Since I am committed to finishing more projects in 2012 than I start, and since I just finished my new über-poncho (which counts as having been an unfinished project because it was made of scraps that might other wise form a massive and difficult to use tangle of yarn), I found myself wondering “what next?”

What next, it turns out, is figuring out the particulars of an afghan that is to be a wedding gift.

I’ve never met the happy couple, but I do know two of the people on the guest list, and because these two particular people on the guest list are dear to me, and because I am shameless and indefatigable in the promotion of my crAft (yes, crAft with a capital “A”), I offered to make a wedding gift.

As I worked on the poncho, I realized that if I am to have an afghan that is also a suitable (and show stopping) gift ready for a May wedding, I need to get busy. So once the last loose end of the poncho had been woven in, I began to consider, in earnest, what I would do.

For a day or so, I thought that I might revisit the Granny Sampler Afghan that took me so long to make, I took to calling it the afghan that eluded me, but I am not inclined to make something twice.

I continued my ruminations after I finished the poncho, and in a moment I went from no idea at all to having a reasonably good idea of what I wanted to do with almost no idea as to how I would do it or what problems might emerge.

This is where ignorance comes in handy. Nine times out of ten, if I had known how much work something would be, there is an excellent chance that I would never have begun work on it. Being as dreadful at estimating the time and work involved in a project as I am means that I often find myself in the throes of a project that is almost (but not quite) too much.

Back to the wedding gift to be: first and foremost, I want it to be something that is used often, if not every day. Second, I want it to be both traditional and (at the same time) absolutely not like anything the happy couple has ever seen. Third, I want them to look at it and realize that they had no idea that they wanted this gift, but now that they have it, the can’t imagine their lives without it. Finally, it has to be big enough for them to share; they are, after all, getting married.

So where did this list lead me? To Leonardo Pisano Bigollo.

Leonardo was a mathematician who spent much of his life promoting “the Hindu-Arabic numeral system in Europe.” He did this with the publication of Liber Abaci (Book of Calculation) which included a number sequence that has since become known as the Fibonacci sequence, Fibonacci being one of the names by which Leonardo was known.

This series of numbers is popular with recreational mathematicians and people like me whose favorite subject in school was math. The first five terms of the sequence are (1, 1, 2, 3, 5). Using these as my guide along with a 5.5mm hook and Red Heart Super Saver lemon, I made a series of squares.

Here they are shown individually:

and here they are in a group photo:

I don’t know exactly where this crochet adventure will lead me — I haven’t even decided if I will go with more drape that a granny stitch with a chain-1 space between the 3dc clusters offers, or if I want the somewhat thicker and less capricious granny that results when there is no chain-1 between the 3dc clusters — but I do know that there is much to be learned from simply making the journey.