Three times now, I have attempted to make a handmade present for my neighbor. Weeks ago I bought a multi-colored yarn, a blend of Chiefs yellow and maroon, plus a little of T's favorite blue and gradient colors between, thinking I'd make another couch blanket like he has on his giant couch in two places. (The current ones are where the dogs have been trained to sit.) I found a cool stitch on the internet, and gave it a try. I think it was sort of right the first time, but inconsistent. I thought at the time it was completely wrong on many levels. I grabbed a second jumbo skein and tried it a slightly different way. Thinking this time it must be right, I unraveled the entire first section and balled it up, setting it aside for later. I worked round two for a while, but knew I couldn't finish in time for Christmas, or rather a few days before it when T left to visit family. I picked it up again a couple of days ago, picked out a pound of cat fur from it, and tried again. It curled horribly, just like it had when I first started it, and I was getting very frustrated. On the way to my appointment yesterday, I brought it to work on in the car. I got a good look at it in the afternoon light. I had been reducing each row by one stitch each time. I swore foully, and stuffed it in my tote bag. This evening I climbed in bed early, exhausted, and set it in my lap. After careful study, I determined that yes, it was smaller by one stitch on each row. I started unraveling it again. I kept imagining that I'd just pull out half, and try to make it look better. I watched the video explaining it again. I swore foully again. It was right the first time, if I had just been putting the base double stitch in the right place every single time. I pulled it out as far as the base row, and started over. Unfortunately, I didn't ball it up this time. I just made sure it didn't overlap itself as I threw it onto my lap. Now I'm stuck. I can't go to sleep until I've remade everything I unstrung. I've been marathoning Game of Thrones and crocheting through the night. I wonder whether I'll sleep before dawn. I've made a terrible mistake.
My foster daughter and I went shopping today. We each got gift cards to the Boulder Bookstore, and we made our first pass through it. Parking was horrible, for all that it was a crisp, cold, sunny day. We ate at a restaurant in a location I haven't entered in decades. (Used to be Tom's Tavern when I was in college. It's a hip spot called Salt now.) Then we wandered through all the levels of the store, up and downstairs. I saw lots of cool things, but nothing I couldn't walk away from on this day. She managed to spend her gift card and then some. I don't know why nothing appealed. Maybe I was still distracted from last night's news.
We made a stop on the way home, and I bought presents for the Pride. I'd been talking about cat beds for a while. Finally followed through on it. We put one in the tiny space between the Mr's chair and the heat register, and we had to coax Rabbit into it. She was grumpy at first. It took her a while to accept it. The other sat, unattended, on my bed until I came in here. Alfred occupied it for hours after that.
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