Dishcloths for Class Reunion

Dish/wash cloths

Knitting these dish/washcloths is a joyful experience, thinking of my classmates and our lives fifty years ago. Little Red School House and Elisabeth Irwin High school are located in Greenwich Village, New York City and that is where I went to the upper level school.

Patterns came from various sources. Not being good at being consistent, my designs evolved and blossomed and I was challenged to make sense of what I was doing.

That is life, though, twists and turns, and making sense out of where you are going. I feel freer to do this exploring now that I'm living with chronic illness.

What does knitting teach us?

Knitting Joy

The last six months have been tough with health issues. Though on oxygen, I went horseback riding a week ago in Harriman State Park, Idaho, not far from Yellowstone.

Judy's Dishcloths

We rode in gentle rain, the horses don't mind. A female moose lifted her head from drinking when she heard us. Among the trees we spotted a pelican on the lake and a heron. No trumpeter swans. Were they nesting? Or not yet arrived?

The mosquitoes are enormous and plentiful, fed by the torrents of rain we are having. I was thankful for the rain gear covering. The horses weren't so lucky.

Knitting is my sweet companion. During the last six months, I had the joy of knitting 26 dish/washcloths for classmates coming to our 50th high school reunion in Greenwich Village, NYC. Not going to the reunion myself, I am thrilled that I could send these simple gifts.

I took pictures with my cell phone and am learning how to download and place on my posts. Here is one, I hope to give you others.

My third oldest granddaughter asked me to knit her an afghan. She chose the colors and the sequence and left to me the designs. I started it almost a year ago. I'm stuck on the next to the last square, one of two kitties.

I found a photograph of two kitties and outlined them on graph paper.

HELP how do I chart the outline for knitting?

The finished wedding afghan

Here is the long awaited wedding gift. It was received in time for the wedding on July 19th in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.

I'm now working on a 12 square afghan for one of my younger granddaughters. You will remember her as Megan, an advanced knitter in her own right.

New to knitting life, a followers widget

I'm returning to knitting life after a long absence due to illness and a long vacation.

As a way of welcoming my readers to return, I've added a Followers Widget. Please add your name as a follower and let me know your thoughts. Let us make a community of healing and joy as we create.

Blessings,
Judy

Update on Family Project - part 2

We are close to the deadline and there are problems.

Panels one and two completed and joined using a crochet technique. The third panel I finished up to the last six rows of knit. My husband decided that this is where he will put in his touch of love. David is a new knitter. He received tips from Meg Downey on how to hone his skill in using the continental style of holding the hands. Still waiting on this strip to be completed. I am impressed with how quickly David is learning the knitting stitch and how involved with our family project.

Panel number four, Megan's column. She was doing great until she reached the last square, the Spider Web. Meg has knitted this pattern and does very well, yet when she was in the last three inches, she messed up. She was ill with fever and could not figure which row she was on and recognized that she had made mistakes which deemed it unlikely she would be able to recover the pattern when she would be well.

Meg handed the fourth column to me and I couldn't figure out which row she was on or the mistakes made. Sooooooooooooooooo.....................I ripped it out.

Now I was down to the fourth square in the fourth panel, the square nobody likes, the square that sticks out like a sore thumb. Don't get me wrong, Megan did a fantastic job in knitting the pattern, but IT was the only block in the whole afghan that was made with muticolord yarn.

Down at the yarn shop, the knitters are kind and generous in their praise for this beautiful work, yet each one would ask about That Multicolored Block and nobody likes it.

Mistakes and ripping out offer possibilities for better design choices. I'm choosing this opportunity to have one square in pink, our bride-to-be's favorite color and I will use the pink to crochet around the the finished afghan. Oh, will we get there in time?

This brings us to the fifth panel being knitted by Paula, our daughter. Busy, stressed, and not being able to pick it up for a few days, I offered to finish her last square. Why did I do that? Although I worked on it, I put it down to attend to the fourth column.

Maybe, I will be able to have Paula pick up her panel and finish it, that would be a great help.

My friends at the yarn store will pitch in and help me - I will ask that they weave in the ends and help with joining the panels. They have already said they will help with the blocking.

The time crunch, will we be able finish the gift this week and ship it off to Cleveland? The wedding is on July 19th.

Wish us well.

Congratulations to Darcy

Congratulations to Darcy's Knotty Knitter for her 200th post on her blog. She is celebrating by having a drawing for prizes. Visit her at http://darcyknottyknitter.blogspot.com/

Please tell her that you learned about her drawing from "knitting life."

I learned of Darcy's celebration from http://ponyknit.blogspot.com/

What is your answer?

Happiness is . . .

Leave me a comment.

Judy

Knitting the Family Project - Part 1

David, Megan, Paula and Julia.

David learning and Judy working on a panel.

Our family is working on a wedding blanket, 60" x 60", 25 squares knitted in five panels. I am responsible for three panels. Megan, 12 in July, is committed to one panel. Julia, 10 in July, is deciding which square she will do on the 5th and last panel. Paula, our daughter, is doing the last column with some help from Julia. David, my husband, is learning the knitting stitch and will contribute to the last of the two squares I am on. The gift is for our second oldest granddaughter, Katharine and her soon to be husband, Jim.

I've made lots of mistakes and marvel at the fluidity of Megan's knitting. Meg Downey says that the mistakes are our "signature stitches." This helps to look at it this way. To give myself some slack, I had put down knitting over 25 years ago and then didn't much enjoy doing it. When we moved to Pocatello, I quickly realized that one of the ways to spend quality time with my family would be to pick up knitting. I have thrown my self whole heartily into it and enjoy many hours at the Mustard Seed Dreams yarn store.