Done!

I finally finished my sisters blanket, just in time to give it to her this past weekend when she visited. It was a complete surprise (yay, I handled keeping a secret!) for her to use when she moves into her new apartment today. Hopefully she'll get lots of use out of it.
It ended up taking around 2.5 skeins of each color of Loops and Threads Impeccable. I didn't measure it before I gave it to her, but it was probably around 4'x5.5'. A good snuggling on the couch size. I used the pattern I found on a leaflet at Michael's and followed it for the squares and color placement. Then I did a border of black sc, white hdc, and blue dc. The squares are seamed together using a sc join through BOTH loops of the edges.
Not only am I done, but I was the first person to finish one and post it on Ravelry, so my picture is the main picture for the pattern :) How fun!
Up next - socks! I am using the Lifestyle Toe Up Socks patern from Charisa Martin Cairn that I found on Ravelry. Really, the thing that drew me to it was the no-swatch needed aspect. It takes me so gosh darn long to make a 4"x4" square on sz 3 (or less) needles, I figured by the time I had it done I could be halfway done with socks! So far, I love it. Judy Becker's Brilliant Cast On is, well, brilliant. It worked so much better than all of the other methods I'd been trying. As for now, I'm just knitting one sock on two circulars, but I can see how next time it will be really easy to do two at a time instead. Ah, pretty Knit Picks yarn, already made into a toe for a sock! So excited! In fact, I'm so pumped, it's time to work on it some more. I'm doing a K2P2 rib for the instep that will carry up the leg, and I think I'll finish the cuff with a k1p1. We'll see.
Here's a picture, on my foot :)

Super Secret Afghan Project

My sister still doesn't know about the GVSU afghan I'm making for her, but she's visiting this weekend, so I'm working on getting it done. All it needs is a few more ends sewn in, and I'm set! It has made me decided I'm tired of working on afghans with lots of different squares. It is way too time consuming seaming and weaving in ends.
I'm ready for something that is all one color! I ordered more yarn from KnitPicks yesterday, plus some new needles. I picked out 6 skeins of Crayon in Azure to make a diagonal knit baby blanket. There are (at least) 4 babies coming up that need things made for them, so odds are at least one is a boy, right? I just fell in love with the color and had to get it. It helps that it was only $1.99 a skein - this blanket could cost me a total of $12, which is even cheaper than the ones I made with the $0.99 yarn! I also picked out some sock yarn. I need to practice a bit before I get it, but I found a tutorial on the figure-8 cast on, and think I might be able to do this after all. Finally, I ordered two skeins of laceweight to make a shawl with. With my cousin's wedding coming up in October, I figured I could make a shawl to wear over one of my dresses to keep me warm. I'm planning on Swallowtail for now, but that could change. My plan is to practice a few repeats with sportweight and big needles first, so I can make sure I know what I'm doing.
I just finished uploading all of our vacation pictures to the computer, time to get them online!
Mr. Giraffe says goodbye!

It's Time To Frog!

I started making another Starghan for my mom to give at a baby shower, but for the life of me couldn't get it to lie flat. Since it's acrylic yarn, I knew I couldn't block it, plus it just DID not want to be flat. At all.

While deliberating, I started making a Ripple Afghan. While researching patterns on Ravelry, I came across a CAL that had started ripples the day before! Yay! That was all I needed to get started. My leftover skeins from the Starghan are clearly not going to be enough yarn, so it looks like I've figured out what to do with the Starghan. Time to rip!
I have a lot more in the Mint colorway than I do Duckie, so I decided to make just a thin yellow stripe every 5 rows. I like it so far - it's different, and doesn't look like the 70's Ripple afghan from my gramma's basement :) That's coming next, with all of the orangey/redy/peachy yarn donated from Bumpa's sister!
(All of my GVSU afghan squares are done, most ends woven in, just sitting there in a big stack watiting, patiently, to be put together. Ugh)
(Oh, and Sweet Dreams? Two strips are also patiently waiting in the box for me to make four more and stitch them together. Someday.)

Oops

I didn't get the deer done in time for Father's Day. As you can see, I have the head, body, and antlers, but no appendages. I did give it to my dad like this, but told him I'd finish it for when we visit on the 4th. It doesn't look like the reindeer in the booklet AT ALL, but I'm pretty happy with it - it looks much more like a Whitetail, which it's supposed to be anyway.

I've also been making progress on my sister's GVSU afghan. I'm on the last set of 16, and hopefully those will be wrapped up by the end of the week. Although, today is Wednesday, so that is sounding less likely. . .Since I am an extremely ADD yarn-er, I also had to start making my Luxurious throw with the Suri Dream yarn I just got from KnitPicks. It is lovely, lovely, lovely. The only problem is with my gauge. With size 10 1/2 needles, it wasn't nearly wide enough, so I went up a few times and wound up with a 13. Now the strip is WIDE enough, but it is much longer than it needs to be. This makes me nervous that I won't have enough yarn to finish. . .I guess worst case scenario means I'll have one less strip, and it will be more of a lapghan than a throw.

It's time for One Life to Live and folding laundry, then more GVSU squares!