I rule in physical labor!!

The english version of todays post… a bit challenging with some words and expressions I dont use very often…. bear with me 🙂

My son and his girlfriend just bought an apartment together. Its a renovation project so I was there yesterday to help them tear down and tidy up.

I love to do physical labor, renovate, tiling, wallpapering, painting and not to forget tearing down stuff!! I have done pretty much everything in my own house, and I am pretty good at it, if I may brag a little. 🙂

Needlework and knitting though….. not so much…

I remember in 6th grade I was going to knit the border of an sweater; knit one-purl one…..

Incredible boring and I would much rather speak to my girlfriends than concentrate on something as unbearable as that…… The knit one – purl one turned out bit random I am afraid…. and when I showed it to my teacher she sighed and said:

» Oh goodness! I think maybe vocational skills would be better for you Janecke»

Teachers could say such things in those days…

And so It was – Vocational skills ( or maybe it is called handcraft?)  WAS better for me!

My mother on the other hand was really good at knitting, tailoring and ironing ( the last is maybe not classified as needlework?) …and everything else that I call «soft-work»…

I just had to mention ironing as well – because my mother ironed everything while I was living at home.

And by that, I mean EVERYTHING! bedsheets, socks, underwear…..

I have memories sitting in front of the TV with my family watching weekend entertainment, while hearing; Shjooooo…Sjhoooo….. ( thats suppose to imitate the sound of damp coming from the iron 🙂 just behind me.

She never sat down it felt like ( of course an exaggeration) she just stood there ironing and ironing…. I think she enjoyed it, but I thought it was sad…..sad that she couldn’t sit down with us.

So I dont iron anything! Ive just decided that I dont know how. I am totally anti-ironing and I never buy anything that needs to be ironed….

BUT my boyfriend do!!! He tried to give me an ironing-board when we first moved in together….. that did NOT play out good!

«But you dont have an ironing-board» he sad annoyed

«I know! There are no ironing going on in this house» I replied.

He hid it somewhere he dosent think I know about :(……. but I leave it….. I do have a shirt for my national costume that needs ironing once a year 🙂 And he will do it for me…..as long as the ironing board is still here 🙂 ❤

 

But my mother was very good at knitting as well – so I never lacked a home knittet sweater that I wanted…

If I saw one in a magazine or on one of my girlfriends  – I just stated to my mother that I wanted one of those – and the next week I did! 🙂

When I went as a foreign exchange student to the US, my mother knitted a sweater to all of the children in that family:

It was the same when I got kids of my own – both my mother and mother in law at that time, knitted a bunch of outfits – that I got a lot of praise for, when taking a stroll with the little ones. I didn’t always tell people that it wasn’t me who knitted them 🙂

My grandmother also were incredible at knitting…… She made sweaters for me growing up and also for my children after I had them…

BUT she also were very cheap and thats NOT a good combination….

The items she knitted was fantastic with complicated braid pattern, but the yarn she used….??? Well have you noticed the basket they have in the yarn-stores with good prices? The yarn that nobody wants? Either because the colors are awful or because the fabric is so synthetic that the sweater sparkles when you put it on….

My grandmother emptied those baskets… 😦

But back to my son and his girlfriends renovation project. They bought an apartment in the middle of the city, very central and with a great view of the city harbor:

Picture taken from their window!

But there is a lot to do with the apartment. Luckily they are going to have hired help to do most of it, as it is a huge project, but all the tearing down they are doing themselves.

So thats what we were doing yesterday. tearing down the ceiling, walls, floor etc..

The apartment is on the 8th floor, so we did get a lot of trips, carrying building material down the elevator and out to a waiting truck……but thats a great workout right there…

A lot of carrying, cardio, fitness and strength….. a real Cross-fit workout!!! But I am glad I didn’t work out in the morning as well…. 🙂

It is something incredible recreational about physical labour – it is pure therapy for me.

I remember when I was getting a divorce from the father of my children – I felt as the worst human being ever….. I just wanted to escape my own thoughts…

My brother owned a big house at the time – an needed help to renovate it. I offered to do it while he was in Thailand. That way I had something to keep me busy, and also a place to crash until the house that I had bought, was ready for me to move in to..

I worked from dusk til dawn; teared down walls, grinned floors, painted, laid new floors and build new walls. Passed out late nights in bed, slept like a rock, got back up in the morning and kept going…

It saved me in a very difficult periode of my life. Nothing can ventilate frustration like slamming a sledgehammer into a wall until it caves…

«JUMANJI» I called out loud while hitting the wall as hard as I could – FANTASTIC!!!

So if you need something to be sutured, knitted or ironed… dont come knocking on my door…… NOT my thing!!

If you on the other hand are going to tear something down, build something up or anything else that requires physical labor???

IM YOUR WOMAN !!