I started working on this quilt six years ago, and now at last I’m finished.

When I started this quilt, John was a sophomore in high school. Now, John is a senior in college, and he is engaged to Bridget and I just designed the Save the Date card for their wedding.

Kim was not yet pregnant with Brock. Yesterday, Kim and Bob registered Brock for kindergarten.

I didn’t have much graphic design education six years ago, though I had taken something like nine semesters of life drawing.

I hadn’t met Tracy Harris when I started this quilt. I hadn’t taken a class from Mike Martin.

I was working at Land’s End in Cross Plains saying “Welcome to Land’s End, this is Ann, how may I help you?” about fifty times a day. During that time, I bought all the sheets and towels I would need for another fifteen years. I really loved doing that. When I got married I didn’t have a wedding shower and all our sheets and towels were from the Land’s End returns store and had other people’s initials embroidered on them. I hated that.

I painted watercolor paintings a lot more in those days, but I cried about it a lot. My paintings were never as good as I wanted them to be.

I didn’t take as many pictures.

I still thought DIY home improvement projects were awesome. But somewhere in the middle of the six years, I stripped all the paint from our porch ceilings with zip strip and a heat gun. Worst. Experience. Ever. I will DIY no more forever. I won’t even let my husband do things.

So a lot has happened since I started making this quilt. That makes me love it more, because when I look at it I think of all those things and I’m happy.

This is the perfect after Christmas scarf – pretty and colorful enough to get you through the awful gray darkness of January and February.

Not that there’s anything wrong with winter, or anything ever. In Prairieopolis, we are only ever perky.

But!! If people from other places, people with weak constitutions, are gloomy, you can knit this scarf and give it to them. Or just wear it when they are around to cheer them up and encourage them to take up knitting.

I tell people who ask, “It is super easy to knit! For real!” and they don’t believe me, but it is. The whole pattern is below. Marmosets could knit this scarf and so could you. If you need help, visit knittinghelp.com.

Lettuce Scarf

By Elizabeth Prose. Published in the Madison Knitter’s Guild Newsletter, October 2006

SIZE: One size

FINISHED MEASUREMENTS: Width: 7 inches, Length: 64 inches

MATERIALS

• [MC] 220-330 yards worsted weight self-striping yarn (I used Lang’s Mille Colori; 2 skeins)
• [CC] 229 yards lace weight mohair yarn (I used Rowan Kid Silk Haze; 1 skein)
• 1 pair US #9/5.5mm 9-inch straight needles
• 1 32-inch (or longer) US #6/4mm circular needle
• Tapestry needle
• Stitch markers

GAUGE
16 sts/ 32 rows = 4” in garter stitch using MC.

DIRECTIONS
With MC and size 9 needles, cast on 3 stitches using the long tail cast on method. Begin increase rows. Knit to last stitch, knit into the front and back of the last stitch (kf&b). Repeat this row for a total of 28 rows. There will be 31 stitches.

Next, work as follows:
Row 1 K to last 3 sts, k2tog, k1.
Row 2 K to last st, kf&b.
Repeat these two rows until work measures 62 inches along the longer side.

Then, begin decrease rows. Knit to last 3 sts, k2tog, k1. Repeat this row until there are 3 stitches remaining. Next row: slip 2 stitches together as if to knit, knit the next stitch, and pass the 2 slipped stitches over the one just knit. Bind off.

With CC and size 6 circular needles, start at one corner and pick up one stitch for every row around entire edge of scarf. Place a stitch marker and join to knit in the round.

Row 1 Knit into the front and back of every stitch.
Row 2-5 Knit. Bind off very loosely.

FINISHING
Weave in ends. Block to measurements.

Don’t tell anyone – I love the holidays. I love making cookies and greeting cards and wrapping presents. It’s pure design fun.

I always find myself working around the clock as the holiday approaches and think, “If I had begun all these cookies and cards decorating projects earlier, I wouldn’t have to be doing this in the middle of the night.”

But you know what? If I started earlier, I’d just do more projects. And I’d be finishing them in the middle of the night.

Household hint: buy a Bethany Pastry Cloth and board. The set simplifies cookie dough rolling out, and pie crust making, and bread kneading.

They’re not just for lefse anymore.

I finished this quilt for my niece Nicole Rammer, who is a freshman majoring in viola performance at Tennessee in Knoxville. It’s a slightly late gift for her high school graduation.

I fell in love with this pretty quilt on Flickr and copied it, at least the front, which was easy to do. The fabrics are all Amy Butler.

My finished quilt is bigger than a lap quilt, but smaller than a twin-sized bed covering. I hope it’s a good size for dorm life, nice for her to snuggle under to watch movies or when she studies.

To be honest, I don’t really know Nicole all that well. Her mom (my sister) and dad have always lived a few thousand miles from me and we haven’t visited back and forth that much. Our families get together for big (and by big I mean 150 people or so) family reunions, but not for Christmases or Thanksgivings. We’ve rarely had a chance to hang out together.

But here’s what I know about Nicole. She is vegetarian and has been, through her own decision, since the age of 7 or so. She just decided one day she wasn’t going to eat anything that has a face. She’s stuck to it ever since.

She graduated from a performing arts high school in Nashville and plays the viola beautifully, but also is a cross-country champ.

She is straight-up gorgeous, dresses like a model, and has 901 facebook friends (lol). She tries to encourage me to dress fashionably, but is pretty good humored about what a lost cause that is.

We’ll all be together this summer for John Dollar’s wedding, and I hope I can spend some time with her and with her sister, Natalie, and with my sister, Peggy.

Meanwhile, I hope she likes the quilt!

Last year, I knit a pair of socks I absolutely adore. They’re my mini-monkeys, my cute lacy socks with a hemmed cuff that I love. Jimi chewed a hole in the sole of one of them.

I remembered, though, that my dear mother-in-law Verda McFarlane, gave me her darning basket when she moved from her big house to a smaller apartment. The basket has two darning eggs, two wooden hoops, a pack of needles and a number of spools of thread.

Verda taught home economics in high school and raised four boys. She knows how to do everything.

I didn’t want to bother her for darning advice, though, because the time I set aside to do it was late at night. So I tried the next best thing – YouTube. This video demonstrates darning with extreme thoroughness. The makers don’t really edit at all. They just tape a woman darning a huge hole in a sock. You get to see every stitch and it lasts about ten minutes (but they have cute English accents, so that helps).

It worked, see? You can see where the darn is – I don’t know if darns are supposed to show or not? I suppose with self-striping yarn it would be tough to match the colors. But it’s not bumpy on the bottom and it doesn’t have gaping holes. I have my mini-monkeys back. Thanks Verda!

Below are the darning tools. Note that the pack of needles cost 15 cents!

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