Stone Tiles and a Summer Sampler.

So, I've been in house renovation purgatory. If you've ever had to pull up wall-to-wall carpeting, including glued down underfelt then you'll understand exactly where I've been. I won't even go into all the gory details of scraping fifty year old glue off concrete, and what it did to my hands. I wept at one point, like a tiny child! It's a testament to my love for Animals, and my own sanity that the carpets had to go!Just looking at them made me sneeze! For some reason, unexpectedly, our dogs, who are really, really, really house trained, took to peeing and pooing on the carpets. I think they were trying to tell me something? Of course the prepping wasn't the worst of it. The dogs and I headed out of town for three days when the Tilers moved in to lay down the lovely grey-terracotta stone tiles. My husband remained behind to oversee the proceedings. On the day I was supposed to come back ( to a beautifully laid floor ) he called to suggest I stay away for a few days more. Um, why? Oh, there's " a bit of dust " he needs to clean up? Anyhow I insisted on coming back to...oh, my word! I'd not taken into account that the Tilers would be cutting stone tiles with an angle grinder. Literally, there was dust EVERYWHERE. Just EVERYWHERE. It's been two weeks and I'm still finding fine terracotta dustings in cupboards and elsewhere. My first thought was for my tiny studio but thanks to some crochet fairy magic it seemed to have missed the worst of it. However, now that things have settled down a tad I am enjoying the benefits of our lovely stone floors!

 No more vacuuming, no more dust mites and sneezing, no more fifty year old GREEN carpets!  One thing always leads to another. It's just the way things are in the renovation game. So we had to paint the walls, and buy spiffy new mats, and think about a new lounge suite, and sprucing up the kitchen, bathroom and shower too! I painted the living room and dining room, Coffee Liqueur... and the Kitchen, Soft Moss.

Hahaha, the revenge of the green carpets! Babe, of course, had to have a lie on each mat just to ensure it's catnapability. :-)

In the meantime I had been almost at the point of joining all my yummy granny squares, but to lift my spirits I decided to do a quick sampler, incorporating a bit of Sophie's Universe, so that I could learn a few new stitches, you know, to keep my mind off all the chaos. I pretty much winged it throughout, changing yarn weight and hook sizes. Afterall...it was just for practice. I spent the few moments between the renovation grind and grime doing a row here and there. The results were a bit chaotic, in colour, from my usual careful planning. Also, a gazillion mistakes but... WHATEVER! :-)

At one point I was going to make an afghan of it but then I remembered that I still had 126 yummy granny squares waiting to be joined into a blanket. I used the Elle Pure Gold and Family Knit , both DK and size 4, 3.5 and 3.25 hooks. Colours chosen at random were... amethyst, soft lilac, lavender, petrol, just pink, ivory. riviera, shrimp, citrus, clementine, sunshine, soft lime and olive. Honestly, I don't know how I would have coped as well as I did without being able to do even just a bit of hooking in-between. My anxiety issues mean that I absolutely hate disorder, and change. Although my entire life, mostly, has been about dramatic changes being thrust upon me, forcing me either to sink, or swim! However, over the years I have come to hate the just swimming part. I want to float, on a lilo, with a crystal glass of pink champagne in one hand and a crochet hook in the other, basking and enjoying my life on this beautiful planet. Crochet has been a lifeline in times of severe anxiety. It's my go-to when I feel overwhelmed and without fail, after a few rows, I can feel my jangling insides settle down.

I wish you a wonderful week and hope that the coming holidays are filled with many happy crochet hours. The dishes can wait. Or better still, delegate, delegate, delegate! :-)

Lotsa love,
Jen
xxxxxxx