Slow Progress

Blog fodder has been hard to come by lately- there really isn't anything super exciting to talk about. Also, progress has been slow, mostly because husband and I have shifted our weekend focus to finally getting furniture for our house. It means Sat and Sun day long sojurns to various furniture places in Calgary, but eats knitting time like crazy.

Fear not, there are some things to discuss!

The Football blanket is OFF the needles, but I have discovered a rather unsettling problem. It's too small.

My calculations and gauge (DESPITE A MASSIVE GAUGE SWATCH... grrr) are off- and this blanket is considerably smaller than what I normally give to friends.

Adding an extra batch of squares would throw off the Z in the middle pattern and most borders with crochet seem to be better suited to little girls. I think I've decided to do a similar border to what I did with the white blanket; wherein I pick up stitches along the various edges and add some length. I'm still not sure what stich pattern will compliment, but I really neeed to get this thing cased. My goal this weekend is to weave in the remaining ends and block the blanket, so I know exactly what size I'm working with.

Making it hard to focus on finishing up the football blanket is the fact that in a fit of starteritis, I cast on a new blanket. Rainbow Ripples, which blessedly uses STASH leftover from the last rainbow adventure, could not wait to get going. It started like this last Monday:

And by this Saturday it looks like this:

I've knit this pattern before and while I found it rather boring, it does go rather quickly. The only downside (and it's huge) is that it leaves a mess of end weaving to get done.

*sigh* I need to make a friend who's only joy in life is to weave in ends. That way I can just hand off that duty to them! Second goal for the weekend is to get the first color reapeat on this donezo and weave in the ends. I refuse to allow myself to start knitting the next red row until the ends are woven on the first section of colors.

I even found a little time to get some purse sock progress this last week- thanks to a glorious few days at my parents while I was taking a course. (I am moving back home. Being an adult is a total scam. It's much better when you're parents insist on catering to your every need! *Thanks mom and dad!)

This little pattern is really great- it looks complicated but it's relatively simple. I'd love to have a cute pair of socks to model for you eventually. (Do you like how I've NOT committed myself to a timeline here?) The other goal for the weekend is to get the heal flap finished and the heel turn done.

I know that slow and steady wins the race, even though my progress is slowed by the distraction of other things going on in my life, by setting these small and acheivable goals, I should have something finished to show off here eventually. The greater goal is for March 1, to cast on my first Stampede project of the year. I need to start or I'm not going to get 2 out the door. It's easy to focus on a project when there isn't the distraction of other things guilting you into knitting. I just need to sit down and hopefully find the time to get a couple of things finished.

So to recap, the weekend goals are:

1) Weave in the ends to the football blanket and block it
2) Get a whole "rainbow" repeat done and woven in on the new blanket
3) Knit the heel flap and turn the heel on the Pointelle socks.

Think I can do it?