it is finished :)
I've spent quite a bit of time over the last few days working on my "year in stitches" scarf. It was hard to stick with it yesterday because I had volunteered overnight at Ronald McDonald house, and sadly, I really can't sleep while I'm there. So I find myself needing a nap most of the following day. Sitting on the couch with knitting needles in hand led to a couple of unplanned naps :)
I was keeping one eye on my knitting, one eye on the clock and one eye on the Hallmark channel! Yes...I did have to backtrack and fix a couple of mistakes because I had my eyes on one thing and not the other at the right time! About 11 p.m. I was just starting into that last blue row on the right side. I had a "sort of" plan for the ending, but was making it up as I went along. I had started the year with 20 rows of a K4/P4 pattern, and planned to finish with 12 rows of the same. I wanted a transition into the last 12...kind of a reflection space (that's the tweedy whitish block after the blue), and I decided to make that part of the pattern as well. When the last stitch was cast off, and my needles were free, I looked at the clock...12:02 :) I think that worked out very well!
I still had most of the ends to weave in, and I had thought I would just leave that for today. But...I tend to put things off, and I wanted to finish this project. I ended up weaving in until almost 2:30 a.m., but in looking at my effort this morning (late morning), I am glad I stayed up to get it done! That was the easy part. The deeper part was the reflection of looking back at it, and then in looking forward for it!
It is such a testament to the last year of my life! I started out the year focused on my goals and ready to make them happen. I like how in looking at the scarf, that is the time the knitting is random. It moves from one color to the next without a pattern...don't think, just do. Then things started getting crazy, and I put the scarf aside. I was still jotting entries in my date book to go back and catch up. As I previously wrote about, that lasted until May 31st when life got really crazy! I'm not sure of the exact date I put the project aside, but it was sometime in April. I didn't go back and "catch up" when I picked it back up in November because that somehow seemed wrong. Yes, I know it's "just a scarf". But it's not really, and I can't explain that if you don't get it :)
Now the question became...what do I DO with it? I have mulled that around a lot! I went to sleep with it on my mind last night, and it has occupied my thoughts a lot today as well. There is a part of me that wants to keep it. But the spirit of the project was to share my life with someone else. It came to me about an hour ago...which made me cry, and now makes my heart sing :)
My Dad will be 81 years old on the 16th of this month. There were times back around November that I wasn't sure he would make it until Thanksgiving (when we were planning a trip there). Then, as he has done many times, he got a little stronger. He was even able to get out of bed for a time to join us for Thanksgiving dinner! Then he got bad again during finals week, and the call came from my Mom that she had called in hospice care. Then he seemed to stabilize a bit. Now we are in a new year, and he is still hanging in there and I wish I could be closer so I could just sit and read the newspaper to him again (it's hard reading the comics to someone...makes them even funnier!). I want to be able to give him a hug and let him know that I love him. I can't do that right now...but I CAN send him a colorful birthday gift that he can wrap around his shoulders. And that is what I will do.
Life can be messy, and my life & relationship with my parents has not been a smooth sail. But in the end, when you get to be a growed up person, you realize that people do the best they can with what they are given. You decide that you don't live in that part of your past any longer, and you keep your eyes looking forward. No one is more proud of me and my achievements at school right now than my parents. It means a lot to my daddy, and no matter what has come before...I am more his little girl now then ever before. He needs a warm, colorful hug for his birthday...and that is what he shall get! that is all!
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