Dare I say it? The dress is almost done. There’s very little of the hemline border left to knit, there are a few more ends to weave it, and the armholes and neckline need to be finished. That’s it. The next day or two will see it done. With any luck…

I hadn’t really thought about it, but when I used this border before on Canterbury Bells, I noticed that it wants to be a little wider than what it’s attached to. This tendency is holding true on the dress. I love it. The border is kicking out a little, looks extra lacy, maybe a little flirty even. It’s never a bad thing, if it looks alright, to have the hem of a knee-length dress kick out a little. Makes walking easier.

Late last week I got a wonderful blast from the past. An old friend from college, Marco, tracked me down on LinkedIn. He and another college friend, Konrad, had evidently been trying to remember my last name for, oh, months. Konrad finally remembered it, and they found me. Marc (as I knew him back in school) and Konrad were two of my best buds in college. But as life goes, we lost track of each other afterward. Until now.

When we were in school, I was your typical broke college student. Marco had more money. I was desperate for a project to work on, but couldn’t buy the yarn. It came up in conversation, and one thing led to another, which led the two of us to the local yarn shop. I’d had a pattern for a granny hexagon afghan for a long time, an afghan that I always wanted to make. The colors were nicely masculine, so that’s what we got yarn for. Because of school, homework, etc. etc. etc. it took me about a year to crochet all the pieces and assemble them. I took two of the most horrid pictures I’ve ever taken in my life of the finished afghan—they were so bad I tossed them—and gave the finished blanket to Marc. Not only does he still have the afghan, but it’s not buried in the back of a closet somewhere. Instead, he has it displayed on his couch where he looks at it every day. This weekend he nicely took a picture of it, and sent it to me. The afghan—which is now more than 20 years old—still looks brand new! Dear Marc. Oh my.

The amaryllis continues to grow. Turns out that what I thought was the infant flower bud is just a new leaf. Something else is coming up from the center now. I wonder if that’s another new leaf, or the promised bud. Time will tell.