Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Dad's Aran cardigan - pictures

As I was seaming up the side and sleeve of Dad's Aran cardigan yesterday, I watched How Clean Is Your House?. (How in the world do they find these dirty homes, anyway?) As I sat seaming and watching, I began to wonder what Aggie and Kim would find to shock them in my house.

There are sometimes good accumulations of dust under the bookcases in the family room if we don't vacuum under them each week. And the laundry room can get sloppy when the children sort the dirty clothes by throwing them at the baskets rather than in them, but that is remedied when anyone goes in there to start a load of laundry to wash. My refrigerator hasn't been moved since we moved in over a year ago, and I'm betting there is a lot of nasty dust and dirt under and behind it.

But then I thought about the stove-top (or "cooker," as Kim and Aggie would say) and how that would probably disgust them. They don't like dirty cookers. Mine is a Kitchen Aid stove-top and it works fine. I'm sure it was put into the house because Kitchen Aid makes fine appliances. But for a mother of many who likes for her children to cook most of the family meals, and who allows all the children (except the 5-yr-old) to cook whatever and whenever they like, it's not the best choice. It comes apart into 13 pieces for cleaning - which means that there are lots of cracks and crevices for crumbs and spills to lodge. Wiping it down after cooking sweeps lots of food bits into the cracks where thay wait and look hideous. And reproach me for my laziness. Because I don't like to take the stove-top apart every day to clean it.

So I sat seaming and thinking of the stove. And the filth. And listened to Kim and Aggie tut-tut over the filthy kitchen they were looking at. I had to quit seaming. I had only about 6 inches of sleeve left, but the stove was calling me to come clean it. The cardigan went back in the bag and I spent the next hour taking apart and cleaning the stove. When I was done, I finished the cardigan.




(Joan graciously did mannequin duty for me.)

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9 Comments:

Blogger Tammy said...

Beautiful work on the cardigan! What an accomplishment!

As for the dirty houses, ahem, you could send them my way. Actually, we're more over-stuffed than dirty with 7 busy people in a way-too-small house.

6:30 PM  
Blogger Jan said...

The cardigan is absolutely breakthaking! I just finished a much simpler aran cardigan for my MIL, so I know that was a lot of work, and it's just beautiful!

My stove top is always dirty too, but it's one of those flat top models. It seems that cleaning it signals the "I need a scrambled egg" mode in my kids brains.

Glad you found my blog so I could find yours! The verse you have at the top is one of my favorites!

8:27 PM  
Blogger Fiberjoy said...

But where's the picture of your clean stovetop???

Tomorrow someone is coming to buy our dog and while I will miss his presence at my feet, I will not miss his continual muddy paws all over my house. (Or tripping over him.) I'm planing to give the floors a good cleaning Thursday, but oh there's still so many other areas.

The cardigan is very nice looking! I look forward to taking the time to slowly read down through your previous posts. :-)

12:50 AM  
Blogger Jennie C. said...

That is a beautiful sweater!

5:18 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

It is gorgeous! I'd love to see a pic of your dad wearing it! Love, Meg

5:56 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Good job on the sweater! Thought you were going to send my cell phone a picture? Seriously, it really looks great.

4:23 PM  
Blogger Donna Boucher said...

I love it!
You are a very talented knitter!
Wow!

7:01 PM  
Blogger Dana in Georgia said...

What a masterpiece! This sweater should be featured as a Fine Art Friday entry.

What? No picture of the stovetop?
We've displayed our desks (mine is messy) and just a couple of days ago, I pictured my *new* laundry room.

I'll be looking for your father, wearing his new sweater sitting at your/his desk.

Blessings fm GA,
Dana

5:11 AM  
Blogger Laura said...

I thank you all for the kind words regarding Dad's sweater. He was able to wear it almost 2 hours before the temperatures here in Alabama turned from the 40's to the 70's. I'm sure he'll enjoy wearing it next year!

8:36 PM  

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