I woke up on Friday to the stark realization that the second to the last weekend of this year’s state fair season was upon me. The penultimate weekend that is the first indication that the end of crochet season is near.

The summer had flown by, the days were getting shorter, and I was down to the last ten full full working days before the fair.

In previous years at this time I have wondered not only how I would get this particular project done, but what I would do.

This year, I have no questions about what I am going to do; I only wonder how I am going to get it done on time, so it is a much more normal state fair season.

Now that the days are so much shorter, however, I need to spend the daylight hours preparing to have something I can work on once the sun goes down, and one of those things is the border of the afghan.

So last night, with toffee yarn in tow, I finished crocheting the fourth round of the piece:

Then using a tried and true picot finish that is featured on the Better Homes & Gardens granny square sampler and which I used to good effect the two times I made it, I got a start on the final round:

Once the sun rose on the new day, I set it aside and did more of the “color work” as I think of it, the work for which I need daylight so that I can see just how well (or not) the colors work together.

Yesterday, while trying to figure out the very best embellishment possible, I got the idea to crochet rickrack, and fortunately for me, someone named Kate already had the idea, and I was able adapt her free pattern to better suit my materials and the scale of my project, and here is how my first try at it looked decorating a part of the center panel:

Satisfied that that particular seam was as good as it could get, I moved on to another piece that was, to my mind, a bit under decorated, and I added orange and pink flowers with yellow/gold centers:

and while there is a lot of work still to be done, when I step back and see how it is coming together, I think that this might just be the year that the penultimate weekend truly is just that:

I am very much looking forward to finishing this project and having the piece itself on my bed while the work of it is in the review mirror of my life. Until then, I will move forward the only way possible: one stitch at a time.