Happy Anniversary to Me!

This is quite a big week around here, and it almost passed me by without my realizing. Tuesday was my 200th post, and that made me go back and check when I had written my first post. Well, it turns out that today is my first anniversary of blogging! I can't believe that I have stuck with it for a year, but it is just about the most fun I have ever had. It has been such a pleasure to connect and share my projects with so many people that I would never have met otherwise. So thank you for making the past year special in so many ways.

I realized this week that I should have had a contest to celebrate, but I didn't leave myself enough time to pull that together. So instead, I have decided to do something that I have wanted to do for most of the past year - host an "along". I am calling it "Summer of Squares" and it is going to be for all of us who are working on afghan squares for one project or another. I should add that there will be prizes at the end of the summer, just to entice and encourage you to join and make squares!

Whenever I lead a book discussion at work, there is always a moment about 10 minutes before the discussion starts when I panic because no one is there yet. I always think "what if I lead a book discussion and no one comes?" Well, I am at that point with the "along" - what if I host an along and no one joins me? So please come play with me this summer! It will be fun! Actually, I wanted to announce it here first, but I will work at promoting it over the next week to some of the other groups I belong to and through the 2007 Knit Along List.

Now, to further whet your appetite for afghan squares, let me show you what I accomplished yesterday on my day off. First up, another square for VT Tech:

Next, I finished a square for Greensburg:

Unfortunately, the first 2 sides, where I increased, are perfectly 8". However, the second 2 sides, where I decreased, are closer to 9". I have a feeling that my increases are tighter than my decreases, and I'm not sure what to do about it. Maybe I should start to decrease at 7" or 7.5", or maybe I should go down a needle size when I start decreasing. I don't know, but I would welcome opinions. This is why I don't like to knit on the bias, though.

And finally, I started a granny square afghan for me:

These are 3 of my favorite colors, and I love how they look together. The square is 12", so I should only need 20 of them for an afghan. I am going to try to make each square slightly different, though. I can't wait to see how it looks all together. I should add that I know the corners a little wonky, but I haven't blocked it yet, so hopefully that will help.

I will check my email, but I probably won't be back to blog until Tuesday. So once again, have a safe and happy Memorial Day weekend!