Men at work - again

I'd forgotten just how much disruption is caused by a bit of building work.  Dust-sheets strewn through the house, sawdust, furniture piled high in all the wrong rooms, and the need to provide endless cups of tea for the workforce.  It's all in a good cause, of course, but having had a few weeks of relative peace and quiet, it has come as a bit of a shock to be back in refurbishment mode.  

The builders' merchant kindly made us the first drop of the day - 8 am, very bright and early - and by 9 o'clock the builder and his willing labourer were in full swing (although it wasn't long before they had both discovered that the window sill in the garage was exactly the right height to lean on when pausing to admire their handiwork!)  I have long-since learned that on such occasions it is best to keep a safe distance, popping in from time to time with well-meant words of encouragement accompanied by tea and biscuits.  And it has clearly worked because by the time they both decided to down tools for the day we had the framework for a partition wall, a new floor and the first-fix of the electrics (I should mention that we have also had an electrician on-site today, just for good measure!)

Keeping out of the way of 'men at work' gave me the opportunity to tackle a few odd jobs that I had been putting off for some time.  So I cleared out under the sink, sorted out the cleaning cloths (most of which needed washing), sorted through the (rapidly diminishing) pile of plastic bags, and put another load of washing through.  It was a really lovely autumn day today, blue skies and a very welcome warm sun, so I then headed outside to tackle a bit of gardening. 

We used to have a large phormium (New Zealand Flax) in the middle of the back lawn.  Phormiums and I have a chequered history; they always look very striking in their early years, but goodness, can they get big!  I had one at a previous house that very nearly took over the small gravelled front garden and trying to divide it was akin to a wrestling match.  And DIL has a ginormous specimen in her front garden that is big enough to lose two children in!  I'm now of the opinion that most phormiums are better off in municipal parks or landscaped gardens that can cope for their eventual size.  Consequently, we no longer have a phormium in the middle of the back lawn.  I did battle with it today and I won.  Quite satisfying.

It seems that lots of our neighbours were out and about in their gardens today, no doubt doing all those 'tidying up' sort of jobs that need to be done before the weather breaks.  Grass-cutting is on the agenda for tomorrow as the forecast is fine again, and I need to start getting to grips with the weed-infested lawn.  

This evening I had a bit of a doodle on the sewing machine.  I have a project lined up and I wanted to try out some ideas.  

I've never been very successful using metallic thread but the idea I have requires quilting with said thread so armed with some very sound advice from Vendulka at OliVen I had a little play around and was more than pleasantly surprised by the results.  No broken threads (joy!) and several more than passable snowflakes.  Actually, it was quite good fun.