knitpurldrop: dooooooily

So last year when my brother left for Purdue for his Freshman year, my mom went to Florida. She comes back for the summer and holidays, but she's pretty much a snowbird now and now that the warehouse at work is starting to get cold again, I can't say that I blame her. So pretty much since she moved to Florida she's been asking for a turquoise doily to go on her table in her dining room, which is copper. It's a cool table, but the idea of making a doily sounded a little painful due to the reinforcement of the stereotype that knitting is for old ladies. So this summer I got a crochet book called Beyond the Square by Edie Eckman, hoping to make enough circular motifs that I could join them together and call it a doily. I made 14 of them and used an entire ball of crochet cotton. Trouble is, it was still REALLY small. I told her I'd try to block it or iron it while stretching it before I put all the pieces together, but after looking at my little crocheted failures for a couple months, I threw them all in the trash. Well, I put one of the little flowers on a hair clip but since I don't have enough hair to clip it does me just as much good as it was when it was part of the doily-to-be. Anyhoo, I threw the doily-bits away. So less than a week before my mom's birthday I decided to make her a new turquoise doily but keep it totally secret because she still totally thought she was going to get the "spechul" doily. And if I've ever tried to keep a secret from you, you probably know that it doesn't work very well. Seriously- I'm like a first grader. I just can't keep secrets.

So I dyed the yarn. It's Alpaca With A Twist Socrates in the natural colorway- they're selling to Indie dyers now and if you have a tax ID number you should hit that stuff up. Because it's awesome. You heard it here first, y'all.

I started the doily on Monday right before Castle. I frogged the doily right after Castle.

On Tuesday, I started again, and by Wednesday morning, I had this.

I went to SnB on Thursday night with my deadline doily and kept working. I finished Friday night, soaked and blocked it and went to the post office on Saturday, still blowing on my doily to get it just a little bit dryer before I stuffed it in an envelope and sent it to Florida.

I got there 13 minutes after the post office closed. I stuck my fist in the air, made pirate noises and headed back home, defeated. I found a funny card. Funny cards make things so much better, especially if they have to be a day late.

I went to the post office first thing Monday. I commented how it was ridiculous that it costs $15 to send a doily. It's a stupid doily. I sent the doily anyway. I held my tongue for four days. It was reallllllly hard.

And then Thursday morning (her birthday was Wednesday) I was talking to my mummy on my way to work and she went to the door for a little package delivery. And I think she likes it....