8.4.15 - Had to take several breaks - my wrists were so achey, but I’m finally done! Weaving in the ends seemed endless, but worth it.

6.29.15 - Finished the graph area! It ended up being 40” x 46.6” Definitely going to do a border - still figuring it out. Used 3.75 skeins of black, .5 red, .5 orange, .3 yellow in chart body. Final skein count will include border.

I’m guessing 90 - 100 hours total work on this.

6.27.15 - Only 10 rows left! Then comes the border and the weaving in of ends.

6.15.15 - Ran out of black and had to order two more skeins and wait for them to be delivered.

4.16.15 - Got another 10 rows done this morning. Last time I’ll be able to work on it ‘til Monday (other than a few hours Fri. a.m.). Am really pleased with the way ti’s coming out! I can’t wait to get the one for my mom designed!

4.13.15 - Haven’t been able to work on this every day, but am pleased with my progress when I do - even when it’s only a few rows. Am stopping occasionally to weave in ends when my wrists get too sore, but have only cleaned up the front so far.

The places I weave in ends tend to be thicker areas and I can feel them, but they’re not visibly noticeable.

Having some trouble with stitch counts not lining up, even though the stitch pattern is the same as the graph - can only assume it’s me. I’m correcting as I go and will use a border to hide the wavey sides. I’ll want something flame-like, I think, in the three brighter colors.

Going to have to get the stitch count thing down before starting on mom’s present, but have to get Erik’s cousin’s baby blanket done before that.

3.31.15 - Ripped out three rows, convinced I wanted to do this in HDC since the color changes would be smoother. Decided I DIDN’T want to do that about the time I’d frogged up to row 2. Nearly started over. Going to do SC and just try and keep smooth stitches for the words. Don’t think it’ll matter too much for Smaug.

Moving my stitch markers up every 5 rows seems to help me keep on track. Have them placed every 25 stitches.

3.30.15 - Created the graph for this as well as stitch instructions.

Alana’s graduating High School this year so I wanted to make her something she can take with her. What better than a geek blanket!?

Had to frog the first few rows. Finally got it right.