I have not been neglecting my crocheting as much as I've been neglecting my crocheting blog.

To follow-up my thought of two weeks ago, on the subway home that Friday I remembered that I had money coming to me from winning our fantasy football league. I can buy all the needles, hooks and yarn I want! Woo hoo! I'm also thinking of buying bins to store my stash in.

I didn't get as much done that weekend as I had wanted. I dozed off in the car and woke up on outskirts of Atlantic City. I did finish the project I was working on. It was a baby blanket for my cousin and his wife. She's expecting next month. I missed the shower, but I mailed it last week. They should have it by now. I'm kind of worried he hasn't e-mailed about it.

As soon as I heard they were expecting, I knew I wanted to make them a blanket. I would have done a layette set but I've never made clothes before! I decided to try to make a blanket with a giraffe on it. She collects giraffes and I thought it would be cute. I could not find a crochet pattern for a giraffe blanket. I'm not a strong knitter, yet, so it needed to be crochet. I did find a pattern for "toddler squares" but it was meant to be cross-stitched onto a crocheted square. I didn't want to do that because I didn't want the blanket to have a wrong side. I decided to blow-up the pattern and try to crochet in color. Didn't work. I've got a better idea of how to do that now, but at the time I was clueless. So, I broke the cross-stitch pattern down into smaller squares I could crochet. They were a lot of fun to do during the commute. Piecework is great on the train. Then I had to sew them together. That part of piecework sucks! Anyway. Two weeks ago I was putting the border on. I even put a mane and fluffy tail on it! I sure hope they like it. It's a peach giraffe with light brown spots and a yellow background. It's very bright and soft. I used acrylic yarn so it would be easy care. I gave them a lifetime warranty. I just know the pieces are going to come a part!

I've been obsessing about crocheting. I started my next project immediately. It's a large blanket for my sister. She whined at Christmas that I'd made blankets for everyone but her. I pointed out that Mom doesn't have a blanket and she retorted that Mom got a tree skirt (made by me this fall). So, I asked her what she wanted. She said she liked the yarn in the tree skirt (Caron Christmas Ombre) but she wanted blues. And she liked the points on the tree skirt, too. (It's octagonal, I think. I'd have to check the pattern to remember how many points it actually has.) Long story short, she wants a blue, pointy blanket. I'm making a hexagon. I'm working in the round with the same style of corners as the tree skirt.

I wrote out a simple pattern but forgot it at work. And since I couldn't wait to start, I tried to just wing it. It took me five tries to get something decent going. None of my first attempts would lie flat. I have that problem often when working in the round. Anyway, I went back and re-started the way I had originally planned and it's working well. I've got 20 3 oz skeins to work through, and I'm nearly done 2.

All I want to do is crochet. My husband and I went to an NBA basketball game on Wednesday and as we were sitting there waiting for the introductions and the game to start I got really anxious thinking about how I could be better spending that time crocheting! I've got it bad. It's all I think about and all I want to do.