It's all Robbie Burns' Fault.

Yes, it really is. I mean, I planned to buy all the yarn for the Cat Square 'Ghan (what I'm calling it) yesterday, at my local Walmart, while doing my usual shopping. Well, "The best-laid schemes o mice an men Gang aft agley," (or, often go awry) ** And that is what happened to me. I went to WalMart, yarn department - and couldn't find any big balls of black or grey. I was not impressed.... I went to Michaels. They had no big balls of yarn, or many balls of plain acrylic worsted yarn either. Well, OK, they did have a couple big balls, but in pastel colours...
But - they did have some Paton's Brilliant on clearance at a buck a ball.... I got four...

So, I came home, ticked off, and had to make a second trip to a Walmart farther away.... I found their last two big balls of grey - and no black. So, I'll have to get black next time, which is fine, since that will be the stripe colour. I do have some black in my stash, but I want to start with a fresh ball, so I can be all official and weigh the ball before I start, and after I'm finished, so that I can say exactly how many ounces/grams to use for the afghan :)

I have a cool scale :)

I also found, at the other Walmart, some neat new tools. I don't know who makes them, but I bought one crochet hook, one set of double point knitting needles, and one circular needle. They didn't have a great variety of sizes, and the package says "galaxy" (with a tm beside it) and H.A. Kidd and company limited. These tools are clear acrylic/plastic, with sparkles... The crochet hook has blue sparklies, the dpns have red sparklies, and the circular had silver sparklies. How could I resist? :)

I'm going to use the circ for this project. 6mm - I *think* size 8 US.

I also took pictures of my finished bear afghan, which is the inspiration for this project. I posted them in my photo album - link on the side below the pets ----->

I will post one picture here, though :)

So, on the "yappy" note... :) I had my two oldest Granddaughters here for lunch. They go to school one street over or so from my house.... but since they live on the other side of a busy thoroughfare, the school division busses them to school, and they are supposed to stay at school for lunch. But, they are allowed to have special days like this one... And they really wanted to see me. Why, I'll never know....

Well, my next post about the afghan should resemble a "real" pattern, and I'll let you guys know how I plan to start it, etc. For those of you following along, you should need about a 6 ounce ball of "tummy" colour. I'm starting with white for mine. If you are doing a solid colour then you will, of course, be starting with that :)

Size: I should mention that here. The bear turned out about 52 inches from top of head to bottom, and about 36 inches at the "waist". This is a good size, in my opinion, for a child or even for an adult to use as a lap'ghan. That is my plan with the Cat Square 'Ghan. I've already crocheted each of the grandkids an afghan of their own - this one's for me :)

So, the squares are going to be 15 inch squares. My opinion would be that if you want to make yours smaller, you can, but I wouldn't go smaller than 12 inch squares.... I used most of one big ball of the brown on the head of the bear, and only one 6 ounce ball of the lightest brown one and a half dark brown, and a small amount of the black (you can probably tell how much white I used....) The leftover white is what I'm starting the kitty with, and I don't anticipate needing more than the one ball of it.

Oh, I picked up some pink - a sort of dusty rose - for the inside of the cat ears - if you have some scraps of pink in your stash, you shouldn't need a whole ball. Or if you can find some of those little balls (50 gram - 2 ounce?) that Red Heart sometimes comes out with, great. I usually have some pink kicking around, but I think I used it all up on some slippers for the grandkids a couple years ago.....

Ok... So... It may be a day or two before the next update, but I still might be posting about other aspects of my life, too. :)

**Robert Burns
(poem is "To a Mouse")http://www.rabbie-burns.com/the_poems/toamouse.cfm