Picnic Table

We've been on vacation.  It was fun, I'll tell you all about it next week.

Before we took off I finished a project just in time for the 4th of July celebrations.  I took this wood and built a picnic table.  From scratch.  It's nothing like baking.  Or knitting. 

After two days of sawing, gluing, drilling and sanding during naptime, this was my finished result.  Once again, from scratch.  It was pretty cool.  We tested it out and found one minor flaw.  When I put too much of my weight on the seats, the wood bowed a bit more than I would like.  This isn't going to work since I plan on spending countless hours playing with a toddler at this table.

So, I decided to replace the two bench boards with one wider board.  It's better this way because the Home Depot guy goofed and one of the narrow boards is about an inch shorter than the others.  A wider board is also a lot sturdier.

Then came the painting.  BG helped with the priming and I discovered that my almost seven year old is a very sloppy painter.  This is good to know since I plan on building some more outdoor furniture.

It took a few days to paint the table, waiting between coats drying, getting up early or painting at naptime.   But look at that color.  BG picked it out, Peacock Blue.  You can't buy a picnic table in a color as awesome as this one.  I absolutely love it.

I've never built anything like this before.  In fact, I asked for a drill for Mother's Day because we didn't even own a power drill.  I've been reading a site called Knock-Off Wood and it's really inspirational.  That is where I found the plans to build this.

Building the table was super fun and I bet that as I acquire more of the proper tools, it will be easier and faster.  Except for paint drying, that takes forever.  This table took a week to build from the trip to Home Depot to posing with it with friends.  Luckily, we went on vacation the next morning so the paint was able to set for a week before being played on. 

I kept the girls distracted by setting up Firecracker S'mores for them to make.    Lollipop sticks, marshmallows, melted chocolate, crushed graham crackers and sprinkles.  I trust that you can figure out the assembly part.  These are yummy.

We love our little table.  LG and I usually spend a little time in the morning before everyone else is up and play on it.  Talk about what we are going to do that day.  Her she is today discussing how she thinks we should put this by the mailboxes and sell lemonade this afternoon.  Catch everyone on their way home from work.  What an entrepreneur! 

I think that there may be cupcakes or cookies involved, also.  I will not be baking them from scratch. 

Pinwheel Blanket

This is by far the ugliest thing that I have ever made.  A pinwheel blanket made of reclaimed yarn.  Before pictures here on Ravelry.

It really is the ugliest thing ever.  I almost hate it.  Don't like the color, don't like the 2ply gray - white mix.  It's really not my style.  All the little knots and ends just add to the yuckiness.

A couple of years ago I was helping my dad move and I came across his Goodwill box and a giant sweater of his that he is now too small for.   I saw all that free yarn and thought that I would make a throw blanket for his new and very chilly house.  Just the thought of how optimistic and naive I was when thinking this would be a cool project makes me laugh.  I'm a far pickier knitter now.  Like the kid that won't eat their chicken nuggets because they are touching the mac'n cheese. 

Frogging this was a nightmare.  It wasn't a continuous knit piece of fabric but rather a cut piece of fabric.  I was determined and started tying all the little strings of yarn together with square knots.  I should of stopped there, darn those rose-colored glasses.

With both sleeves knit up and half the front I finally put the blanket down and it was never picked up again.  Making a couch sized circular blanket takes a very long time.  And it smelled bad because I neglected to wash the sweater before frogging it.  Finally, I stopped.

I dug it back out after finishing the Wallis because I really enjoyed binding off a project that had been sitting around for a long time.  I finished the row that I had stopped in the middle of.  Did one round of purl and then bond off.  It took about an hour.

I guesstimate that I used about 1/3 of the yarn in the sweater.  The entire back and part of the front hadn't even been frogged yet.  It comes to a nice baby blanket size.  Too small for me to use, but great for one of the girls to use.  And I washed it so it smells like Downy Lavender. :)

I took pictures of the blanket before washing, just in case the square knots didn't hold through the wash.  The knots were fine and I found three dropped stitches that started to run.  It just adds to the ugliness of it.

I am so glad that I finished this up right where it was left.  I don't have to spend another minute thinking about it and now I have the perfect blanket to take camping.  Because I really don't care if anything happens to it.

I'm Busy Being Bored

It's amazing how being a Stay at Home Mom can keep you busy to no end and bore you out of your mind at the same time.  

Keeping BG busy for the summer is fun, but exhausting.  She would like things to be exciting and different every day.  I'm glad that we have a large group of girls in our neighborhood as she normally plays with them every afternoon giving me a break.

LG has started walking everywhere, wants me to pay attention to her when she's talking and brings me food from the pantry whenever she's hungry.  She even brought her nursing pillow over once.  We have fun walking everywhere we go, but it takes me 10 times longer to get from point A to B.

Then there are the countless hours spent watching BG play with an orangutan at the zoo, run around at the park, or play in the garden at the library making sure she doesn't get kidnapped or injured.  Countless hours stacking blocks to get knocked over by LG, trying to read the whole page of a book before it gets turned or following her around to where ever she feels like going. 

It's very boring, but I'm so busy doing it. 

Then I have to take full advantage of nap time to get anything done around the house.  There are a few things that I can get done during solo playtime.  This does not include doing the dishes because LG thinks that the dishwasher is the coolest toy to take things out of and then try to crawl inside. 

And none of this time can be spent knitting.  At night I have the option to knit or sleep.   I sleep.

The Wallis Cardigan

I know that you have been waiting for this one.  Well, I know Natalie has been waiting for this one.  How does it happen?  You start something, put it down for a minute and suddenly two years go by.  I got on Ravelry to edit my progress on the Wallis Cardigan (rav) and saw that I had cast it on May 1, 2008.  I can't believe that it has been that long. And yet, I totally believe it.

Sure, I've made lots of things between then and now. But two years to finish a sweater is a bit much.  As a result, I had to frog back a little bit when I started knitting on it again.  I had made a few modifications to the size and length of the sweater.  I also lost my notes.  So I frogged back to where the double knitting ended and reknit all the decreases.  This way the two fronts would match the back.

The main modifications to the sweater were increasing the length to fit my torso and adjusting the stitch count so the waist would fit my hips instead.  That fancy little bottom is suppose to by above my pants line.  I didn't use any buttons either.  I mattress stitched it closed instead.  In hindsight, I should of knit all of the hip band seamlessly.  The double knitting was a pain to seam up.

With all the changes I made to the bottom of the sweater, I didn't think to measure and verify that the top of the sweater would fit well also.  It's a little big in the neck and does this thing (see photo below).  I'm not sure what you call that, but I call it falling off my shoulders even though the sweater never actually falls off of me.

Photo taken by Cat

I still love it and plan on giving it lots of wear.  Out of the four tops that I have made for myself, this one will probably get the most wear as it fits the least awkwardly.  In two of the three other tops, the torsos are way to short.  The third one is long enough, but has a deep back that I don't like.  I plan on someday fixing that.