My Own Long Project: Finito

I'm inclined toward the massive knitting project on small needles. I'm not sure where this comes from.


Many of you have seen me toiling for the past few years on the miniwrap--it is a sock-yarn version of the Knitting at Knoon pattern, Wrap Me Up. I loved knitting it. It takes a little longer than the original wrap, but that's because you need to adjust it to make it longer when you go to the small needles. Doing that was no big deal. I added a few random squares that we had been doing in our Zimmermania class--killing two birds and all that.

This weekend, I went so far as to line the wrap with cotton fabric, attaching the lining by hand around the edge. Then I used a sewing machine to sew the fabric down around the blocks, in the ditch, as if it was a quilt top. (A walking foot is crucial for this job.) That kept the whole thing straight. Knitting gets crooked easily, especially when you are making patches of different stitch patterns.
 
And then, this evening just before dinner, after I had spent the entire weekend with all this sewing of the wrap, along with almost 2 years of actual knitting, the whole thing was suddenly finished. I sat in disbelief for over 5 seconds, and then Kevin said he was hungry and wanted to get going. Since it is summer and we are a little safer from college students and their pedestrian-and-driving ways, we went downtown to eat dinner and take pictures of the wrap. Here are a few of those pictures. I have lived in State College all my life, so let's add in a little town history while we're at it.

The first picture was taken in at the side of the Tavern where they're doing some remodeling.





When I was a kid and went with my family, I always got the lasagna. I think that their recipe has not changed in 40 years. It is still terrific.

Next is the scarf on the famous State College Pig statue. You see, apparently 100 years ago in State College, pigs were allowed to roam free in the streets. (Now it is just college students who roam free in the streets.)

Then 100 years later, in 1996, we in State College decided to remember the free-range pigs and build a statue in homage. The mother pig was named "Centennia" by a committee of townspeople, who thought that the name was appropriate for the "centennial" of the town. The piglets were named "Ed" for the education that completely surrounds us here in State College, and "Hope," for the hope that we all have that we are going to finish the rest of our projects soon, so that we can start new ones.

That dear little Hope seems to be hiding under the scarf does not bode well.

Or is that Ed?

In any case, we will all start new projects.

Finally, those of you who live in State College will instantly recognize the mural. It is on a side street that has been beautified with Famous State College Important People that are Not You. Or at least they're not me.

Until today. Heh.

You may not know the back story of this particular section of the mural. It looks a little puzzling, I admit--but I can help you out because I am a native of State College, and therefore I know what's going on because of those important circles I'm always running around in.

Here is what is going on:

The couple on the left is kissing because they are so overjoyed that I am finished with the mini-wrap.

Then below to the right, the man has put a dog on his head so that the dog can see the wrap better. But the the wrap is at the wrong angle for the dog to see, so the dog is feeling rather distracted and looking the other way. That is the way dogs are, you know.