Yarn Along ~ Baby Blanket, White Lily and a Beloved Book

Mr. Husband surprised me with an
after Catholic Easter Lily!
(Orthodox Easter/Pascha is late this year - May 5th!)
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My baby blanket continues to come along!
I had great help with it at church this past Sunday ~
I am so new at this,
I did not realize that to knit the yarn has to be behind
and to purl the yarn has to be in front.
I learned other things as well,
it was great!
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I have doubled it in size since last time I posted it.

Funny riding back from church story:
So after all the great help I got on Sunday
I knit more of the blanket on the way home.
I was tired but determined to get more done ~
I am eager to learn and have more things I want to make!
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So I was telling Mr. Husband how I learned
more about how to keep the stockinette stitch going well
(I have been getting confused on what I just did,
whether knit or purl and would repeat a row instead of
doing the opposite of what I had just done).
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Then I said,
since the blanket is rather spontaneous,
unstructured and creative,
a bit here-and-there/all-over-the-place,
at least it is true to who I am...
Mr. Husband,
who is much more structure and methodical than I am,
heartily agreed. :)
Later I told my Mom this conversation and she laughed ~
as she knows me full well and knows this to be true of me,
all she could say was 'poor Mr. Husband' :)

So the blanket is very much one of my
creations.
I may eventually learn to do this better,
but for now I am enjoying the process and not
worrying about keeping perfectly to a pattern...

I am rather liking it!
And I am getting a bit better at it
and I think of the instruction I was given on Sunday
all the time; it really was helpful...
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And it is exciting to be on my third section already ~
I am back to the mix of blue bonnet and pear yarn ~
the next section after this will be all pear
and then mixed again.
Then we will see how long it is getting. :)
Mr. Husband assured me that my nephew,
who is the cutest ever
and who I saw with a darling family picture
with him wearing a baby-bow tie for Easter!
Too Cute.
Anyway, Mr. Husband says the cute nephew will not
mind the imperfections and creativity
in the blanket.
And it's made with love,
and that's the best part.

I am loving the sunshine and Easter Lily.

I suggested that when this one is done flowering,
that we plant it downstairs in the little garden patch
in the courtyard.
So we hope to do that.

Of course I had to include a new picture of my Cleo Cat!
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So, since Novice K. died and I wrote on how
his copy of Christ is in our Midst
impacted my life so greatly back in 2007 or so,
I thankfully found the book,
with Novice K. handwriting in it...

 

and I have started reading it again;
I have come back to this book so many times;
the pages in the front are falling out and need to be reglued.
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As I said in 2008:
Fr. John is a monk who lived in the Valamo monastery and then New Valamo in Finland; he died in 1958. This book is a compilation of letters he wrote to his spiritual children. It is very accessible and has deep wisdom. 
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This book is so wonderful ~ full of love, of light, of a deep simplicity ~
it can really show us how to live on a new level
and at the same time consoles us in our times of
struggle and weakness.
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I truly could never recommend this book enough! 
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What are you creating, crafting and reading?
Yarn along with us!