Score: Knitting:2, Painting:1

My three day get-away / knitting marathon at the cottage was just what I needed. It gave me a chance to do some serious knitting and to recharge my personal batteries. Sierra (my black lab) kept me company and made sure that I didn't spend my entire time nestled in a Muskoka chair with my knitting.

She loves her walks on the beach and will play fetch as long as anyone will keep throwing the stick into the lake.

Armed with three full knitting bags, the plan was to complete several knitting projects in three days of uninterrupted knitting (yes I have already admitted to being a little too much of an optimist). I'd still have my sunset walks on the beach an a few swims to cool down.

By the end of day one, I had knit a square for the Great American Afghan in "Button Stitch" and completed the second sock of the pair in Aracunia's Ranco (the 1st one is on display in the store).

By the end of day two, there was another afghan square (very obviously needing blocking - I never thought of bringing styrofoam and T-pins to the cottage) this time in a bullion stitch. It was a completely new stitch for me, in which you wrap your yarn around the base of a stitch 10 times. It results in a very dimensional stitch that composed the flowers on the square. One of the pleasures of knitting this afghan is that you are continually learning new stitches and techniques.

If I could keep up this rate of knitting, the afghan would be complete in a week - only six squares to go.

The sunset on day three was spectacular. Unfortunately, I had become quite distracted through the day. Our cottage is constructed with wooden facings, the deck is wood, the outdoor furniture is wood and our window frames are --- wood. With the extreme winds and storms that come in off the lake in late fall and winter, all the wood needs plenty of maintenance (translation - painting). This needs to be done every four years and we just cycle through doing one area each summer. I just couldn't ignore the peeling paint on the window frames anymore and it was obviously its turn for a new coat of paint. I actually don't mind painting - its the preparation that is the problem. You scrape and brush off the loose paint, think you're done and start on the endless cycle of finding more peeling pieces and next thing you know you're down to bare wood. I had checked to make sure that I had plenty of external paint to do the job. It didn't register with me that I would also need primer until I was staring at the stark natural wood surface and of course we didn't have any. What should be a simple trip to the paint store is an adventure at the cottage. It's a good hike to the boat, cross the river to the marina, drive 20 km to the closest hardware store, buy the paint .... decide that I needed the nutrition of an icecream cone before retracing my steps... and two hours later start painting. The fresh paint on the window frames looks great and I managed to cast on another square and knit the first few rows before ending my mini knitting holiday. Final score: Knitting 2 and Painting 1!