Grieving Highland Park, the morbid and angry thought on this Fourth of July was, What could be more American these days than a mass shooting with innocent parade-watchers shot dead?

And please, please, please, can we vote out the people who are okay with us having more of these?

So I picked up the needles to create a little solace.

Now, here’s where I admit out loud that all along, there’s been this feeling hovering around this baby blanket of, this isn’t going to be the only one.

Yonder daughter came over. Loved that I was making it.

But…

She’d been really hoping I’d make a white cashmere/cotton one like the one I made her other close friend, so beloved still by that baby who’s now five that when they moved to the mom’s native New Zealand and left nearly all their belongings behind, that blanket came with. Not having it was unthinkable.

She wanted that level of passionately loving this blankie again, and she just couldn’t see it in wool (side note: to which she’s allergic), no matter how nice. As for cultural reactions, she reassured me that whatever the immigrant grandparents might think, the prospective parents are thoroughly American and white is no problem at all.

Okay, I’m at 11″, let me just finish this one first because someone is going to need it to be already done and I just don’t know when nor who they are yet. It still feels like the right thing to be spending this time right now on, and I’ll have months to get the other ready.