summer time and the living is easy

chaos is the only word to describe my life this past week...and i don't really have much to show for all that chaos either! is everyone like this during the summer? i feel like every year, knitting takes a back seat during the warmer months, just because i'm busier with social engagements, i spend more time outside, i don't know.

but this year, i have even more going on. a few months ago i mentioned that we were looking to buy our first home, and we did settle on a place a while ago but i hadn't mentioned it since, because there were various holdups. but now stuff is starting to happen with it, so here's a little update: we're buying our apartment! which sounds a little anti-climactic (it was for me at first), but really, i'm so, so excited. we've lived here for over two years now, and i love it. when the building was bought last year to be turned into condos, i was seriously sad about it. i didn't want to leave. but when they first offered the place to us at a 'reduced' price, as is, we weren't impressed with the amount it was being offered at. it seemed too high. however, when we started looking at other condos in the area, we realized what a great deal it really was. our place was built in 1928 and it's beautiful. what's more...it actually has quite a bit of storage, and is fairly large for the price. so in the end, it seemed like the smartest move to stay. plus, we don't have to pack all our stuff up and move!

anyway, even though we are basically buying our place as-is (as in, we're not paying to have them renovate our entire apartment like they are doing to the other units in the building), we did decide to have them redo our kitchen. soon, granite counter tops and stainless steel appliances will be mine! here's a 'before' picture that i took after we cleaned everything out:



in the meantime, we had to leave our apartment for a while so that those renovations could be done. so this weekend, we packed up our kitchen and some of our everyday stuff, and moved into another building that the company owns. ugh. for us only staying there for six or seven weeks, it was a lot of work. plus, the place we're staying in is a studio apartment, and basically looks like a cheap hotel room. it's kind of depressing. our clothes are scattered everywhere and there's not a whole lot to do there, since most of our stuff is still at our place. i'm trying to be upbeat about it, but it's already getting old. i'm already counting down the days til we can move back in!

i have done some knitting. here's brigitte:



i think i like her now. i'm not entirely sure it's going to fit well (i know i could take it off the needles and try it on, but i'm too lazy), and i'm also not sure if i'm going to have enough yarn! even though i'm using the called-for yarn, and i bought enough, i'm a little worried that this sweater is going to end at belly-button level, which is just way too short. i have two more balls of the yarn and a little bit of a third left. we will soon know for sure!

i've also done a tiny bit of sewing. a lot of friends have birthdays right around now, so i've been whipping up little sewing projects as mini gifts. i'm working on some more purl bee cocktail coasters, and i made these potholders, from the lotta jansdotter book:



and that's all i got for the moment! hopefully things will calm down now that we're settled into our temporary home, and i can finish brigitte and get going on a new sweater: i'm torn between starting the hourglass sweater from lmkg, or starting breton girl from the new knit scene. i have yarn for both. maybe i'll start them both!