Through the garden.... for more than a year

Yes, it took me more than a year to finish this thing of beauty. I was far from calling it a thing of beauty while making it, though. What a headache that pattern gave me! Of course, I have no one to blame but myself, since it all boils down to not reading the whole page of the pattern before I was halfway through! For a relatively smart brunette, I sure can have blonde moments sometimes!
Finally noticed, after cussing and throwing the blasted thing into a storage container several times, that the pattern was for advanced experienced crocheters.
Well I finally finished the thing, and got to blocking and starching it. That took almost as long time as making it (well it sure felt like it (",)    ) with sore fingers to match! Had to make an emergency run to the local home-depot kind of store,  to get more styrofoam, since the tablecloth was way too big for my styrofoam sheet. Finally I had it starched and blocked, and now it awaits delivery to a new home. It's meant as a birthday present for my mom. She has a beautiful octagonal dining table, but she's always in trouble finding tablecloths and toppers for it. I just hope she likes the blessed thing!!!!
The pattern is called Through the garden, and was published in Decorative Crochet Magazine, September 1999, issue number 71. I found it in a Danish crochet magazine/booklet from DMC, called Haekling nr.29.

 Here it is after the first round of roses...

 

Here it is, blocked and starched, more than covering my more than large dining/kitchen table...

Details of the blocking...

A thing of beauty, right....

Close up of the dreaded center that gave me soooo many headaches....

Close up of one of the wedges....

And finally a close up of the roses and the increase...

I'm quite sure that somewhere my granny and great granny were laughing at me, while I struggled with this, but in the end, I think they'd have to be quite pleased with the final outcome!

I swore I would never ever do this pattern again, but only a few days later, I'm thinking: Well, I MIGHT want to give this another try someday....

Well I've got an excuse, I'm certifiably crazy!!!