The quiet joy of creating

I had a lovely weekend. When I made Dad his blanket, he found information on blankets for soldiers who had been wounded and I promised to make at least one. A friend gave me some acrylic yarn that she had acquired for a special order (she's a fiber artist and someone commissioned one of her shawls but really wanted acrylic yarn.) in lime green, so I decided that I would be making the citrus blanket - lemon yellow and orange, perhaps to round out the citrus spectrum.

Alas, it was not to be - the yarn shop did not have orange in that type of acrylic, but did have yellow, and the perfect shade for pink grapefruit. Um. Well, while pink is heavily discouraged, this is hardly a little girly color, so I hope someone wants a citrus blanket with pink grapefruit. But the colors all look good together, and I'm working them in Aran stitches so that it's both decorative and thick with no holes. So I got it a little further along

And then, I took a break from the acrylic and the heavy thoughts that the citrus blanket, despite its cheery colors, inspires and turned to a happier task. I promised one of my coworkers a lace handkerchief for her wedding, so I've been doing sample pieces of lace - needle tatting and crochet. I have some idea how bobbin lace works, but I don't have a cushion or lace weights. Knitted lace isn't the look I want, and neither is Battenburg (which is so not my favorite kind of lace), and since I'm presuming she wants it this century, needle lace is out.

And I finished a crochet lace handkerchief this weekend. Woot! And it's beautiful, so beautiful. I can hardly wait to see it once it's been through a tea bath to turn it a lovely ivory color. And the tatting is coming along well, too, with little drop shapes in the corners. Plus I got in some banjo practice time. So although I didn't get out much this weekend, I feel I got stuff accomplished.