it passes the carpet test for me.

  It dried out enough for them to finish my egress window.  Luckily there hadn't been any more landslides since the first one.  It's not the prettiest thing, but it does what it needs to and that's all that matters.

  It is about time to call in the first group of people again to regrade the lawn dirt and make it look nice again.  I'm not sure if the hay/straw they put around will get in the way with that or not, but it would be easy enough to get rid of if they need to.  I'm not sure why they spread it out, but I'm sure they have a reason, and I'm sure if someone told me why that I would say that it makes sense.
  The people to do the theatre/media zone stuff should be out tomorrow and I think Bill's real door will be showing up next week.  They had talked about getting the ceiling in the kitchen painted yesterday, but they ran out of time and it looks like they didn't do it today either.  Though there might also be a bit of confusion with it as well.  I didn't completely understand what they were talking about, but I heard someone mention semi-gloss in a confused voice.

  This is my version of the Quick Knit Baby Shrug.  I wasn't sure I would have enough yarn, so I didn't do the largest number if increases.  I also knit until I ran out of yarn, which makes mine longer than the pattern.  I really like how on one sleeve has another color for the bind off.  I also did seed stitch where it has you work rubbing and garter stitch.
  I have too many projects on my mind to do next.  I want to do a semi-mindless shawl, but I also want to do a double-knit color-work hat.  Right now my plan is to start the shawl, and if I don't like it, then I can take it out and start the hat.  I will do the hat at some point, so don't worry, you'll get to see what I'm talking about it.  It's really fun looking and a free pattern, though from looking at it, I might rework the crown to a more gradual curve.  No one should be surprised that I already plan to change the pattern.  It's some kind of crazy fluke that I can follow them correctly when testing patterns for people.

Remodel Day 58: More Little Details

  You can see the differences in the finishes of the mud and the paint on the ceiling.  The foreman told the guy to use the white trim paint to cover the matte finish and while the color wouldn't be the same, it would look better.  The contractor said that while it would look closer, it would still look bad because the colors wouldn't be the same.  They did a bit of back and forth where the contractor kept saying that it would look bad.  The foreman then said they were just going to paint the ceiling with ceiling-white paint.  All the other ceilings have the correct paint on them, so the confusion about random things in my house continues.

  There was a hole below the faucet that was patched badly before, but now it looks nice and it looks like they sealed around the tub where it touches the wall.  The upper wall was also smoothed some.

  It is so good that they are thorough enough to make sure that the beverage cooler we got works.  So very considerate.  I think it's really funny, and while it's there, why not use it?

  Bill's room no longer has the door that makes me want to put magnets on it.  This is good because he will be getting the door he really wants instead of the one that was there.  There is nothing saying that I won't want to add magnets to the new door though.

  The plumbing inspector was in and I guess everything looked good because the back of the plumbing for the tub is now behind this little plastic door/cover.  It's good nothing had to be ripped back and done again.

  They asked Bill if we wanted the handles in the traditional spots and we figured why not.  I think we even forgot that we were getting handles since you can open everything without.  They do look nice though.

  The shim is gone and some edging is now there.  It's a bit odd that the edging here is a different color than the ones on other walls in the basement, but I'm pretty sure no one else would even notice.  They also finished filling in behind the hearth topper.  The oddness with the door framing and floor framing in my craft room also got sorted out today.  The last thing they would have to do, if they haven't already, is to fix the bowing on one of Bill's walls.  I didn't check, so they might have already gotten to that too.
  The things for the theatre area arrived today, and Bill and I had picked up the peg board for his workshop late yesterday.  Everything is getting so close and I'm excited and nervous.  I hope we get as much use out of it as I picture and I hope I can get my craft room layout nice fairly quickly.  I will definitely have to downsize some of yarn, because moving it showed me that I have a lot more than I thought.  It went through one sorting and will have to go through another before it gets moved back in for good.  I'm hoping that K&CC will get to start meeting soon after I start going through it again so it won't have to live in my car, like some I already have to donate has had to.

Remodel Day 57: Moving Heavy Things

  I'm glad I still like the door handles I picked out.  Not too fancy but also not too plain.  They didn't have enough to install all the handles in the doors that need them, so some doors still have holes.

  The drink cooler is in!  I probably knew that there were blue lights, but I forgot, so I got a fun surprise.  I really like how it looks, even though it looks super modern and the rest of the items look a bit more rustic.
  You can also see that we just lost the last port for anything on the switch plate.  That was the easiest fix for it, since it didn't make sense for it to be like that.  They also need to figure out what to do about that shim on the edge there.

  The center is a slightly different color.  I'm glad that since that happened, they noticed it and put it in the center.  I figured there were things drying around it, so I didn't touch it much or see how it felt to sit on it.  They don't need me ruining the things they just finished.

  The keezer is down, which was a surprise to us.  Bill mentioned that even though they helped take the freezer out, that they would not be helping us to bring it back down.  Then today they said they had to get into the garage to bring it down.  They didn't get it at first but got really interested when Bill explained it to them.  I told him that he needs a business card.

  We were a bit nervous that the bathroom wasn't going to have a latch on it and that we would have to add that ourselves.  Another surprise of the day was that they put one in, though you have to pull the door back towards the bathroom some so that latch catches.
  Last night Bill and I tried to see if both of us fit into the tub at once.  It's a bit of a tighter squeeze than we had hoped, but we do fit pretty well.  They also fixed the problems with the doors of the cabinets in the bathroom, so now everything opens just fine.  It doesn't look any different, so we aren't sure how they did that.

Remodel Day 56: More Paint and Hanging Stuff

  They finished patching and painted the inside of the stairway.  It's a bit odd that it is now the light grey color of the basement and not the pale yellow of the rest of the halls in our house, but it makes sense to match it.  When the guy was going along the edges he was so slow, smooth, and steady.  My hands definitely shake more than his do.

  This actually went up the last day they worked, but I didn't get a picture of it until now because of the wet paint on the door.  I don't remember the mirror looking this fancy, but I'm really liking it.  They still need to fix the door problems.

  My doors now have an easy way to move them.  There is a little hook that pops out so you can easily close it when they are all the way open.  This is probably how all pocket doors are done, but I've never had one before.

  We have power in the floor now!  The electrician also messed with the one of the switches.  The one with the bonus outlet was taken down and one of the switches was removed.  Not sure why they did that and what will happen, but we shall see what tomorrow brings with that.

  The beverage cooler also arrived.  It got caught in a bit of rain, but not as bad as some of the storms that happened today.  It is super heavy and will have to wait until tomorrow to get taken down.

Paint Day 55: Caution Wet Paint

  Yesterday was a day off and we had no idea if they were going to show up today or not.  The shelves are up but the wood isn't secured to the brackets yet.  We shall see what the do about the hole for the water shut-off valve.  So far they have made everything else look nice, so we have no reason to start questioning it now.

  I didn't get to look around too much because a lot of things were still wet from the latest coat of paint.  Last we checked they still hadn't fixed all the small things we brought up, like the drawer in the bathroom and how one of the trims on my craft-room door overlaps the floor framing.  At some point Bill will be getting the door he wanted on his workshop.

  Luckily I managed to get some knitting done, since the pictures are less exciting then usual on the construction side.  I partially designed this hat a while ago, but didn't do much with it.  I then figured it out and got two hats knitted, but then I didn't like what I did with the crown.  I redesigned the crown and knitted two more samples.  I liked it more, but I knew I could better.  I finally got to a crown shape I liked more and that's what you see above.  At some point I will get pictures of each of the design steps.
  I released it today on my Ravelry Shop.  You get four sizes and a note in case you need to change it at all.  I've made so many of these and I'm glad to move on for now, even though they are a quick knit.