Making a Home. Awning.

I am discovering my biggest pet peeve on the boat is water in the cockpit. I know this sounds ridiculous, it's a boat! But when we are alongside I need the cockpit as another living space. If the salon is my living room, the cockpit is the family room and I don't want it to be wet.

We have plans to save up over the summer and have a custom dodger/enclosure made in the fall but for right now I just needed something to cover the areas around the cockpit, I was sick of having dew settle over everything and then everyone's dirty feet would walk in it and leave dirty, wet foot prints all over the deck and when it rained it was near impossible to make it onto the boat without getting everything soaked from the puddles that collected on there.

As I had discovered in our first attempt at trampolines (still an ongoing project) my juki quilting machine was not up to the task of thick sunbrella fabrics and sailmakers thread just jams my bobbins, but it is the only tool I currently have until I can get set up with a sailrite machine so I had to skimp on the materials I used.

The underside of the awning, aft.

I bought a roll of duck canvas which is not has thick or difficult to work with as sunbrella type fabrics, it is water resistant, though I am assuming I will need to spray it with the scotch guard every few weeks.

The corners.

My machine could only handle normal thread so we expect this awning will only last until the fall before it starts to deteriorate. That's a shame because it turned out so well. I took some measurements and concocted a pattern out of thin air and it fits like a glove.

One of the side wings.

Our cockpit has a hard Bimini over head where we have the solar panels but the seats extend beyond this and when it rains the water just runs right into the cockpit or blows in. I have grommets along the top hooked over some screws and grommets in the corners to bungee over to what few life line stanchions we have up.

It does the trick, gives a nice bit of shade, protects from the rain, but is a bit hard to crawl in and out under, but small sacrifices are worth not having a wet/dirty cockpit.

Penelope's grass patch amidship.

As for everyday living, things are still going smoothly, the kids are getting used to the long-ish trek from the truck to the boat. I went in search of our own dock cart and saw these plastic gardening wheel barrels at Home Depot, it's a perfect size and easy for the kids to tow but it is so loud rumbling down the docks. It has tiny plastic wheels, so I'm not sure if we can make it work.

Aislinns school room. Yes we are still not finished school for the year, I'm trying but we have completely lost whatever little momentum we had, we'll be lucky if we get done by September in time for the next grade.

Finn helping with invitations.

Marks latest, most pressing project is the hot water heater (still), We had a few days of hot water, where it worked great, but now it won't light at all, back to boiling water for dishes and the marina for showers. 

My most pressing project is the renaming ceremony where s/v Aukai officially becomes s/v SweetHaven. The marina only had one Saturday available for us to use the park facilities this summer  and it turned out to be this upcoming Saturday, so I've had four days to prepare a party for 70. With the such short notice only about 25-30 can attend which probably works out for the better, not sure how we would have fit that many people on the dock.

Invites ready to go.

Finny in a time out.

On top of the new challenges to living on a boat we still have the normal ones of parenting, the adjustment period to any kind of change, whether it be a move or company coming or going, is always difficult for Finn and the dog, apparently. Penelope seems to be having the most trouble, she at least has the potty system down now, but she is a ball of nerves, doesn't like being left alone on the boat and when we do take her off it's hard to get her back. I took her up to the park last night for a walk and on the way back I get down to our dock gate and she is no where to be found. I had to walk back up to the office and found her hiding by the bathrooms. But we are only on day ten, she'll adjust, we all will.