Finished Objects

Since I am currently living in the midst of chaos I'm getting a totally disproportionate thrill out of having something finished to show. Out of the depths of my "personal" desk drawer at the office I pulled a string bag I had started to crochet about three years ago and stashed in my office drawer as an "emergency project". Typical of my attention span for non-gift crochet items, when I got near the end I started to think about how I wanted to change things around. Of course I decided the straps of this bag in the original pattern were too narrow at the bottom, but I could not decide what I wanted them to look like instead. Then I realized that I could surf the Internet and knit at the same time, but I had to LOOK at my crochet. Well, that project hit the back burner. An hour of work this week got it finished. The pattern is a free one from Lily that I picked up years ago. I plan to use it to carry home my farmers' market scores, and to keep with me for quickie grocery trips. I made the bag a bit shallower and attached the handles across a larger area to suit my purpose a little better. I tend to be kind of careful to (mostly) follow a knitted pattern, but with crochet I just leap off into the void. I guess it's because crochet is very forgiving - it won't punish you by unraveling the way knitting will. Also I can't even remember when I learned to crochet, so it seems pretty natural and intuitive to me.

I also finished the plain striped socks this week. I must confess that none of the socks I have knit during the spring or summer are washed or blocked yet. I'll have a blocking festival later in the year when it gets a bit cooler. I like to block them all at once because one pair or a dozen pairs, I have to hide them from The Evil Roxanne. She shows no inappropriate interest in my yarn, or work in progress, but anything wet and blocking she cannot resist. I have learned the hard way to lock up wet wool.