I finished my Girasole a few days ago.  I absolutely loved this pattern.  I’m already debating on what yarn I want to use for my next Girasole.

I think that this was the first thing I’ve knitted where I really saw what blocking can do for a piece.  I guess because it was pretty large.

So this is not a great picture, but I wanted to try to show how kinda ruffled up it looked pre-blocking.

I’d had planned to block it on our bed, but I quickly saw this was not going to work too well, so after giving it a nice bath for about 30 minutes, I took it downstairs to the floor for blocking.

Even this required some adaptation.  I have some great blocking squares, but I didn’t have enough of them.  David suggested cardboard.  Yay David, because this worked out really nicely, even though it wasn’t too pretty.

This was actually pretty easy to block as far as the shaping went because I just had to put a pin in every point and try to get a good tight block all the way around.  It took a lot of pins, but they were well worth it.  I love this pattern.  I think I have said that 50 times now.

I let it dry all day long.  We had to keep Koko out because that girl.  As soon as I looked away, there she was standing in the middle of the blanket.  I just knew her claws were going to wreak havoc, but thankfully no damage was done, and I lifted her off the blanket and deposited her outside (Luckily, it was a beautiful day). I would have liked to let it block overnight maybe, but I couldn’t have left Koko outside all night, nor could I confine her to a room because she’d try to chew the door down.  Or scratch it down with those claws after she realized she didn’t have enough teeth left to chew the door down.

I tried to take a few pictures that might do it justice, but it’s pretty big so this was not easy for me to accomplish.

This is not a picture that does it justice, but Davey took it of me holding the blanket, so I love it.

This picture is ok, and it captures the color well.

Here it is a little closer.

So as it is becoming painfully obvious, I am pretty proud of this!  A year ago, I felt so inept at lace, so it was nice to succeed with it.

I  made this throw for my cousin and her fiancee (now husband) for their wedding gift.  I’d planned to finish it by the time we went to Omaha a few weeks ago, but it didn’t quite happen.

I confess that by the time I had it blocked, I was having some second thoughts about sending it away.  But I have a great cousin who married such a nice guy. My cousin was the flower girl at our wedding.  I babysat her when she was a tiny little baby.  Plus, it gives me an opportunity to make another one which I hope to start and gradually work on it over the next year.

Here’s Angela and her husband.  It was a beautiful wedding!

And then here is Angela with Davey.  When we took him into the room where Angela and everyone were getting ready, he got so serious.  He had big eyes and he was just taking it all in.  I think he liked having his picture taken with her.