Making Progress Everywhere

 My body is still trying to adjust to more activity due to cardiac rehab. I am finding that I had adjusted to less activity better than I thought. My calorie intake had adjusted to my activity levels.  I have just sent that out the window.  This has lead to eating at odd times and falling back asleep because my body is still trying to heal and manage calories.  I find that I can not eat as much as I use to.  I got up at 6 am for breakfast and then got sleepy. I slept until noon.  I had really intended to be at the mall around 10am for my walk.  I did make it there by 1:30pm. Take today for instance, I tried walking at the nearby outdoor mall.  I have not yet been cleared for graded walking so no walking around the block yet. I found that after 20 minutes of the 40 planned minutes I was very tired. I was walking too fast. I know this because my mileage was too high.  I have to figure out a way to walk slower and obviously it was not my current audio book.  I guess that I will have to ask what beat of music I should be walking to and creat a playlist. 

In Tunisian crochet, my Skill Builder Hat by aklori designs has picked up its pace.  I finished round 11 of the crown.  I am now have begun round 2 of the body.  Having never made a top down hat before has left me wondering when the body will turn into a tube. I can say with certainty that it will not occur in the first few rounds.  The body is the easiest part of the hat so far.  The body is also much faster to crochet.  

Time for tonight’s progress picture. When it is finished, if the orange is not the right color for me, I have the perfect friend to gift it to. It is starting to look very orange to me. 

One Booboo

 I have found 1 boo-boo on round 9 of the Skill Builder Hat by Aklori designs.  Tonight I just gathered up the stitches and put a stitch marker to hold it together.  Tomorrow I will go to the back side of the work and pick up the stitch.  I am hoping that the repair work will be similar enough to just pick up the stitches and put them in there proper places.  After all I have over 26 years of experience and people hand me their projects to fix all the time.  If it comes down to the worst case scenario, I will just take out round 9 and fix it.  I have really started to get my rhythm down on the crown work.  

Without further ado, here is the current picture. 

The Skill Builder Hat

 I have made it to round 4 of the Skill Builder Hat by aklori designs. It is beginning to make more sense.  I have switched the stitch markers to the first stitch of every repeat.  So I have extra open stitch markers ready to go. I am making the medium size hat for me.  And move the last round of stitch markers as necessary.  When all is said and done, I am seriously considering having a separate cookie jar for my crochet stitch markers.  I seem to be accumulating them fairly quickly. Just keeping ahead of running out.  

This is definitely not a project to do when watching television for me.  

The latest update photo.

A Cookie Jar Full of Stitch Markers

 I don’t think that I have ever talked about my 26 year collection of stitch markers.  I do admit that I have a cookie jar full of stitch markers.  The size that holds a little over a pound of cookies.  I personally have never weighed my stitch markers. I have stitch markers over various projects and in my kit bags of accessories, I have more than several.  So all my stitch markers are not in the jar at any given moment.  

I use stitch markers for almost all my projects.  Whether it’s to mark the beginning and end of a row. To mark increases and decreases. To mark the repeats on some patterns. Of course to share when some when someone needs one.

I personally find that it is easier to keep track of repetitive patterns, such as lace or shawl work. The most stitch markers ever used in one project was around 50. I have found a new use in the hat that I’m currently working on. I have started the Skill Builder Hat  by aklori designs. I have restarted it more times than I wish to admit to.  Even though it is not a complicated design, it has enough repeats to drive me nuts and send my head spinning.  So I decided to mark every single Tunisian Simple Stitch with a stitch marker. Yes, this is a Tunisian Crochet project.  This has helped tremendously as I have finally got the rhythm of the hat down. I haven’t finished row three yet, but I’m sure I am going to be diving into my stitch markers to get more until I get to the body of the hat. Then I will be down to one stitch marker marking the end in the beginning of the row. I have had to replenish my stitch markers for this hat three times so far.  You can tell by the picture below that the stitch markers weigh more than the yarn at this point. I found it appropriate that the back side of the panda marks the beginning/ending of each row. More pictures of the hat will be forthcoming. 

If you would like to crochet this hat too, just go to www.akloridesigns.com. You will find Lori’s patterns and books. Also links to tutorials. The yarn is available at Birdhouse Yarn in Tucson Arizona or most of your local yarn shops.