When I was a little girl and taking piano lessons, there was one recital that I remember being particularly nervous about. My father, who has been a musician all his life, said to me, “If you make a mistake, just do it twice and call it jazz.”

Well, let’s just say we are going to call this one jazz!

Over the years the terms have changed for me, but the concept has remained the same. Now things are “original” or “artistic” and if all else fails, I can always slap on the label of “folk art” and get on with my day. It’s my own sly way of saying, “yeah, I meant to do that…”

The pattern for this one was featured in this winter’s issue of Living Crafts and it’s a great little pattern. I’m planning on making quite a few for our own family. It’s kind of large and rather floppy, so I do wonder how they will hang though. I imagined this one as the sort of thing one would lay out on a nature table.

The theme of this exchange was “light” and my partner expressed a preference for lighter colors; yellow and cream, blues and purples, as opposed to the traditional red and green of the season. The preference was a big part of my inspiration for our package.

The “jazz” of this project comes from my apparent inability to count while working in the middle of the night. Being off by say, 100 or so beads, really puts a crimp in things. As does not having enough beads and having to supplement with beads of a different size. Needless to say, the whole thing was a bit of a compromise.

This was my first time knitting with beads and the whole process was aggravating, fiddly, and slow. And… I *loved* it. It makes no sense what-so-ever, but let’s face it, I rarely make any sense anyway.

Part II of the package tomorrow!