Endings......

Today is a day of endings.

The end of December.

The end of 2015.

The end of yet another round of yarn chicken!  The log cabin style blanket project has officially been determined to be a draw.  2 for the chicken and 2 for me!

It all started with a bag of assorted colors of Big Lots Acrylic.  I bought it on a day that I had a coupon for 20% off an entire purchase and the yarn was marked at a dollar a ball.  I bought all they had in a beige, cinnamon brown, burgundy and black and proceeded to knit a couple of little charity scarves out of some of it and then uncovered it again months later to start a tv watching blanket as the colors would look good with the sofa.

Now, being the organized knitter that I am (NOT!!!) I of course knew how much of each color I had (NOPE!) and just grabbed balls out of that big plastic bag as I needed them.....And along came the yarn chicken.

He tugged and pulled at ends until he won with the cinnamon brown.

He tugged and pulled at the ends until he won with the burgundy.

He pulled and tugged, but lost (by less than a yard) with the beige.

He pulled and tugged, and tugged some more until he lost with the black.

The finished blanket is just one or two people large...I didn't measure it yet, was too busy washing and clipping all those pesky little ends....and does go rather nicely with the sofa!

I learned a few things knitting this very plain and boring blanket.  (I suppose the first should be to check how much yarn you have before you start, but I doubt that will ever be my strong point!)  Having spent years knitting shawls and seamless items I haven't had to do a lot of picking up of stitches, other than sock gussets, and having them look messy was annoying me, so I worked at learning a few different techniques and the back side of my blanket looks like this :

Not too shabby if I do say so myself!

So there is one ending that turned out just right!

Of course, today is also the day of reflection on the past year.  What went well?  What didn't?  What do we plan for next year?

I am always happy to sweep the last dirt of the year out the back door, and open the front door to see what things the new year will hold.  2015 was kind of a mixed bag.  Some, few, high points, some, too many, low points.  But, as a wise person once said, without the hardships we would never enjoy the highlights.

Here is wishing all of us a year filled with highlights in 2016.

~M