Finishing, Starting, and Busy in Between

First the finishings...  My youngest daughter, Shelby, graduated with honors from high school Thursday night. We are very, very proud of her. And, I think we were all ready for this chapter of her life to come to an end. She’s ready to move on to college, Michigan State University, and I was ready to be done with school. My girls are 4 years apart, so I’ve been in high school for 8 years. Definitely time to close that book of fond memories, vigilance, lunch money, dances, swim meets, soccer games, choir concerts, etc.

Here's a picture of the happy graduate and me.

As for knitting, I finished my Oaklet Shawl. Click here for pattern details: RAVELRY. I’m very happy with the finished product, both the yarn and the knitting. It was my first experience blocking points out on wires, and I learned much through trial and error. Isn’t that usually the best way? Anyway, if you look closely, you can see some of the loops made when I fed the wire through the lace. I need to feed and pin those better next time around. One cool thing about working with yarn is that I can fix the loops by getting it wet and re-blocking. Right, I’ll get on that in my spare time.

Here’s a picture of my shawl on blocking wires.

Lucky for me the weather turned chilly so I could wear my shawl right away. I think I’ve covered Michigan’s crazy weather in a previous post. Anyway, it really is not a huge exaggeration to say you can be in a swimsuit one day and a snowsuit the next. So, below is a picture of me wearing my shawl and long sleeves on June 2, which happens to be hubby’s and my 12th wedding anniversary. No need for a shawl 12 years ago in Las Vegas where we were married. Lest you think the worst of me, we planned to get married there. It was not a drunken-regret-it-the-morning-after-affair. We had a lovely chapel wedding, a minister called Rob, and I wore a shimmery pale pink dress that still fits!

Sorry. I’m getting off track. Now for the in between. Finished my shawl on Tuesday or Wednesday, blocked it, and cast on another project. Shelby graduated Thursday, my 29th (again) birthday was Friday, and our anniversary was Saturday. 

Which brings me to starting. I began a blanket buddy for my dear friend who’s expecting her first child, Calvin James, the end of this month. This is the same friend I knit the booties and mitts for in April. A blanket buddy is part stuffed animal and part blanket. I found this adorable elephant/blanket pattern for 3 bucks - and, well, did not even try to resist. Click here for pattern details: RAVELRY. This has got to be the most adorable thing I’ve knit yet. Although I think I’ve said that about every baby project.

Here are the pieces so far.

Adorable, right? Thanks so much for reading. Hope your week wasn't too busy and you had time to enjoy something just for you :) ~ Christina