September 13, 2016
Our shed at the farm finally has walls! Charming has finished adding all of the T1-11
siding. He still has several items that
need to be completed like installing the side door and windows, putting
shingles on the roof, adding outside trim to make it pretty, and painting. Although this list still seems long, the
major work is done. Because I’m sure you’re
getting tired of reading about the shed, I won’t showing any more pictures of
that until it’s completed.
We have many other jobs to focus on that will bore you almost as
much as our incremental progress on the shed.
We are hoping to build a simple cinderblock chimney on the house before
winter. We also need to cut and
stockpile some firewood so that it can dry out and be available for use next
winter. After those two things are done,
we hope to start renovation on the house.
I’m all for taking the winter off and hibernating in our current home,
but Charming is gung-ho to move to the farm. Although it is inconvenient to be moving back
and forth between the two houses, I definitely recommend doing this versus
renovating a house while living in it.
Having gone through the kitchen renovation a while back, I can tell you
that it’s really difficult to have to jump over construction materials to fix meals
and live a normal life.
Recently, I decided to start a new knitting project to fill my
spare time while Charming was working on the shed. Since the winters at the farm will be colder
than it is at our current house, Charming and I will need plenty of warm socks,
hats, and sweaters. It will be important
to have layers of warm woolies for our farm winter wardrobes. Several years ago, a friend of mine gave me some
older knitting magazines. One of them
was the Fall 2003 edition of Knitters’ Magazine. In it, there was a lovely sweater called, “Round
Trip” designed by Kay Dahlquist. I have
been moonin’ over this jacket since I first saw the pattern. I especially loved the back panel of the
sweater, which has a sort of hour-glass shape to it. The magazine shows the sweater in a
variegated yarn, which is beautiful, but I wanted the sweater to wear with
dress pants. Because I tend to wear
black, grey, or brown dress pants I wanted a sweater that would go with these
colors.
I am close to finishing the sweater and I really like the way it’s
turning out. The back of the sweater, as
well as the border, is off-white. The
right sleeve is tan and the left sleeve is dark grey. Although these colors are definitely not for
everyone, they will work perfectly with any of my dress pants. The sweater has ¾ length sleeves and the
front sections are rounded. I may add
some kind of a closure, if needed, after I finish it just to dress it up a bit
more. Because I like this sweater so
much and it knits up quickly, I may make another one (or two) to wear on those
no-so-dressy occasions. I’ll share
pictures of the finished sweater in my next post.
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Charming uses a rope to pull the upper level T1-11 into place. |
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Still need to cut out the window at the top as well as windows beside the door. |
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All T1-11 siding is now in place. |
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Charming designed and made vents to the top point of the shed. |
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He'll add screen to the holes and then paint before being put into place. |
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Sweater shown in the 2003 Fall issue of Knitter's Magazine. |
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My version of the sweater. I love it! |
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Back view of the sweater. I love the hour-glass shape of the back panel. |
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Powder appears to like the sweater as well. |