Yesterday, I had an appointment that could not be put off, and like an ancient inset stuck in amber, I too was stuck waiting, so I did not get started on my crochet until the early afternoon.

And when I did, I was faced with seem like myriad pieces, each of which seemed to have myriad ends to be woven in.

So I got out my yarn needles and got to work.

The work was (and is) slow.

There are the ends of the yarn used to seam the pieces, there are the ends of the yarn used to do the embroidery, and there are also the ends of the yarn that I use to crochet directly into some of the pieces to fill the gaps — all of those ends need to be woven in.

So I did, and I even made some substantive progress which can be seen, and which is measured by not what is there (a few ends not yet ready to be woven in), but by what is not (all of the ends of yarn that would be there if I had not woven them in):

With measurable progress made in the upper left-hand corner of the center panel, I turned my attention to the lower left-had corner. I was ready to secure one corner of the teal piece to a gap in the fresh green piece, but that was going to leave me with a new and different gap at the bottom:

So I got out my CraftSmart Value yarn, and got to work filling it.

My first effort was interesting (in a good way), but not sufficiently sturdy, so I frogged it. My second effort was interesting (but not in a good way), so I frogged that as well. My third effort, while not entirely perfect, was perfect enough:

So I decided to call it a day and get one last photo to document my progress:

And while, at the moment, my progress seems far too modest, I know that one of these days, I will reach a tipping point, and things will begin to come together in ways both unexpected and easily foreseen, but until then I will move forward in the only way possible — one stitch at a time.