If Your Friends Jumped Off a Bridge..

Would you do it too? For me, the answer is yes. When I was 18, my friends and I all went down to the lake and I watched a bunch of them jump off the bridge into the water. I was so scared, but I finally got up the nerve to jump. Turns out, of the hundreds and hundreds of people who have jumped off that bridge, I'm the only one to ever get hurt. I wound up breaking 2 bones in my back. Before then, I never even knew that it was possible to do such a thing.

Anyway, my back will never fully heal, and it will be broken even when I'm 85. My body's just learned to adjust, but from time to time, I do something stupid (namely not bending at the knees) and it gets hurt again. This is what happened Sunday. I've been on bedrest and pain meds since then, so I've had plenty of time to knit, yet I haven't seem to finish anything.

I have way too many WIP's, and I've been dividing my time between them - so, essentially, nothing really gets finished. I did finally take a few of the Rebuilding Greensburg blocks off the needles and get them packed up and ready to ship out. The deadline isn't until August, but I'm going to be out of town starting next week, so I thought I'd be a little proactive about it and ship them now.

I threw in two teen/adult sized hats that I had made earlier, and I also tossed in a small ball of worsted weight black yarn for seaming. I figured that would be something they couldn't get enough of. My contribution isn't much, but I'm hoping that it will help. There's one lady who's donating a whole afghan (seamed & ready to go!) made of Noro.

I didn't do a final count, but I think I wound up with about 20 squares. My squares are nothing special (most aren't even really square), but it takes the ugly ones to make the beautiful ones stand out.

There's still time to make a square if you're interested! It only takes a few hours and you can really make a dent in your scrap pile if you like.

Interesting note about the box that these are being shipped in: I'm kind of a treehugger, so I always like to reuse packaging if possible. This box has been previously used about 4 times while it was shipped back and forth between my mom and I this spring. I'd send home some charity knitting, she'd send it back with a care package. I think that it's only fitting that it get sent on to Kansas for what is likely to be its final journey.

It's a small world after all.

I love blogs. The coolest thing has happened. Laura, the amazing woman who started the Rebuilding Greensburg project left me a comment. I know, I know.. it doesn't excite others in the same way, but it made me feel special. So, I decided that I'd knit up a few blocks this afternoon. Here you go! I'm up to 16 now.


(I really have to get my camera fixed so that I'm not using my camera phone anymore.)

So, it turns out that Laura will be in Michigan later this summer to meet up with some friends, so it's likely that I'm going to be able to hand deliver all my blocks. She was also telling me about some great knitters and a yarn store in the area that I should visit. (I love that someone from KANSAS tells me about great yarn stores in the middle of Michigan!)

My friend Sarah is coming to town later this month, and I'm pretty excited to have someone to go yarn petting with. Turns out, even she's heard of this great yarn store, and she lives outside of Chicago. I better get to knitting. If I can get a lot of this stuff marked off my list, then I can actually buy some yarn! Yay!

Updated Summer Knitting Goals:

• 2 not-yet-started baby blankets (pattern to be determined)
• Finish up moderne baby blanket
• 4-5 UT Dishcloths for silent auctions that are going on back home
• At least another 8 garter stitch squares for the Rebuilding Greensburg Project
• At least another 10 baby hats for my church's Warm Embrace ministry
• An unnamed gift for a friend. (Details can't be listed for obvious reasons!)

Rebuilding Greensburg Blocks

What?? Two posts in one night after having nothing for months and months? This is craziness.

I just wanted to plug a great charity knitting project for anyone who wants to do something wonderful & use up some of those small pieces of stash yarn.

Laura Spradlin of Sugar Bunny Knits is collecting 8" garter square blocks to sew into afghans for some of the families whose homes were destroyed by the tornadoes that ripped through Greensburg, Kansas earlier this spring. She's hoping for a little more than 1000, and already has over 300!

The squares are coming in from all over, and before the end of the summer, there will be some coming in from right here in East Lansing too! I've made about 14 or 15 so far, and I'm just going to keep letting the squares pile up and send them towards the end of the summer. How many can you make?

These little things are perfect for using up those tiny balls of yarn that you really can't do anything with, yet refuse to throw away. Back in the fall, Nicole sent me a package for winning a contest on her blog (yay for random goodness!). It had all kinds of goodies in it, and there were tons of little balls of yarn so that I could sample some different fibers. I used them of all for these blocks.. they probably made 4-5!