Long Time No Blogging

Wow, I can't believe how long it's been since I actually posted anything on the blog! I know that time flies, and it has definitely flown the last several months. Naturally I've still been doing a LOT of knitting, but Facebook, summer, a church canoe trip, vacation, and other chaotic events have resulted in a plethora of blog posts which have only been written in my head. Unfortunately I have not yet figured out how to transfer them from the depths of my mind to the pages of the blog without the intervention of my fingers, which have a marked tendency to be wrapped up in yarn and knitting needles at most any waking moment.

In the mean time, my Double Hearts blanket pattern has been published by Mary Maxim, and I've had a couple of people who have requested that I knit them a blanket using that pattern. I've also worked on a couple of other designs for next year's pattern contest, but both will need a bit of tweaking before they are ready to enter in the contest. I think they'll turn out really nicely though.

Right now I'm busy knitting up a storm to restock after a fairly successful craft fair on Saturday. This week I need to knit 1/5 of a Double Hearts blanket each day, to have it ready for the customer by the weekend. I also need to knit one hat each day this week, and three hats a day after the blanket is done, to have enough stock for the next upcoming craft fair. I also will need to squeeze a few dishcloths into the mix since my dishcloth stock took quite a hit on Saturday.

In addition, I'm crocheting on an afghan that one of my knitting customers had started and then talked me into finishing for her. I'm not really thrilled with the project at this point, for two reasons: first, it's very challenging to start in the middle of a project and try to match the gauge of the previous crocheter when the pattern that was provided doesn't even mention the recommended hook size - lots of trial and error here; second, although I have crocheted for nearly as long as I have knitted, I don't do as much of it, and because it is so much slower than knitting I'm much less patient with big crochet projects and therefore considerably less proficient at crochet than at knitting. There is no way that I'll be able to charge anything close to what my time and effort are worth for this project; however, considering that this is for a repeat customer who has paid me well for past projects, I'll finish it up and make her happy. However, I have no intention of taking on any further crochet projects of this nature at any point in the future.

And last but not least, my grandson started kindergarten last month. It's hard to believe that he could possibly be that old already but he's still incredibly cute and the highlight of my life.
He has recently shown some interest in knitting, and I'd love to have him for a while and work with him to see if he picks it up.

Meanwhile, my computer time is up for now, and I need to get back to the knitting since I still haven't figured out how to knit and type at the same time. I promise that it won't be nearly so long until the next post.