Dirty laundry.

We're getting ready to sell our house. We bought a new house farther south, closer to our kids' schools and most of their friends. Getting our house ready to go on the market is, of course, a process. It started with paring down the kid's clutter (a.k.a. plastic crap - we practically needed a full dump truck for the Fashion Pollys alone!).

With that done, our house looks great, I must say. We've done a lot of polishing and decorating and some major outdoor overhauling over the past almost two years that we've been here. Poor Brent spends every weekend from dawn to dusk sweating over our full acre here in Midtown. I would remind him that it was his choice to let go of the lawn crew because he decided our eldest "is old enough to help me out in the yard." I could rib him about his horticultural perfectionism. But that would surely be counterproductive.

Anyhow, while we have improved most every square inch of the house, there was one last bastion of nastiness that lay hidden behind closed doors. I enlisted the help of fellow knitter, designer and "stager" extraordinaire, the phabulous Phara, to upgrade our sad laundry facilities. Check out this before picture. I know ya'll are chartreuse with envy over the lovely "antique" wallpaper, circa 1920:

Now, look at the results. Ty Pennington, eat your heart out!

Phara also went through our house, room by room, ajusting pictures here, arranging knick-knacks there. It made an enormous difference. (If you want to hire Phara, you can reach her through Ravelry, where her rav name is "colorcrazed.") Lucy, for one, is ready to step out and head to our new digs cross-town!
(See, that's her paw steppin' out below her ladylike beard!)
Also steppin' out is Eileen, in this beautiful wrap sweater that she made from Alchemy hand-dyed Silk Purse in the Grass Harp colourway. It is just stunning with Eileen's auburn hair.

And in case you're considering steppin' out to Loops to seek out new fall projects, we just received a new batch of Trekking XXL in brand-new colors:

Also, Stacy came in and took Terrie's Bono Kimono class this weekend, bringing with her a fresh batch of Glam Grrl in Cherry Bomb, plus new Gothique and Foliage. We sold nearly 100 skeins on Saturday! But there are a few left...

That's all for now. Sandy just ran through a fresh coat of polyurethane on our newly-refinished kitchen floor. Gotta run!

- Shelley
shop online at loopsknitting.com