Forward Progress

  Ah, and here we are again after another sleepless night... Done with ripping back an entire skein, and back to an almost-completed panel blanket. Since this round of insomnia is keeping me up again, I'm glad to have a simple project like this to work on. And since I'm always terribly cold in the air conditioning, I'm also happy to have an afghan to work under even though it's the middle of summer.

  I'm starting to wonder if my current sleeplessness could be work-induced. Rip van Winkle has taken to sometimes sleeping in a chair to stop his snoring, and it leaves me with an empty bedroom and a (sometimes) quiet house at night. Unlike any other time of the day, the middle of the night is when I can just keep working with no interruptions... And it's kind of nice!

  Once I decide that I've had enough of work for the night, it seems like I'm able to wind down quickly and go to sleep. But if I don't get tired of working, I don't get tired at all and I just keep going. Maybe this current state isn't really insomnia at all, and it's more like... Drive. It's a paradox that I'm not sure I want to try to solve... Am I crocheting because I can't sleep, or am I not sleeping because I'm crocheting? That thought might show you that my quiet time gives me too much time to think.

  Either way, the schedule is working out for me. I threw together a whole panel blanket in a few nights, didn't I? Using a size N - 9.00 mm hook and worsted weight yarn, the project works up quickly as it is... And using the seamless join method on panels goes super-fast! But without that quiet time free of interruptions, I'd still be trying to finish panel #3. And if not for the decision to rip back and change yarns for the seam, I might have let this project go idle.

  Instead, I finished the joins well before midnight and continued on to experiment with a border. (That's where I stopped taking pictures, because I want to keep the whole finished project secret for now.) After a few different color and stitch combinations, I made up my mind and worked on. At 3 a.m., I cut my last yarn. To be honest, I can't call it completely finished because there's still some tails to weave in... But wow, does it feel good to finish a project so quickly.

  The pattern is for one of the next GrannySpiration Challenges, but I'm excited to let you in on a few tips and tricks I've been learning from my blanket-making experiences. I still have to finish up the final part of the Be Square Top tutorial, then I'd like to start another project to help clear out my stash... But wait! What about the "no-new-WIP" rule? Oh! Crochet world, you put me between a rock and a hard place sometimes. 😉

Happy Crocheting!