Happy Day!

Oh, happy day! This stack of fleece blankets is the last 17 out of 60 that I have tied. You may recall that 30 two-layer blankets were donated to Project Linus last month through Quilts from Cornerstone, my second Saturday group, and 2 layers of fleece is too heavy for Project Linus.

I have spent 1½ to 2 hours a day almost every day for the last 2½ weeks untying two-layer blankets and retying them into single-layer blankets, plus most of 4 days converting the first 13 blankets into 26 single-layer blankets. I was thrilled to tie the last knot. The last time I did a happy dance like that was a year and a half ago when I learned that my AT&T career was about to end. (Yes, I was ready to retire.)

The next project that I hope to get off my to do list is weaving in the rest of the yarn ends on this knitted feather and fan afghan and crochet a border up the 2 sides. My (step)sister gave the half-knitted afghan to me several years ago. I took it to a craft night last July to start making it a whole afghan. I finished the knitting months ago, but got sick and tired of weaving in ends and set the project aside.

I don't like weaving ends in knitting and this lacy afghan knitted in sport yarn on size 10½ or 11 needles is especially challenging, because the ends don't want to stay put. I finally discovered that if I weave most of the yarn into the stitches and then reverse direction, split the yarn with the needle and pull the end of the yarn back into the strand it holds.

These projects are cutting into my sock knitting time, but Project Linus always needs blankets and I want to get some of this stuff done and out of the house. Click on any picture for a larger version.