Scratchy crochet shawl on it's way to Ireland

I finished the scratchy shawl and washed it so it was a bit softer. I still did not like the finished shawl as I had run out of the cream and had to use some light brown to finish it off. My friend came to bleach my hair roots ( I refuse to grow old and grey gracefully I am going out as a blonde! ) and fell in love with it and said it would be perfect for her mother who lives in Ireland. So I gave it to her but forgot the photograph it first so you are spared the sight of the offending article. I have posted the picture of the pattern so you can see how nice the shawl would be made in better quality yarn. I made one in cream and one in black as gifts a few years ago. The pattern is in a Studley crochet book from the 80's.

Today I went down to the haberdashery warehouse I used to go to when I had the wool shops and surprise surprise they actually remembered me so embarrassment was spared. I had taken my niece to introduce her as she is a teacher and the school she works at could use the warehouse for a lot of their craft supplies. She was totally amazed by the Aladdin's cave of treasures that were behind the warehouse doors. She is a convert and will return with the arts and crafts teacher as the prices there were far below what they have been paying in the past so the children will benefit from more materials for the budget that school has to work with. I was very restrained and only bought a pack of white dishcloth cotton and some large yellow headed pins that will be useful when I am stitching up garments. I could have gone mad in there but I am supposed to be on a stash busting project and not a buying one!

I am trying to push on and finish off crocheting a couple more blankets for the premature baby unit so that I can take them to the Pumpkin carving next week. I really need to do more crocheting and less web and blog gazing. I still haven't done any more on my Ravelry site. I put my finished articles (apart from the scratchy shawl) on Flikr so doing Ravelry as well is just too time consuming. When I am not in a rush and can dedicate a few hours to it I will update my space on there and have a look around. I don't want to get sucked into it just now and waste even more crocheting time.

I have a whining dog to walk and then I am going to settle down to a bit of crochet. Rats - I just remembered that I have the ironing to do first. Ah well, ironing first and crochet second I suppose but then again I could hide the ironing in the cupboard and just do the crocheting instead!