Weekend Highlights

 I managed to finish knitting Zivah's hat. We like to call it "The-cat-in-the-hat-santa-hat". I'm working on one for Joe now.

On the way to Thanksgiving dinner, we stopped in to see the buck our neighbor had shot that morning. Terry has a way of nabbing odd deer. This one was a nine-point. He has a 13-point mounted on the wall in his kitchen.

 My brother brought his dirt bike down on Saturday, so I got my first real experience driving a motor cycle.

Chris and I finished putting up the siding on the dormer, and while I was out celebrating some family birthdays, he got it painted. We're glad to get that done with the cold, wet weather starting to settle in.

Joe likes to "race" his cars. I was getting tired of him playing with them on the carpet in the living room, so finally made him a racetrack (complete with pit road) out of masking tape in the playroom.

Finley Worries

A couple of times in the past month or so, Finley has come to me after the kids were tucked in for the night with tears in her eyes, holding her 'soft blanket' tightly to her chin. Usually, when this happens, she is worrying about something like a lost toy or is scared of something general like alligators. Lately, though, her worries have centered around death.

"I'm worried about being dead," she said. "... Can we feel when we're dead? ... Can we see?"

I can envision the image in her head, of a still body trapped in the dark, unable to move or see, utterly alone. So I explain to her that for those that love Jesus, we are given a new body and go to be with him in heaven and that people that died before we do will be there, too. "Will we be young or old? ... Will Gramma be young? ... Will I get to have my soft blanket?" So many questions I don't have the answers to.

I wrote and illustrated a little book several years ago about a little bug wondering what heaven would be like, and from all he'd been told, it didn't sound like it would be a place where he really wanted to end up. To be honest, streets of gold and sitting for hours singing doesn't sound very enticing to me. Where are the soil and trees I love so much? Won't we get to have fun?

How do you explain to a seven year old that, I think, heaven is about being with the One who loves us best of all, and once we are enveloped by that, it changes what we think is important... like having your special soft blanket. The best verse I could think of to ease her worries was John 14:2 : "In my Father's house are many mansions... I go to prepare a place for you." I told her that God loved her so much, that he is making a special place for her in heaven, and that he knows her favorite colors and the things she likes and probably is decorating a room for her in a way he knows she'd love. (And who knows, I thought to myself... maybe her soft blanket will be there. I wouldn't put it past him.)

So this morning, I was going through the schoolwork she brought home yesterday, and found a little book entitled 'I Am Thankful'. Page one: I am thankful for my family because they are my family. Page two: I am thankful for my teacher because she teaches me. Last page: I am thankful for deth because we go to heven and see god.



The hat that inspired it all.

Well, I finally finished the hat. But I should have known better and told the kids it was for someone else. Because now, Zivah and Joe want their own hats.



Finley's finished hat.

So I figured out the continetal style of knitting, have improved my knitting speed, and have started in on a hat for Z.


 And since I didn't think I'd have the patience to teach Fin how to knit, I taught her (and Joe, at his insistence) how to finger knit. This is keeping them satisfied for now.


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Knitters Are Underpaid

Christmas season is fast approaching, and I was wracking my brain trying to think of cool, home-made gifts I could make to ease the budget. My mind flashed back to a picture taken of me when I was about two, a long, pointy, knit stocking cap hanging down my back. "Perfect!" I thought. I browsed the net for a free knitting pattern and bought some circular needles.

I decided that before I spent too much time on a real gift for someone that might not be as nice as I envisioned, I would make a practice hat for Finley using yarn I already had. I started off, feeling pretty good about the project. That is until I discovered after several rows that I had twisted the stitches and had to start over. I persevered and tried again. This time, I could see the hat taking proper shape.

A few days later, I had the main body of the hat done and was ready to start tapering. But in classic Wendy fashion, I hadn't really read the instructions thoroughly and had just been doing what I though was logical. And it looked awful. I re-read the instructions and found what I had done wrong, tore out about 20 rows and proceeded. The hat is now taking shape to my satisfaction.

But really, this hat is taking a whole lot more time than I anticipated. If I wanted to sell these hats online and make it worth my while, how much would I have to charge? If I was to earn a measly $5 an hour knitting, I could not afford to buy this hat. At this point, I have been working on this for 2 to 3 weeks, for (at least) an hour each night, and (at least) five days a week. So far, I would have to charge $50 to $75, and I'm not even finished. I wondered if there were any hats like this on etsy.com and how much the asking prices were. I found several with a price tag of $25 to $40. The only way to make money off these hats, or be able to justify the time it takes to make one for a cool, inexpensive Christmas gift is to be able to whip one out in a day or two...

So unless I become a speed knitter in the next few weeks (Check out this video. It makes me ill.) don't expect any hats from me.

Books

Yesterday, I drove down to Lewisburg to do some shopping. I had some library books to return and was hoping to find something else to read. I had been on a contemporary author reading spree and was ready to read something classic. I didn't have anything particular in mind, so started scanning the shelves for old-looking dust jackets or bindings that gave away the fact that the book contained something classic. I couldn't seem to find any, so decided to check for the first author that came to mind: Austen. Nothing. What about James Joyce? Nothing. Panic started to set in as Zivah and I zig-zagged back and forth down the long aisle. Thomas Hardy. Nabokov. Nothing. Only a few months ago, I read an aging copy of George Eliot's Adam Bede. It was gone. Had the people of Marshall County lost so much interest in the classics that the librarians cleared their shelves of great literature to make room for excessive amounts of John Grisham and  Belva Plain works?

I headed toward the librarian's desk, wondering if I needed to start budgeting for books so that my kids wouldn't grow up not knowing who Mark Twain was. "Do you have a classic literature section?" I asked the lady. "You mean authors like Jane Austen and Agatha Christie? Right over here." She led the way to section 813 as I nearly sank to the floor with relief.

Of course, now my mind and emotions are spinning. While on one hand, I'm thankful that I don't have to weed through so much drivel to find a really good book, I'm pretty sure people will be less likely to read a classic on impulse. What constitutes a classic, anyway? And that section looks pathetically small... (Oh, Nashville Public Library, how I miss you.)

Tuesday morning, my mom showed up to help me get started putting up the siding in front. I was hoping to get three or four rows done before the kids got out of school. As we were loading some planks into the bed of the truck, my neighbor pulled up in his Gator. I thought he had come over to tell me the other neighbor's horses were out again. But he said he had heard the plea in my last blog post, and had come to help. At first I thought he was just joking, but no. Less than three hours later, we had most of the siding up on the right side. It is such a great feeling when you get done more than you expected. [Thanks again, Terry!]

And with Chris coming home from work early a few days last week, we managed to get some flashing up around the dormer and put up the siding on one wall. I'm feeling a bit more optimistic this week.

Every time I post a picture of the house these days, it seems as if there is little progress or difference in the photographs. It was exciting to see walls go up and big sections of roofing get completed. But now, detail work is more time consuming and the days are getting shorter, and as much as I would like to post a picture tomorrow of siding covering the whole front of the house... well, who know how many pictures are between here and there.

So although it may not look like it, we did get quite a bit accomplished this weekend. Trim is around the second story window, and the soffit and roof trim is up on the front of the dormer. We also decided to extend the eave across the front of the dormer to help protect the lower windows, so had to build that out and put the roofing material up. It was what my original drawings showed, but when we built the dormer I talked us out of it because I was worried it would sag. I'm glad Chris talked me back into it. We like how the eave breaks up the towering front wall. It was a pain trying to figure out how to get the metal to 'match up' (as in reality it doesn't), but we (or should I say, Chris?) managed to get it to work. 

The weather is supposed to be really nice the first part of this week, and I am trying to figure out if there is anything I can try to tackle on my own while Chris is at work and the kids are in school. Anyone out there want to come by and help hang some siding?

Chris took the day off work yesterday to finish caulking and painting the west side of the house. The foundation will eventually be painted a bit darker.
Now we start on the front.