Fumbling Around

Yesterday was a frustrating day for me, because I could not find my glasses. I fumbled around and looked high and low (and yes I looked on top of my head, Vixen and Jen). I backtracked trying to trace my steps. I looked under the bed in case the cats had knocked them under there. No luck.

Exasperated, and resigned to working blind, I grabbed my husband’s weaker glasses less strong pair of glasses glasses for better eyes than mine, and sat down to crochet. I pulled out my handy dandy yarn barn that was given to me by a volunteer. It’s wonderful for keeping the yarn contained and untangled! I also use it to store the crochet hooks and scissors I use when I work. When I popped it open—Lo! and Behold! I had tucked my glasses in it for safekeeping. Duh. I now have them super-glued to my nose.

I was pretty delighted to be given that Yarn Barn, because I had never seen anything like it. I must admit that I haven’t crocheted much in many years, so I was “out of the loop,” so to speak. If you are dying to have one, and are as cheap as I am, you can make your own. One of the women I crocheted with this week told me how her husband had made her one, so I gave it a try. It’s very simple, and you can recycle at the same time.

All you have to do is guzzle a big old bottle of Dr. Pepper and rinse out the bottle. Looks a lot like that Yarn Barn, doesn’t it?

Now, get a pair of sharp scissors

Or one of those Exacto Knives, if you are more coordinated than I am

Very carefully cut three sides of a rectangle into the side of that bottle, and cover the edges of that rectangle with tape (so it won’t snag).

Voila! You have yourself a homemade Yarn Barn!

It won’t last very long, but that means you can chug more Dr. Pepper. Hey, don’t y’all think I should have my own show on HGTV? Maybe Martha Stewart wants to interview me? You can just see me chatting with Martha, can’t you?

I’m not holding my breath waiting on those.
[author's note: I fully realize this was a simplistic project unworthy of television coverage. I write with tongue firmly planted in cheek.]

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The Share A Square Project is going very well indeed. As of yesterday, we have 1954 squares for Share A Square (1954 was a very good year!). In two months time, we have gotten more than one fourth of the way to the number of squares we need. To make 140 afghans, a total of 6720 squares are needed, but we are going to reach that with no problem at all. Every day, new people are joining the project, lately some from Live Journal and MySpace. Y’all can comment here, but I’ve found it difficult to comment at your house. I just want you to know I can’t thank you enough for participating.

This project is incredible. I really do wish you could see all that is going on. Check on the Share A Square Blog to see more.

I have spent the better part of this week driving places and sitting to crochet with local people. I need you out there on the World Wide Web creating those wonderful squares—BUT, I need local people to help me get them together into afghans for the children at Camp SanguinityCancer Camp.

Tuesday of this week, I joined the ladies at the Denton Senior Center. They have been kind enough to take the squares to make one afghan and their crochet hooks are flying.

On Wednesday, I went to the Roanoke Public Library to crochet with a needlework group. Most of them don’t crochet, but two women took squares to put together afghans for me.

Squares have been coming in the mail lately. I’m glad to see that the mailbox is not empty. These are from Karen B in MO, Stephanie S. in WV, and Deb E.
[Deb: If you see this, please comment or write me an e-mail. In our zeal to clean house, the envelope in which your squares arrived has disappeared. I'd like to be able to thank you!]

This lovely group of squares arrived from Carola in Sweden. I had her name wrong when I first listed her, and I apologize for that.

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There have been a couple of people contacting me who have wanted me to do more regular updates. This puts me in quite a quandary. On the one hand, I know it’s important to make you feel involved. I want you to feel the same excitement that I get when I handle all these squares from around the world. I want you to know that your work is counting for something. On the other hand, if I don’t go find local people to help me get these together, the work will be for nothing. I can’t do it alone. It’s only me on this end of the computer line. I don’t have an organization backing me, and I’m just fumbling around trying to figure out how to get this done. Please have patience with me if I don’t update daily. I’m doing the best I can with what I’ve got.

Just for the record, this is not a blog about crochet. At the moment, it’s heavy on yarn, because I’ve made a commitment to put together 140 afghans. I won’t quit until it’s done. That means I’ll talk about the project pretty frequently. But, I will blog about other things, too. This blog is really about “yarns.” I’m a professional storyteller, and this blog was to be a place for me to write stories. I need to be able to write stories, too, so I can keep the fire in me alive.

I want you to feel free to tell me if you need an update. Sometimes I just need somebody to crack a whip, because I’m just fumbling around.

[EDITOR'S NOTE: The Share A Square project has ended, and the afghans were delivered on July 7th, 2008. Although we will not continue that project, an exciting NEW endeavor, called the Good Medicine Project is in progress for summer camp 2009. We hope you will join us.]

Related posts:

1. It’s A HAPpening Thing
2. A Handful of Squares
3. Share A Square Update
4. Warm Your Heart
5. Crochet Squares—It’s “Darned” If You Do, And “Darned” If You Don’t
   (So To Speak)

Tagged as: afghans, humor, kids with cancer, Share A Square