If I create enough patterns, does it make me an engineer? Lisa at Unraveled Fine Yarns likes to call me a knitting engineer. Could it be because I redesigned the Peace Blanket pattern, creating my own layout of the words and composing my own borders? I did grow up in a family of engineers so yeah some of that creativity carried over. But an engineer? Debbie New, Lily Chin, and Alice Starmore are engineers. I'm just an experimenter. Maybe in a few years I'll get to the engineer level of skill, but I'm not there yet. Heck I've only done one sweater! The border is blocked! In the meantime, I'm looking at lace patterns to make a scarf for a silent auction coming up in September. I'm putting my chartmaking skills to the test as I try to make charts on Excel. I know there is a font out there you can buy that has all the symbols for making charts, but I'd rather try to come up with ones of my own on Excel so that I don't have to download fonts on every computer I use. The symbols I would need for cables are my current stumper, but I've got something in mind (merging cells is milling around the depths of my depraved little mind). Speaking of depravity, I've started going through the hormone swings of pre-menopause. I was prepared for the psychobitch that usually shows up once a month (thanks to modern medicine, she has been a very rare occurrence). I was ready for hot flashes. I've accepted my greying hair. However, no one said anything about the nymphomania rearing its inconvenient little head........ Boy the house is clean.... Current projects: Border for the Peace Blanket; top-down socks with afterthought heels done in Idena "Crazy" Current book: Shroud For a Nightingale by P D James Watching: The Civil War by Ken Burns; "Delicatessen" by Jeunet & Caro.