I made these fun fabric flags on Sunday. Tonight we are dressed up as pirates answering he door for trick-or-treaters. I used 1/2 yard of 4 fabrics and 3 packages of black double-fold bias tape.

Impulsively, we decided to cut into our living room wall Thursday night and start our window to the stairwell project. This led to blowing in insulation to the entire attic Friday night (sorry for the noise neighbors!) and now we have quite a project in the works. It's looking good though, we got the new stairwell ceiling up! We've ordered a new exterior window to add to the front of the house and also blew insulation into the main living room walls between the studs. We filled the holes in with "Great Stuff" foam in a can and now I am seeing more wallpaper scraping in the future since the walls look wierd with the holes. It feels good to have a freshly insulated house.

Luckily we had plans to get out and carve some pumpkins with some friends today so we have some fine jack-o-lanterns on the front porch.

This is what I do on Monday nights... Innebandy. This excercise is on my list of favorites, along with Jazzercise, which I haven't been able to get back to for a few years.
I've been playing since the winter when I met Jesper. I am the only girl who plays with the group and also am the only one who doesn't speak Swedish.

I am taking Swedish classes on Thursday nights though! At least I can start keeping score.

Bathroom spiffyness... BEFORE:.

A superior drywall patch and texture later, we painted and installed the lights.

We chose two colors and put them on the bathroom wall on Saturday. It is very similar to my last bathroom in the condo, but it just happened that we got these colors. It really wasn't in the plan, just impulsive.

I couldn't stand the light fixture that came with the house. It was missing a glass cover and two bulbs were burned out. Since it was impossible to find a replacement glass, I picked out a new fixture and took down the old one. I wasn't surprised to find a big hole in the wall behind. I ended up cutting out a larger rectangle hole to repair it. I headed down to Dunn Lumber, pulled down my hair and asked sweetly for a scrap of drywall. Jesper had to pay when he asked, but of course being a girl asking for drywall, how could they charge me?

Anyway, we turned the power onto the new fixture and it didn't put out enough light for the whole room, especially the shower. Lame! I was sure I could get Jesper into the attic crawspace and sure thing - it happened tonight and we now how two light fixtures in the bathroom and it's got light again.

AFTER:


I got the ceiling fixture from IKEA and happened to have it on hand after deciding not to use it in another room. I got the vanity mirror from Lowe's. The paint is Benjamin Moore, unknown color names.

When Jesper's parents were here, they helped us with our front yard. They moved back our rocks and reseeded the grass. I added a little garden to the area and look forward to adding some plants in the spring. Since we planted it, it's rained enough so we don't have to water the grass seedlings. It's looking good!

I've also been busy tackling more house projects. I've been scrapping wallpaper from the hallway and also am swapping out the bathroom light fixture. Here's a taste of the wallpaper coming down. I wrote down a 7-step plan to completing the hallway project, being able to mark off a step is motivating.

Pretty soon we are going to have a lot of leaves to rake up in the backyard, I remember we had so many last year. About 3 weeks ago we planted lettuce and spinach. The lettuce doesn't look like it lived past 1 week, but the spinach seems to be growing. Maybe I'll get n some brocoli if I have time and daylight.

While stalling on my brown sweater, I whipped up this Pirate hat in a week. I was not sure if it would be too big since I used Cascade 220, but it fits me perfect. I like my hats a bit loose.
I really liked the pattern, but the cast-on was a bit painful. I ended up knitting this up on size 4 circular needles.

I don't normally post about work, but I thought I'd put it out there that there is this open position at work that I am hiring for an so here it is!

Associate Producer, Bellevue, WA

We stopped by IKEA on our way home Sunday and meant to buy another dresser, but they were out of stock. We always check the As-is department and came upon a pile of partially used Benjamin Moore paints. We grabbed 6 cans at $5 each. Normally a can of this paint is $40, so this was worth the risk that the colors were not right.
We chose 4 colors for the bathroom, here they are on the wall. The blue on top is really nice, but we already have 2 blue rooms. I am leaning toward the bottom color. I think we might end up doing a 2-color, with the darker at the bottom and the lighter aqua at the top, maybe with a white chair rail trim in between. This all was very impulsive. For a while, I was thinking I really liked the white bathroom walls, then I put up a purple towel and thought that color would look nice next to the tiles. The great thing about this paint is that it was so cheap, so we can swap it out later with something else without a loss. Anyway, horray for less white walls!

I've cast-on for the Pirates hat. I am using Cascade 220 in blue heather and Treliske Organic Merino for the white. It was pretty fussy to cast-on for, but now I have finished one pattern repeat and it's looking pretty good. I think it will fit, but be a smidge loose, which is fine for a wool hat. I really hate hat head and an itchy forehead. Stella has been keeping me company when I take this spot on the couch.
I've also reached the point in the Tangled Yoke Cardigan and I've run into a place where I think I am off 1.5 rows into the cable. This cable is not going to be as care free as I'd hoped. Make 1-into-5 is an annoying stitch to do, it really cramps up my hand. Also, there are mentions to "see stitch guide" but the stitches are not in the reference. I had to look in the Vouge book for the bobble stitch and had to assume what make 1-into-5 was.

Wednesday after knitting I picked up the Essentials of Baking: Recipes and Techniques for Successful Home Baking according to William-Sonoma. This weekend I finally had some time to cook and made whole wheat bread Saturday morning and then orange poppy seed muffins on Sunday morning. Both days I got up much earlier than normal, because I was excited to bake. They turned out wonderful, Jesper said the muffins are on his list of favorite foods. I also made soup, I sort of followed a minestrone soup recipe, it ended up very heavy on the veggies and was really delicious with the baked bread for lunch.