With January behind me, it's a good time to wrap up on the first room in my house that I took the time to work on: Z's play area.
You can find the "before" view and my goals in the post here.
To review my goals:
I found it really hard to photograph the area because of the dimensions of the room and the lens I was using. This is the view from north to south. I was able to get the extra Trofast storage unit from Ikea, and I replaced the bins that Z had broken or damaged. We also purchased an Expedit bookcase from Ikea -- selected because it wasn't specifically "kid furniture" and could be put into service somewhere else, if necessary -- getting those things pretty much knocked out goals 1, 2 and 3.
This is a detail shot of the corner with the easel and the bookcase. In addition to the storage, I wanted to start to create an art area for her. That easel was also from Ikea, and, at $15 it was something both John and I could agree on. It has a chalkboard on one side, a white board on the other and a nice way to hold a roll of paper for her to draw on, too. The blue circular bin behind the red chair is also an Ikea purchase. It is being used to store balls and balloons and a few stuffed toys. I really like the Expedit unit and all the uneven height shelves. This makes it perfect for storing toys and books of a whole variety of sizes -- and most things are at kid height, but there are still some areas out of reach for things that we need to go into "time out".
This is the toy storage area. We already had the bottom Trofast system, we purchased the middle and top units. The top unit will hold art supplies (things that should be out of reach unless adult supervised) and the middle additional toys. We're not sure that this is the final configuration. Right now we're also trying out having the second large unit sit at a right angle to the first unit (along the carpet line) so that Z can have two areas to play on.
As far as goal 4 is concerned, we're still mid-sort. Not surprisingly, I didn't find too many books or toys worth parting with, and once I had the bins to sort things into, it made it easy to start to find all the pieces for things that I thought were broken or missing too many parts to be worth keeping. Just goes to show that a little organization can go a long way towards understanding what we really do have!
Overall, I'm extremely pleased with my first month's efforts. I think that keeping the goals simple and manageable made it easier for me to keep my eyes on the prize. Tonight those bins will get their photo labels (an idea from the comments on my first post that I thought was brilliant -- thank you Anna!), and I will get a chance to play with my new laminator for the first time!
Now it's time to pick the next room!
You can find the "before" view and my goals in the post here.
To review my goals:
- Get a second toy storage frame so that the two
can be placed back to back and Z can have an area to play on top of
- Replace
the toy bins and label them so that toys like Legos and Tinker Toys
have a dedicated storage area -- hopefully this will also help others
get the toys back to the right place.
- Get rid of the metal crates and get a real book case of some kind for her books.
- Cull out old toys she doesn't play with and find a place to donate/share/recycle.
I found it really hard to photograph the area because of the dimensions of the room and the lens I was using. This is the view from north to south. I was able to get the extra Trofast storage unit from Ikea, and I replaced the bins that Z had broken or damaged. We also purchased an Expedit bookcase from Ikea -- selected because it wasn't specifically "kid furniture" and could be put into service somewhere else, if necessary -- getting those things pretty much knocked out goals 1, 2 and 3. This is a detail shot of the corner with the easel and the bookcase. In addition to the storage, I wanted to start to create an art area for her. That easel was also from Ikea, and, at $15 it was something both John and I could agree on. It has a chalkboard on one side, a white board on the other and a nice way to hold a roll of paper for her to draw on, too. The blue circular bin behind the red chair is also an Ikea purchase. It is being used to store balls and balloons and a few stuffed toys. I really like the Expedit unit and all the uneven height shelves. This makes it perfect for storing toys and books of a whole variety of sizes -- and most things are at kid height, but there are still some areas out of reach for things that we need to go into "time out".This is the toy storage area. We already had the bottom Trofast system, we purchased the middle and top units. The top unit will hold art supplies (things that should be out of reach unless adult supervised) and the middle additional toys. We're not sure that this is the final configuration. Right now we're also trying out having the second large unit sit at a right angle to the first unit (along the carpet line) so that Z can have two areas to play on. As far as goal 4 is concerned, we're still mid-sort. Not surprisingly, I didn't find too many books or toys worth parting with, and once I had the bins to sort things into, it made it easy to start to find all the pieces for things that I thought were broken or missing too many parts to be worth keeping. Just goes to show that a little organization can go a long way towards understanding what we really do have!
Overall, I'm extremely pleased with my first month's efforts. I think that keeping the goals simple and manageable made it easier for me to keep my eyes on the prize. Tonight those bins will get their photo labels (an idea from the comments on my first post that I thought was brilliant -- thank you Anna!), and I will get a chance to play with my new laminator for the first time!
Now it's time to pick the next room!
I have now started enough weaving projects to realize that I really don't mind warping looms. If you need to clear your head and refocus, warping a loom is a perfect activity. At one level, it's very "lock and load", the tasks are simple and repetitive, hands are engaged. On another level, you are forced to keep both brain and hands in action, especially if the pattern you need to use when threading your heddles has a longer repeat. For the 
This strange looking picture is a composite (it's hard to get a full on good shot because of the whole long/narrow issues with my house layout). This organizational embarrassment is my laundry area (it's not really a room -- more of a largish closet). You'll also note the server in the top right corner -- my poor laundry room also serves as our home network closet and houses not only the big honking server (nicknamed "gargantuan" because of its capacious harddrive room) but also a variety of satellite TV equipment and other miscellaneous home networking miscellany. And as if that wasn't enough functionality for one closet the top left part of space is taken up with some storage stuff.
Blooming Batik 9 Patch -- "Fire"
The Specs:
This is what I got when I said "hold Daddy's socks while I take your picture". Not the best picture of the socks but a pretty good picture of the kid. She's now beginning to understand what I want when I give her knitwear and ask her to hold it while I take a picture. And she was very excited afterward when it was time to give Daddy the socks. 
These are the fingerless version of the 
As with other patterns of Ysolda's that I've worked, I was impressed with the easy to follow instructions. I love that the pattern is mirrored on each glove. Besides the modifications she suggested for shortening them and making them fingerless, I made only a few small changes to suit my own needs. I chose a 2.5 mm needle instead of a 2.75 mm needle (I have pretty narrow forearms and wrists and didn't want the gauntlets to be too loose) and added a couple extra rounds around the knuckles. They were a little stiff pre-blocking, but after a soak, they softened up and have a very lovely drape without being too loose. Smooshy seems to come with pretty generous yardage, because I used right around half a skein for this pair of gauntlets.