Friday, September 01, 2006

Now with 100% more blog material!

Whew! It’s been another crazy week in my life. So much to say. But because this is a knitting blog, I’ll start with the knitting first and then move on to the drivel about my life that may interest about five of you.

Thanks!
Thank you to everyone who voted for me in the Amazing Lace challenge. I appreciate all your support. Sundaes all around!

Knitting!
It is the shawl that never endsProgress! Now that I’m working on the edging, the Shaped Triangle shawl is starting to look more shawl-like and less blob-like. According to my handy-dandy anal-retentive spreadsheet, I am now exactly 83.06% finished with the shawl. I’m a little nervous because when I was 75% finished, I had used more than 75% of the yarn. I’m not allowing myself to panic yet as I think I can do a little fudging at the end to save yarn if needed.

Silky Woolly goodnessMore Knitting!
Peter and I happened to be near Yarntopia on Tuesday (see below for the reason), and he suggested that we stop by. (Yes, his idea, not mine. Isn’t he great?) As soon as I walked into the store, Amy said, “You didn’t waste any time!” Huh? What?

As it turned out, Amy had sent me an email earlier that day to tell me that the yarn and pattern for my fall Yarntopia sample knitting had just come in. For reasons described below, I hadn’t seen that email. So it was all a surprise for me! I’ll be knitting Serenity from the new RYC Style booklet using RYC Silk Wool in a luscious purple color. That’s 50% silk 50% merino. Yum. I’ve swatched and will cast on this weekend. Expect a yarn review soon.

Puzzle solved!
Monkee has been hounding me about whether or not I’ve solved the crazy clues that were sent to me over my trip. It was hard, but I did manage to decode the clues. Instead of making anagrams of the FIRST letters of the words, I had to make anagrams of the LAST letters of the words. As soon as I did, the answer was obvious:
Sherry Floyd.

Yes, Sherry Floyd. Who is she? She’s no one right now, but I happen to know for a fact Monkee plans to change her name to Sherry Floyd as soon as possible. Why does she want to use that name? Well, it’s because Sherry Floyd is an anagram itself for “fleshy or dry.” Monkee, being the die-hard Texan that she is, loves Texas barbeque. And like all good Texans, she’s picky about her barbeque. She likes her barbeque to be either fleshy or dry, but not both at the same time.

Ingenious isn’t it? That Monkee sure is a clever one. If that’s not the answer to the clues, the only other possible answer is that the words are completely random and designed to drive me out of my mind. But I’m sure that can’t be the case. Monkee wouldn’t do anything like that to me.

Drivel!
Bald bookshelfLast week, I informed you that Peter and I were planning on selling our house and moving. I even complained loudly about the stager who invaded our house. Just LOOK what she made me do to my bookshelf! Peter and I have six large bookshelves and four of them look like this now. (The other two have books that I use for my work and I refused to pack them up.) I wonder if people who come into the house think we’re crazy for having so many bookshelves and but so few books.

But that day with the stager was only the beginning of an eventful six days. Here’s the play-by-play:

Friday afternoon: Peter goes to our buyer’s agent’s office to sign an offer for the place that we want to buy. At the same time the stager is in our house driving me batty.

Friday night and all day Saturday and Sunday: Peter and I work furiously to do the things the stager asked. Lots of packing and stashing boxes in the attic. The last half of Sunday is used to completely clean our house from floor to ceiling. Scrub, dust, vacuum, mop, touch-up paint, repeat.

Sunday night: We get a counter-offer from the seller of the house that we want. We discuss and decide it’s good.

Monday: Call buying agent tell him to find out a couple more details from the seller, but that we were happy with the rest of the terms. Meanwhile, our house officially goes on the market--property is listed on the MLS computer, sign goes up, keybox goes on door, photographer comes to take photos of our now perfectly staged house.

Tuesday: As we’re preparing to go to our buyer’s agent’s office to sign the official offer papers, we get a call telling us that the first showing of our house will be that afternoon. We tidy up (hide the cat toys and cat beds) and leave. We finish signing papers but there’s still more time to kill before the showing at our house is scheduled to be over. Peter suggests going to Yarntopia. We do. Yarny surprise! As we’re driving home Peter says, “Wow! This day has been perfect. We’ll get home and there will be an offer on the counter.” We both laugh.

As soon as we get home, Peter calls our seller’s agent to ask her a question. Before he can ask, she tells us that we have an offer on our house. For our asking price. Offer is sent to our house. Peter reviews it. It looks good.

Wednesday: Peter calls seller’s agent to tell her that we accept the general terms of the offer but want the timing of the closing adjusted. Our buyer’s agent calls and says that our offer on the new place as been accepted and signed and we are now under contract for our new home. CELEBRATE! Seller’s agent calls to say that our requests for the adjustment of closing were accepted. We sign those papers and now our house is under contract, too. CELEBRATE! And then fall down from complete exhaustion.

Thursday on: Now it’s time for me to worry about the actual moving process…

20 comments:

shetha said...

Eat! Drink! Be Merry! Celebrate over the weekend! Tuesday you can worry about moving LOL. Congrats on the AL challenge too -- well done!

Helen said...

whoah moving! yay!!

silly monkee.

and when i checked the bookshelf photo in flickr, i saw the photo of my two flowers. ain't that the cutest thing? teehee

i cannot wait to start my shawl! you'll share the spreadsheet, eh?

just under halfway done with the border on Ana's shawl.

Pumpkinmama said...

Wow - busy week indeed. Congrats on all the house stuff falling into line - how wonderful.

Anonymous said...

Brilliant.

amylovie said...

I'm so glad I was part of your awesome day. Congrats on selling your house so quickly. I know that is such a relief.

Amy

Anonymous said...

Congrats on the lightning-fast buy and sell! Let's hope it was the stager's ideas that really did it, and then we can forgive her for her weird rules. Congrats also on winning the Amazing Lace challenge (I definitely voted for you!).

Jennifer said...

Congratulations! I'm so happy that this went smoothly for you. Real estate can be such a horrible experience. I've got stories... lots of bad, bad stories...

turtlegirl76 said...

It all sounds like Kismet to me. Wonderful!

Meredith said...

Congrats! Will you be moving around the same area? That's very exciting!

Elizabeth said...

I guess the stager was right. Though I, myself, prefer a full bookcase to an almost empty one. Congratulations on everything going so perfectly. Your stars are truly in an optimal alignment!

Anonymous said...

I think "crazy" is the best thing someone might think about your empty shelves. I might go for the less charitable "stupid" -- as in, "doesn't go in for all that funny book larnin'."

Anyway, I mean no offense to your stager, but if I walked into a house and saw bookshelves like that, I think I'd laugh out loud and assume that the current occupant was from another solar system and hadn't been told how shelves are generally used.

I LOVE both the yarn and the pattern for your fall sample knit. Do you think Amy needs any sample knitters in Rhode Island?

Hey, I'm the first one to jump in to say that I'm one of the five people interested in the rest of your life! I think that means I love you best.

Anonymous said...

Excellent all around! a new pattern, a new house -- and a sold house!
Whee! congratulations!
(Oo! Oo! And I'm interested in your life too!)

Anonymous said...

I think it was the cats that sold the house so fast. The buyers thought: "If three cats can be happy here, so can we."

I can't believe you figured out the clues so quickly! Brilliant! (I knew not sending you verbs would make it too easy.)

Brenda said...

Congratulations on selling your house so quickly! And best of luck on your move. Your shaped triangle shawl looks beautiful. I am new to your blog. What is the yarn in the shawl?

SuzannaBanana said...

Wow! That couldn't have gone better. One showing, sold, and now the cat tree doesn't have to be hidden anymore.

The triangle shawl is gorgeous.

Congratulations!

Anonymous said...

Wow how lucky are you?

Anonymous said...

WooHoo! That is awesome! And I would so luv to find nice built-in bookshelves like yours.

Laura said...

congratulations on selling your house, and getting the new one! that's so exciting! :)

Cheryl:) said...

I've never heard of a stager! Looks like CLEAN SWEEP was through!!! I'd be in big trouble if they were here..

SAM said...

I'm tired just reading all this. This move was meant to be because I haven't heard this kind of story in a long time - Congrats! So, where are you moving? Closer to Yarntopia by chance?