Finally finished!

I put my mom's Christmas present aside once again. This time to make an afghan for Carrie to give as a gift at a baby shower. Carrie went through my stash and picked the colors. They ended up being pastels....white, mint, blue, lavender, yellow and pink, repeated, ending in white. I did the Easy Ripple Afghan on SusanB's website. (didn't get a picture which is sad since it was very pretty) I had 3 of the 6 planned repeats done and a night to get it finished. Instead of continuing on, I turned it 90 degrees and made the ripples go vertically instead of horizontally. Worked perfectly as a small crib blanket.

Then it was back to my mom's afghan. I'd given myself a deadline of this last weekend since she'd be out to our house visiting. It didn't get done, but it was SO close. So the next self imposed deadline was Monday when I'd be visiting her house. I had to stop working on Sunday because my fingers hurt from weaving in so many ends. Needless to say, didn't finish. I spent most of yesterday on it much to the detriment of everything else around me. Finally at 6:30pm I did the last reverse single crochet stitch around the edge. Wooohooo!







While I love the blanket, I am SOOOOOO glad to be done with it. I'm not a fan of lots of sewing and tons of ends to weave in. I am now free to move onto another project. I should be finishing Sean's spidey afghan since I'm so close to finishing it. But it's not imperative.

What will the next project be?

Dying with the kids

Today is a lazy day since Danielle and I aren't feeling so great right now. One of the things I've been wanting to start doing is dying yarn with Kool-Aid or food coloring. The idea is to get good enough to dye reclaimed yarn and possibly start selling it.

What's reclaimed yarn? It's yarn that is from unraveled knit and crocheted things bought from the thrift store. I've only done a few for practice, mostly acrylic. But I have quite a few waiting for some attention...namely cashmere, merino wool, silk and such. Even if I don't sell it, there's NO WAY I could ever afford to pay the prices that these types of yarn cost when new. So at the very least I have cheap expensive yarn to work with. I'd love to make a cashmere mobius scarf (scarf made into a continuous circle, twisted on itself...like this). I also think a cashmere hat for Meghan would be awesome. Or double layered mittens with the inside layer being cashmere.

So anyways back to the original thought line....Dying Yarn. I kept thinking about doing it and putting it off because there were projects to work on and then sweaters to unravel. I couldn't take it anymore. I had to DO IT! I was about ready to pull out a sweater and start ripping it apart when I remembered I had some Moda Dea Cartwheel (100% wool) in my stash. The skein I'm using is grey and white but it should still work. The whole line has been discontinued and it was at the dollar store. (wish I'd know it was discontinued when I first found it...I overlooked a lot of nice stuff I'd probably like to have now). Which means if it's a failure, I've only lost a dollar or so.

The process is so safe that the kids can do it, so I decided to make it a project for the little ones and I. I broke out the yarn, wrapped it into a hank around my arm, tied it off in a few places and away we went. The intention was to use food coloring until I discovered we were out of vinegar....so Koolaid had to be included somehow. That is if I could find it. I tore the kitchen apart and just as I was about to give up I found ONE packet of grape Koolaid. YAY!!!

I filled an 8c measuring cup with water, poured in the grape KoolAid and away we went. (no I didn't allow it soak for a set amount of time like you're suppose to...that would be boring!). Danielle picked blue, Sean picked red. I was sad to see the container of yellow had dried up. Then I got the brilliant idea of adding water to it and see if we could get every last drop out. So there's a splash of yellow in there too. I just had the kids drop the color in, one on each side and swished it around a tiny bit, trying not to mix the colors too much. We threw it in the microwave....Sean setting it for 2 minutes, me microwaving my coffee for 2 minutes while the yarn cooled a bit and then Danielle doing the yarn for another 2 minutes. It's sitting on the counter as I type. It has to cool down before I can rinse it out and examine it. I wanted to take some pictures but Eileen can't seem to find the battery charger for her camera. Hopefully we can find it soon.

PHEW!

Took a looooong break from blogging but not from crocheting.

I made my cousin Christine's wedding afghan after a restart. I found out that white wouldn't work well with her decor so remade the hexagons with Caron one pound in off white. I made it 6 hexagons wide by 7 hexagons long, measuring... 45" x 65.5". Unfortunately I never got a picture of it before my mom took it to Tennessee. Christine loved it!

I started a Spiderman blanket for Sean using Stitch 'n Frog's Superhero Dreamcatcher pattern. I have the last 2 sections to finish (about 9 or 10 rows) then the webbing and it's all his. He's been "using" it, hanging tails and all when it's accessible.

Pat and Alex got married Nov 13th. I didn't end up making them an afghan. I figure I have their whole life to get one done. Besides I think one of the two Tree of Life afghans I have started is suppose to be their's. Alex requested an afghan for Christmas and I obliged. I used Hobby Lobby's I Love this Yarn for the first time and made a ripple afghan for her. It was done with 3 shades of blue I started from the bottom and made a section of each color, starting with 6 rows per color. Then I'd start the color sequence again but decrease a row each time. Once I got to 1 row I started increasing again. Can't quite remember whether I ended with a 3 or 4 row section at the top. It was finished with hdc around and then reverse single crochet in the darkest blue. Unfortunately I didn't measure it or get a picture of it. I wasn't too crazy for it and told her she could exchange it at a later date for an afghan of her choosing. She said she liked the one she received.

Next I started an afghan for my mom for Christmas. She'd recently redone her livingroom with dark brown, red and dark green furniture. She also purchased a large painting of a poppy that's on the wall. So I took a few patterns...mutilated and mashed them together and came up with the poppy trellis square. The poppy was made using this flower as a base (with a few modifications. The I surrounded it with the leaves and trellis from the Rose Trellis Afghan pattern in my new book... 50 Sensational Crochet Afghans and Throws. There are so many revisions I can't list them all here. If you want to see them check out the project on my project page at ravelry. Here's one of the squares...



I didn't finish in time for Christmas so she got a box with 24 out of 35 squares in it. She's really excited for me to finish it. BUT...



I had to put my mom's present aside because we had a baby shower and a bridal shower on the 8th and 9th of January that I needed to make presents for. For the baby shower I picked up this blanket that I started in August. After buying more yarn it didn't take long to finish the body. It was the border that took for work. I hate deciding which border best suits which afghan. I decided to do alternating stripes of white and coordinating colors (mint, yellow, pink and baby blue). The white was done in hdc. The coordinating colors were done with 2 strands held together and in sc. I finished with a stripe of white and then reverse single crochet. Again no picture of the completed project.

For the bridal shower I picked the pattern Proposal from the 50 Sensational Afghans book. And again, I wasn't finished by the time the shower rolled around. I had the whole body done so wrapped that and then asked for it back so as to finish it. :o) After I got it back I decided to add another row of blocks to increase the length. The border itself took hardly any time. I had to give my hand a rest for a few days (thumb was getting extremely numb quickly) but had it done by that Wednesday. Now if I could just get the finished afghan to her before something happens to it. Here's a finished picture...



Closeup of the square....



Today I'm back to working on my mom's afghan. Hopefully I can get it done by next week. (told her it would definitely be done by the end of the month) Then I'd like to finish Sean's blanket and maybe a few other WIP (works in progress).

Lots of hooking going on

Most of the things I've got going on are quick and easy projects so they're working up quickly. I worked on the copycat afghan in the morning and did 5 more repeats for a total of 10.



In the evening I finished up the body of the surf and turf afghan. It's now been put into my WIP (works in progress) basket until I decide which border to use. I think I'm going to have to have a major border making session to get rid of all the projects waiting.

After the little ones went to bed I got out my baby afghan book and started working on Christine's wedding present.



The pattern calls for 52 hexagons but I think I'm going to make it bigger so need to do a few more. Just need to figure out exactly how many. Guess I have some time to figure that out since I only have 4 motifs done so far. lol I need this done before my parents leave for Tennessee the weekend of Oct 9th.

Onto something new

I'm suppose to be starting an afghan for my cousin's wedding. She lives in Tennessee so I won't be going (it's a month before Pat's wedding so we can't swing it $$). I decided I could crochet her an afghan and send it with my parents though. So I started looking through my baby afghan book and then I moved onto Ravelry to see pictures of what people had done with the patterns in the book. I pretty much know which one I'm going to attempt for her. It's one of the ones I wanted to do for Esther and Tim's shower gift.

BUT I just had to keep looking. I saw a really neat variation of the afghan that's on the cover.


The main color is white instead of blue and they used a variegated rainbow for the white accents. So I ran to my stash and pulled out a Caron one pound skein of white and the rainbow colorway of Jo-Ann Sensations Rainbow Classic. Another yarn that I wanted to love but just couldn't. The person who did the neat variation of the blanket said she used a K hook. The book says to use an I hook. I decided to try the K, got a few rows into it and didn't care for it so switched to my H. Here's how it's going so far...



I'm figuring I'll make the body as big as either color of yarn will allow me. And of course I'll also have to get going on the wedding gift too....soon.

Soooo close

I had decided I wanted to do a mindless project next. I picked a baby blanket, using the diagonal box stitch as that project. I had at least one whole skein of Caron's Jumbo prints...baby rainbow ombre so used it.


It was working up quick and easy...just like I was looking for. The idea was to do the body and then put it aside until I needed it or found a border I liked. I tried to gauge when I'd used about half the skein, figuring I'd then start to decrease the rows and finish the blanket with the second half of it. Well I didn't do so well as I ran out of skein, yet still have about 6.5 small rows to do plus sc around the whole thing.


Maybe I can find a stray partial skein laying somewhere. If not, then it'll have to wait until I need it for a gift, pounders go on sale or I decide to use a 50% off coupon. So into my WIP (works in progress) basket it'll go.

Lesson learned

Back in Jan '09 when I first started crocheting...I bought a LOT of yarn. JoAnn's Fabric had a huge yarn sale and I went crazy. One of the yarns I loved was TLC Essentials' Surf and Turf


I thought the brown and turquoise would make a great baby boy blanket.   I even had someone in mind for it.   I bought 3 skeins, brought it home and started playing with it immediately.    I just couldn't like it no matter which pattern I tried to use with it.    The turquoise color run was just too small.  Instead of giving me splotches of color I was getting tiny streaks.   I tried sc, hdc, dc....I tried to work it into an afghan, hat, afghan again...always frogging it.   Then I came across the diagonal box stitch and decided to give the surf and turf one more try...taaaadaaaa!  The stitch gives more opportunity for the turquoise to "butt" up with other turquoise streaks, creating the splotches I was originally looking for.   It also helped that I dropped my hook down to an F hook which gave me a  wider worked up section for each color run  (4 whole dcs). 

Where the lesson comes in is that you have to pay attention to dye lot. I know, I know...how could I not already know that? It's been said a million times when talking about yarn. Well, the yarn companies started the no dye lot advertising and I didn't realize it only meant solids, not verigated. Even one of the skeins I originally bought is different then the original two...the dark brown is almost black. It's put aside waiting for another project. My original skeins had rust in it. The newer ones have grey in it. I prefer the rust ones.

Original skeins


Newer skeins



I also see the importance of trying to get all the yarn for your project at once. But I'm excusing myself to that fault and blaming it on being an inexperienced crocheter and not realizing how much yarn a project would need.

Here's a funny...while photographing this I realized....I messed up big time on the thing! I had stopped short for a row, creating a new side straight edge. Then used that point as the new edge for 9 rows. Nothing to do but to frog them and redo the rows. It wasn't so bad since the dark brown had been pooling into a solid stripe which I wasn't so happy about. So I broke the yarn and started working from the opposite end of the skein...problem solved.

Here it is before I frogged it.

Playing with cotton

I have SO many things I need/want to do in the next few weeks. My mom's birthday is June 2nd and I have an idea for that. Fortunately it shouldn't take too long to make up. Liz's birthday is June 14th and I said I'd make her a shrug. I'm thinking of doing Maggie Wrap that I found on the Knitting Daily website. I have some cotton I bought from the dollar store last year that should work up well with it. The pattern isn't written, it's a chart only one which I've never done...so that may be a bit of a challenge for me at first. We're also have a baby shower for Allison on June 13th. I'm going to give her one of the blankets I've made already. I'd like to get a light sweater, hat, bootie set made for her too. Right now I think Justcrochet's free sample pattern is going to be what I try out. I'd like to make it in lavendar (Allison's favorite color is purple) but I don't want to go out and buy new yarn. I already have a pink I can use...so we'll see. I'm hoping the lavendar wins out in the end. lol


So with all these things on my mind/todo list in the next 3 weeks, what do I do? I break out a cake of rainbow cotton I got as a mill end package at AC Moore and I start crocheting a POTHOLDER! It's from Bev's Country Cottage website.



I started it about midnight and woke up midstitch at about 1:30 (not sure how long I'd been dozing). I started back up as soon as I got up this morning and had it done in no time...



I then decided to start a round ripple with it to see how the color pattern worked out. I wanted it to be drapey so decided to go with a larger hook and chose a "K" one.



After hitting round 6 I had run into and worked around too many mistakes so I stopped. I wasn't liking how it was working up anyways with the larger hook. I decided to restart it and chose an "I" hook instead. I think I'm liking it much better. I don't have a picture of the new one because my camera battery died. I'll try to get it up soon.

Playing Catch-up

Wow! It's been a while since I've posted here. Even though I'm not posting it doesn't mean that I'm not crocheting. Now that Drew's wedding is over I'm hoping I can keep up here better.

I finished and blocked Allison's shawl with time to spare. She looked lovely in it if I do say so myself. Then again, she'd look lovely in a paper bag. :o) The shawl is Dot Matthew's Fancy Fans Stole. Using Bernat's baby sport yarn and a J hook.

My lovely new daughter-in-law


Best view of the shawl


I also managed to get the round ripple afghan done for my nephew Jeremy and his wife Klare. It's Lyn's round ripple pattern made with a G hook and Naturallycaron's Country and Spa. I didn't mean to use two different types of yarn. AC Moore had both types mixed together in their display area and by the time I noticed it (at the register), I was too burnt out to try and fix it. I don't think I could've gotten all the colors I wanted in one fiber anyways. (spa is a bamboo/acrylic mix, country is a merino wool/acrylic mix) So I'm crossing my fingers that the two different materials don't react differently to being washed. I used Biscuit and Jam's random stripe generator to work out the pattern with a tweaked in one or two spots.



On Tuesday I decided I needed to connect with my hook again. So I ventured into the garmet sector of crocheting. I've never done anything wearable except ponchos. With my granddaughter due in July I decided now was a good time to try it out. I went with Sue's no holes hexagon sweater. It was really easy and quick to work up. I made some modifications to it although now I think I have to revise them a bit. I was hoping to get a newborn size that wasn't baggy. There's nothing more pathetic then a newborn with clothes sagging off of them because they're too big. It's why I always like to have a preemie outfit for taking them home. (unless of course the baby is 10lbs like Luke was!). I think it's a bit too small though. It's perfect size for Danielle's baby doll!

It's done!

I finished Esther and Tim's wedding afghan 8 days early! For some reasons the last 3 repeats I added on caused more problems then the rest of the blanket combined. I frogged and frogged at least once in every repeat. And I still have a mistake or two that I had to work around. It ended up being 49" wide and 58" long, coming to my collar bone with my feet well covered. I'm hoping to get a picture of it after the kids come home from school. Seems once I let someone borrow my camera, they think they can use it and take it whenever. So not sure where it is at the moment.

So now I'll be working on Allison's shawl. I'm hoping it will only take a night to do, but that might be a bit ambitious. It would be cool if I could get it done for her shower which is also next Saturday.

3rd skein

I"m technically into the 3rd one pounder skein of the wedding shower afghan. But with the first I did a bunch of false starts of the afghan so it wasn't really a full one. I thought I could call it done at the end of the 2nd skein. Then I threw it over me. It covered my feet and came to just under my breast...nope not big enough. I think it needs to cover me to my neck. I figure it should be big enough after 3 more repeats. I thought I'd get it done last night but I ended up going to bed with Sean. So tonight should be the night I finish it.

I went back to AC Moore today. I think the one pounder is too thick a yarn for Allison's shawl. So I decided to work with the Bernat Baby Sport that's on sale this week...$3.99 for a big ball (reg price is $9.99). I've also decided to try a different pattern.... The Fancy Fans Stole. I admit it, I love shells. I'm thinking it should be quick to work up so if I don't like it, I can try another one in the next few weeks. Hopefully though both Allison and I will like it.

Putting aside the shawl

I'm not loving the shawl and am thinking of changing patterns. So until I HAVE to do it, it's in hibernation. On Friday I decided to get Tim and Esther's shower gift started. I started making pinwheel motifs to piece together....no quite right. Then I started a popcorn and cable afghan from my baby afghan book...first row of the pattern and I didn't like that either. So then I moved onto a lacy ripple and it's just right! I've gone through one Caron one pounder in off white and have started the second. I figure I'm a little less then half way through. I'll decide on the actual length of it as I work it.





I hit A.C. Moore yesterday. They had both Caron's Spa and Country on sale....2 for $3 (regularly $4.99 ea). When figuring out what presents I had to make I forgot...I have a baby shower the day after Drew's wedding!!!! So I've decided to attempt for my first round ripple afghan for this gift. Danielle and Sean were angels while I was deciding what colors I wanted. I picked out 2 skeins of each color. What I didn't realize until I was at the register...the store ahd mixed up the Country and Spa into one display! So some of the colors I picked were Spa...a bamboo yarn. Others were Country...a merino wool blend. UGH! It won't work if I only pick one fiber. Am I going to be in trouble? Will they be messed up once it's washed? To be on the safe side I also bought 2 big balls of Bernat baby sport in the funny prints colorway since the baby is a boy. That way if I start running out of time or I don't like how the round ripple is working up...I can quickly do a simple afghan in this.

Oh yeah, I also bought a Caron one pounder in white with my 40% off coupon. I'll use it for Allison's shawl.

Just wanted to let you know

I'm still here. Haven't done a ton of crocheting. Mostly what I have worked on was trying to figure out what material (yarn or cotton) and hook size I want to do Allison's wedding shawl on. I may even change patterns all together. I'm hoping to get it done this week. I have too much to do on and off the hook to keep playing with it like I am. With all the motifs I've made I could probably have made 4 shawls. Right now it's going well with white cotton and an H hook.

GRRRR! I just found the baggie holding the shawl project on the floor...OPEN! Obviously it's been there a bit because everything is dirty and covered with dog hair. Guess I'll be starting over. Luckily it wasn't too many squares but still. Didn't anyone notice they were stepping on it? I guess I'll have to put it under lock and key before I leave from now on.

Once Allison's shawl is done I'll move onto an afghan for the couple whose wedding is the week after Drew's and Allison's. It'll most likely be a neutral color. I'm thinking either a simple textured ripple (worked into the back loops every so many rows) or a pinwheel granny square I saw in my baby afghans book. If all goes according to plan, I may even be able to finish an afghan for Allison and Drew too.

Playing around

Well I've done quite a few squares of teh lacy flower shawl. I think it's going to look nice. Now to just decide which yarn and what hook to use. I originally started with the Jamie baby yarn. I have at least 15 skeins of the white. I thought with the thread of sparkle it might look nice. Well whatever you gain with the sparkle is taken away with the feel of the stuff....UGH! I have no idea how anyone would allow that stuff to be used on a baby. It's some of the roughest yarn I've ever felt. Probaby why it's discontinued and at the dollar store.

I then moved onto the Caron's pound of love that I have. Much, much better. I started with a G hook and it looked ok. Then I moved up to an I hook like the pattern suggests. Definitely a lot softer and better drape but the square seem huge. I moved down to an H hook, just to see the difference. I haven't decided which I like, nor am I sold on this yarn.

The squares go really quick and it's a join as you go so there won't be any piecing in the end (YAY!!!). I'm making about 4 or 5 squares and then sewing in the ends. Any more then that and all the ends get tangled in my work. So once it's done, it should be done. I could see me taking a whole day and getting this done....no problem. Last night I was thinking it might be cool to add in some squares of her wedding color/ But now I wonder. I'd also thought of doing the 1/2 motifs alone the ends, giving it a zigzag edge. I probably won't though.

I was thinking of trying to block the strips that I've already made. A) to get practice blocking as I've never done it before. B) to see the actual look of each hook size properly. Allowing me to judge which look would be best.

It's killing me not being able to take pictures! This place is boring without it...sorry!

I talked to Allison

Her grandmother is too ill to crochet her the shawl, so I'll do it. I showed her my ideas and I think we're going with the Flower Lace Shawl (the 2nd link in my last post). Only revision so far is that it'll be a stole, not a triangle shawl. Should make it a bit easier as I won't have to make 1/2 or 1/4 motifs. I haven't decided if I want to go with the cotton yarn they suggest or use the Jaime baby yarn I have already. I'm thinking of using the baby yarn as it's thinner and has a thread of shimmer in it. Plus it's on hand. I'm hoping to lay Sean down and play with it in a few minutes (he's sleeping in my arms as I type this). I'll update you later on how it's going.

Can I really pull it off?

Drew and Allison's wedding is set for May 15th. That gives us a little over 60 days to get everything accomplished. Allison is having a family friend make her wedding dress. They'll be meeting tonight to figure out which one it'll be. She'd like a strapless but isn't comfortable with it with her ample top. I suggested a shawl might be nice to cover her and she liked the idea. So I've been looking at shawl patterns lately. Yesterday I tried out this one. This morning I came across this one and I think I like it a lot better. So am thinking of trying a motif or two.

I got to thinking...Allison might want to ask her grandmother to make her shawl for her. Her grandmother has a lot more experience with crocheting and would probably do a much better job then I would. Besides, it might mean something extra special to come from her grandmother. Also I can think of a lot of other things I could/should be doing for the wedding. Of course if she wants me to make it, I will. Just thinking. I'll have to talk to her this week.

I'll probably try one or three shawls anyways since Liz has wanted a poncho since Christmas. I think a shawl is a much classier alternative. I'm sure she'll like either one.

Not much hooking

I never edged the doll pillow last week. It's still sitting here mocking me. We went away Saturday night and I was really tempted to bring some crocheting along. Figuring it was a family outing and we were suppose to be doing things as a family, I left it at home. I probably couldn've gotten away with doing some in the early morning hours when I was the only one up, but not much.

I did manage to pick up a hook after we got home. I've finished 5 of the 6 rows of the blue ruffle on the Ruffles all Around blanket. I'm stalled again as I'm not sure where my Baby Afghan book is at the moment. GRRRRR! Figuring we have 2 mos until I have 2 weddings and the bridal showers will be even quicker then that...I started working on the white ripple blanket for T and E's wedding. I'm afraid I'm not going to be happy with it. The outside of the skein seems to be fuzzing up already. What's the blanket going to look like after a bit of use? WHY do I do this to myself? (2nd guess my choices in the project)

I'm thinking I might do the Tree of Life for Drew and Allison but I'm afraid I can't get it done in time and I don't want that to happen. The sooner I get T and E's done, the more time I'll have to figure out and work on Drew's. Then it's onto the grandbaby's stuff!

My shoulder is feeling it

I wound and wound yesterday. I have just about all the yarn I wanted to do, done. It's all in my bedroom, contained neatly in 3 plastic see through totes. I can see just about every skein of yarn I own by just looking at the container. I also have a cardboard box that's holding the large or full skeins that I didn't want to wind just yet. Oh and then there's my 3 drawer plastic dresser that's in the livingroom. It's holding my books, hook bag (pencil bag), UFO (unfinished objects) and the yarn for the projects that I'm currently working on. I've found a few stray skeins/balls here and there today, but I'm not sweating it. It's made me feel a bit more organized and wanting to do more projects and even get out my sewing machine. It's also pushing me to get my room in order so I put the totes away (need to clean out my closet first)

This morning I found a skein of yellow yarn sitting on the couch and couldn't figure out why I didn't put it away last night. When I picked it up I figured out why...there was a project attached to it still. It was a doll pillow that I'd started for the Christmas Bazaar to go with this blanket...



So I decided to stuff it and finish it. It's stitched in my no thinking, go to pattern of alternating rows of hdc and dc. Looking at it I figured the stuffing would show through the holes though so I decided to make a pillow insert of sc using red heart super saver in soft white. You can't see it and I didn't make it so you could remove it. I probably could've gotten by with putting the stuffing in a piece of pantyhose before inserting it in the original pillow...saving me an hour of crocheting. But I had fun and it was relaxing to just sit there and make it. I'm trying to decide how I want to edge it. After it's done I'll take a picture and share.

I'm hoping to work on the Ruffles afghan later tonight. It's getting to be one of those...I can't wait to get this done!!! projects.

My hook is on a short hiatus

That doesn't mean that I'm not doing anything with my yarn. I've been trying to get it under control. It has a way of working it's way into every part of the house. People are complaining. I don't blame them. Even I get mad when I'm walking out of my room and my feet become entangled in a mass of yarn. So I've been using my Christmas present and taming a bunch of skeins for the last few days. The sucky thing is...as soon as I start winding...my eye and nose start going crazy. My eyes itch horribly and my nose starts running and eventually getting stuffed up. I took some Claratin yesterday and it did seem to diminish the nose running.

I'll be happy when it's all in order. I thought I was almost done until I turned around. I had forgotten about a whole tote of it! So I think I'll finish it up today. Then I can start to take care of some bags of unraveled sweaters. I'm trying to design myself a yarn swift out of K'nex. The swift itself is a no brainer...how to keep it anchored is another matter. I'd also like to see how my yarn winder does with unraveling things. I'm thinking it could speed things along nicely.

I did end up adding a few more stitches onto the All around Ruffles afghan. Not enough to take another picture though. Well off to wreck havoc with my sinuses.

4 AM already!?!

Friday night I got work putting the first ruffle on the Ruffles all Around afghan. It's a lot of stitches as it's 6 rounds wide. I was going like gangbusters and would've kept going but it was 4am and I had to pour beer for a 9pm Syracuse basketball game that night. If it wasn't for the beer pouring I may have stayed up all night.



I went with Caron's Pounder in Denim. It's a heathered blue and at first I wasn't sure if I'd like the "faded" look of it. It's growing on me. I just hope I end up pleased with it. It stinks to put so many hours into something to feel so so about it. I'm hoping to work on it when I get off here for a bit.

And in all my loserness. I keep thinking of starting even more projects. This time it's a shawl. Liz wanted me to make her a poncho. I'd rather make something that's a bit "fancier". I thought about making her a shrug but there are some really pretty shawls out there. Besides it's less fitting so not as fussy and I'm not sure I'm ready for sleeves yet. So far I've held off on it but I'm not sure how long I can last before I give in.