My apologies for neglecting my duties as a blogger... Life continues to get in the way, but I'm here now and let me catch you up on my crafting addictions as of late! (Promise this post is mostly pictures!)

I finally finished the Ashton Shawlette! It feels like it took me forever. Unfortunately I'm not ecstatic about the finished project, and am a little disappointed. I hadn't realized that I had messed up a portion of the chart on one half of the shawlette, nor did I realize I had done the cast-off too tightly thus creating a straight edge rather than a scalloped one at the bottom. Oh well.

My family's poor little shih tzu dog, Tobey, was feeling sorely neglected due to the presence of my new service dog, Patty. He was getting very jealous that she got to sleep in my bed and was following me everywhere. To help lessen the sting, I made him his own little bed from some scraps of superhero fabric that I had. Just two simply squares sewn together with a little polyester fiberfill between them to create a soft little bed for him in my room.

And finally, I began a new embroidery project called "Spring Sampler" that I found on Pinterest. The pattern is from Bakercourt – Design, Bake, Craft. It's a lot of fun to work so far, and is putting my embroidery skills to the test. I decided to stitch it on some cotton fabric that I had, after dyeing it a nice beige color with some extra strong coffee.

And I transferred the design using my window as a lightbox and lightly penciled it onto the fabric before stitching.

So that's my crafting adventure as of late. What have you been working on? Let me know in the comments below if there are any awesome projects out there that I'm missing out on!

I believe I had said in my last post that I thought I would be finishing the Ashton Shawlette (Ravelry link) the same day. Life apparently had other plans! I got very wrapped up in practice sessions with my service dog Patty (we've made good progress!) and random chores around the house to help out my parents. Long story short, I still have two charts left to go, but I'm more than halfway done with the shawl.

I also broke my new cellphone... which hopefully will get replaced today. And the new Otterbox Defender case that I bought will be coming in a few days. Hard lesson to learn but I learned it well. No more fashion cases for me!

Sorry for the random and rambling post! No knitting or DIY pics today... So instead, how about these adorable pictures of Patty?

After taking care of Patty, my service dog, I pulled out a skein of sock yarn that had been languishing in my stash because I was unsure of what to do with it. A brief scan of my Ravelry queue though, and I knew I'd be starting the Ashton Shawlette today! The way the chart is going I maybe finishing it, too. It works up very quickly, and the chart pattern is very easy to read. I am using US 6 needles (32" long) and sock yarn from Knit It Up's line Sock Yarn Cinema (the Twilight colorway). It is shaping up to be a nice, quiet Saturday watching movies and knitting.

Also, I promised I'd plug my boyfriend's blog... So for all of you gamers out there, check out the blog for Aero Studios, which documents the creative process of an independent game designer. His ideas are really good (and yes, I am saying this from an objective position!), and I really encourage you to check him out.