Progress Report

Things I have learned -- It is hard to count to 2. It is especially hard to count to 2 when you are watching TV. My vacation started out in strange ways. First southern California had a wet storm roll in along with the jet stream dipping down from the north. There was actually snow in the higher elevations in the LA basin -- pretty rare especially in late February. By the time I left for the airport on Saturday morning at 'O' dark thirty the rain had pretty much passed through. The main problem was that the dew point was causing fog on the freeways and the other drivers on the road didn't seem to understand that when it is hard to see you need to slow down. Oh well.

TSA ended up being a nonissue. When I got to Hawaii and started unpacking I discovered that I had both tweezers and nail clippers in my carry on bags. It might have been that both the person in front of me and behind me in the security screening had items that triggered hand searches. Coming home I actually brought my knitting and the pointy lace needles and that caused no issues.

While waiting at the gate I strung the beads on the garnet. I counted twice and there was no mistakes in the number of beads. The blue was a snap, the gold was a snap and the first row of the wine colored beads was also easy. Then I reverted to a mental state of pre-Kindergarten. For the life of me if I crocheted that row once I did it at least 6 times. If the person sitting next to me had been awake I might have gotten up and walked the aisles; but, since he slept from the time we left until the final announcement began telling us we were landing, I had little choice but to just slog through it. I finally got the second row correct and for some reason the final 4 (March Maddness reference not intended) rows of wine beads were done by the adult that knows how to count to 2.

The whole motif was finished before landing and I took a picture. I am not sold on the color. I would like a little more contrast between the bead and the yarn. I have done the second long wave January portion of the motif and the February portion through the 4th row of beading. I think that the beads I chose to substitute for the red beads is too close to the gold beads. So I quit until I get up to the San Gabriel Bead Co later today.

[The original post was at 9:30 a.m. 3/11/11 -- This addendum was added at 4:50 p.m., same day]

I just realized that I frogged the February portion of the second long wave motif before I took a pix. I ended up with a silver lined red bead (yes I know that is the color shipped originally shipped from England.) with an iridescent overlay. The Overlay tones down the red color and now it doesn't clash with the other two colors.

I started the Wave and Chevron motif with the SB 3.12 (D) hook. After the first 2 rows (foundation and first pattern row in garnet) and the silly thing measured 37 cm. Arrrggghhhhh! . . . . . So frog, frog, frog . . . . . . Switched to the Clover D hook and worked the first 5 repeats on the first pattern row and measured and it is just a little over 17 cm. Success!!!!!

Today I am going to look for some worsted weight acrylic at a big box store so I can start a crocheted bear for the Mother Bear Project. http://www.motherbearproject.org/ If you would like to contribute I give this organization a 5 star endorsement.


I have a suitable yarn for the body but I don't really have anything that I like for pants and shirts. I still am not adventurous enough to deviate from the main pattern but I know that once I get more comfortable I will start experimenting.