It's life, Jim, but not as we know it.

It's about time for a real post about the life of Liz. I've posted about movies and food and musicals and concerts, but nothing really about me... well, I guess in the long run those posts ARE about me, but there are other things going on in our lives that might need to be recorded for future posterity.. ha ha. Whatever. Lets see what I can come up with.

 

I finished the blanket I had been making for Rachel's baby. He is due July first, and his name will be Cooper. this blanket took way longer to make then it needed too. I made the afghan mostly of yarn that formerly belonged to John's Grandma Evans. Mother Evans has a stash of it in her basement. Green, White, Brown and Variegated. I did have to buy the orange yarn because I needed just one more color that wasn't in the stash.

 

 

It took me about 3 months to finish. The pattern wasn't terribly difficult, just tedious... but I think that's true about most crochet projects. Tedium just comes with the hobby I suppose. And though it wasn't difficult it was extremely frustrating. It's two rounds of 24 lines each alternating colors. This may have been a little more than I was ready for as my second crochet project ever, but the book listed it as "Easy" so I thought I could handle it...

Well, it started out okay. Then suddenly I noticed that the "seam" where the colors changed was getting really crooked. Next, I was weaving in tails when I snipped a string in the pattern and had to unravel half of my completed work (setting me back about a month) ... Oaky, now that I have to basically start again I tried straightening the seam. That was good... but then I noticed that I had cut some of the tails too short and I worry that it will unravel with use. Then there was this problem and that problem an before I knew it I hated this blanket. the center rings appear to be too tight so they bulge strangely, but after talking to a friend who crochets a lot it appears that this is a common issue with this type of pattern. But in the end it turned out okay and I handed it off to Rachel and it's not my problem any more. I did tell her though that if it fell apart then I would make Cooper a new one. I may make Cooper a new one anyway.  

 

Now I am working on a new blanket for Arianne and Scott's baby. He's due in August.. This blanket has been much easier and much less frustrating.... well a little less frustrating then the last one. It's made up of several strips of different colors (I'm making it in St. Lewis Cardinals colors for Scott) that are attached together by a zig-zag stitch that I still need to figure out. I have it mostly done and could probably have it all done if it weren't for one strip of red that was driving me crazy. I had to unravel it about nine times because I kept missing a stitch somewhere in the pattern and I didn't realize it until the end of line 5 where it should have matched up, but it didn't I was anywhere between 2 to 4 stitches off... finally on one round where I ended up only one stitch off I said to heck with it and just added the extra stitch and kept going. I guess that will be the end strip that doesn't need to match up with anything. But like my mom says "A blind man would be happy to see it." and she's probably right. Except that I'm not giving it to a blind man. Thanks to advice from my sister Jessica I have now invested in some Stitch Markers that have helped a lot and hopefully I'll have this one done sooner than later. I do like the pattern though and think I'll try it again. I'll post more about it when I'm finished.

 

I have also decided that my brain only functions on one creative level at a time. I feel like since I have picked up crocheting I haven't really written anything. It's like I'm so focused on finishing the project I'm working on that all of my creative fuel is used up so I sit down in front of an open Word document and I have nothing to write down. That's sad. I hope that maybe I'm just suffering from a case of writers block and not the fact that I no longer have the words to feed my imagination. I guess it's time for me to sit down and pound out a story about Unicorns to prove to myself that I can still do it.....

Someday I'll continue with my choose your own adventure story. However I think the poll up in the corner of my blog is kind of funny showing that the majority chooses "Kill Yourself" - I'm sure that if anyone is new to the blog they may be taken aback and confused by the question... maybe they even think I'm a bit suicidal. Who knows. It's just funny to me now.

 

We've spent some time with friends the past few weeks:

Of course there are game nights with John & Angie, and Megan. They're totally awesome and have introduced us to a lot of new board games, and card games we've never heard of before that we now love. We had dinner with Becky & Jacob, and their kids, a few weeks ago. It was fun to see them. We don't see them often enough. We introduced them to a fun new card game called Pirate Fluxx. We all had a fabulous time. Bryce & Jennie, and Owen are in Utah for the summer, and they also came down from Logan to have dinner with the Shapiro's. It's always fun seeing them. We miss them when they're so far away.

Everyone's kids are getting so big. It's starting to make me feel old while I watch them grow up.

 

Before going to dinner at the Shapiro's house John and I had some time to kill in Salt Lake because we didn't want to drive all the way home just to turn around and drive all the way back to their house... So we stopped at the Church History Museum to see the new exhibit called "Seek his Face" the paintings were nice to look at. There were some really strange ones and some really nice ones but they were all the artist's interpretations of Christ. I love going to see the displays at the museum. It's not a large place, but it's always interesting. 

 

Then there was the U2 Concert, and Les Miserables and it seemed like nothing else really happened in between. I guess there was Memorial Day. We spent the weekend with family, and also dog-sitting Frodo and Lilo for Norm & Becca while they went to Las Vegas. And then there was my dad's 76th birthday. John and I stopped at a British store (or two) and bought him some candy, and also some Pasties for dinner that night.

 

I think that's about it for now. I can't think of anything else at the moment.