rambley post about stashbusting crochet

so.. a bit radio-silent as of late.

have been pretty busy actually. a few weeks ago was spring break, where instead of kicking back and relaxing, my "days off" consisted of going to internship (2.5 days) and then driving 3 hours up to the DC area to spend some time (2.5 days) with someone who.. i'm becoming "involved with".. and then 3 hours off to charlottesville to spend some time with my sister + her fiance (2.5 days), and then 3 hours driving back home in the wee hours of morning to go right back into the work/school schedule. i know, i know.. complaining. and people who have real jobs could argue that they don't have a spring break. but.. bah. i mean, in many jobs, you do the work during the hours you get paid for and then don't have to commit too much personal time outside of work. school, you go to class during the day, then the evenings are used for homework and lab time on weekends. then also doing the internship. and working at the mall on weekends, so usually ending up with a 7-day work/school-week (but, luckily luckily, i haven't been scheduled to work as much on the weekends, so i am getting some time off.)

and then have been having carpaltunnely issues.. boo..

but anyway.. took some of the FO's off the progress tracker on the side, as well as some projekts i'm not actually working on (aka, the kittyville hat for my little sister, which is for her birthday -- not until july, and i just have to do the ears..)..

have been doing more crochet lately. i have a bunch of not-so-nice yarn i purchased "back in the day" from thriftstores when i had been thinking about making yarn hairfalls.. which of course, i never did as.. yarn hair falls aren't tremendously nice looking -- very "i made this myself at a low cost" sort of look.. which it essentially would have been.. heh.. so some yarn in lots of different colours, but not nice quality yarn. like, i mean.. not terrible, but not something you'd wear against skin. kind of the redheart acrylicky sort.

so i had thought to myself, what would be the best way to use all this up? i had originally thought toys.. but then i stumbled across this crochet star blanket pattern. or technically it's an afghan pattern.. what is the difference between an afghan and a blanket? i like referring to it as a blanket. because crocheted afghans?? that is definitely something i did not see myself ever making.

well, it stems back from when i was in the video classes of the computer arts program, and render time for video would take forever, so i would bring along some knitting to work on while my projekt would render. and there was this girl who liked to imitate what i did, and so she started bringing crochet projekts to work on. i, at that point, did not know how to crochet, and had attempted to teach myself but couldn't figure it out (and it actually turned out i was doing it right, i just couldn't tell!) so i asked about her crocheting.. until i found out she only knew how to double crochet and was not interested in expanding her knowledge, just content to make panels of dc that she would seam together to make an afghan for her boyfriend. (she also didn't know how to start or finish). and i thought, dear god, how boring.. i eventually took one of those 2hour courses at michael's to get a kickstart in crocheting and after a minimal amount of time, knew more than she did.

of course it's not the who-knows-more game.. it just really bothered me that she had no interest in learning more. expanding horizons and whatnot. i don't understand! but in any case, i definitely associated afghans with boring. (and her's wasn't even the grannysquare sort of afghan.. it was like sewing together 3 large scarves. of plainness.)

so.. yeah.. surprisingly i am crocheting an afghan blanket though. but mine is different! it's shaped like a STAR! which will be perfect for cuddling under -- if you turn it upsidedown so that the point is at your feet, it's perfect for tucking around your body. the point would go under + around your feet. the next set of points would be tucked under your legs and the uppermost would be tucked around the upper body.. mmm, cozy. and even though it isn't the most nice feeling yarn, usually blankets are used with clothes on underneath, so it wouldn't be directly against the skin. perfect for on the couch watching tv and cuddling up with the blanket. plus, i plan to smother the blanket with fabric softener to make it nicer.. heh..

in any case, its turning out nicely so far.. have done a goldenyellow, orange, and red orange (each with some rows of black separating).. next is maroon/burgundy.. and then i haven't decided what comes after that.. i was thinking greens, so i could move on with the rainbow scheme (frog green, dark green, bluegreen, lightblue, dark blue, purple), but i'm not certain i want the red and green next to each other (too christmas).. hm.. shall have to think on this..

anyway, rambling..
must go off to bed. i've been sick lately as well..

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ETA: holy crap, this is a long entry!