The first thing I did on what I’m calling my “Knitting Sabbatical” is finish up a project that I’ve been neglecting for a while. I started it in February, and was very excited to get going. I zoomed through the first 75% in a couple weeks. The next 20% felt like it took forever. And the last 5 seemed impossible to finish (AKA, I put it up on a shelf and didn’t touch it for 3 months). Sounds familiar, right?

But instead of getting stuck on Sleeve Island while working on a sweater, this time I broke out some paints and did the biggest paint-by-number kit that I’ve ever seen.

I decided to try it because my Instagram feed had been showing me paint-by-number ads for what felt like weeks, and I’m nothing if not a sucker for a good ad. (Or a bad one, for that matter. I’m pretty suggestable.)

However, I didn’t buy any of the ones from the ads, instead getting one at random from Target. Because… who knows? It was much bigger, and much more detailed than I expected. I don’t know if there were any spaces bigger than my thumbnail.

It was actually really fun, and that last 5% really wasn’t bad- it took me maybe two hours once I sat down to work on it. It’s the perfect on-the-couch-watching-documentaries-or-listeneing-to-audio-books activity. (…And I’m officially 75 years old.)

Now I just have to find a place to hang it up. If only we had a cabin in the woods, it would be perfect!

Have you ever done a paint-by-numbers?