Continue-itis

You've heard of start-itis.  Well, I'm suffering from continue-itis.  I just keep knitting on the same items and never seem to finish them.

I'd forgotten how much I dislike having mutliple projects on the needles at once.  I mean, one simple, knit while I read type project and one complicated, gotta pay attention project on the needles at the same time is okay.  It's a good thing actually.  But more than that.... and it's just a bad case of continue-itis.

I did finish the knitting part of Mimosa and one side seam is sewn.  But that other side seam....  I really neeed to finish it before Sarah beats me over my head with my knitting bag but....

But when given the choice between sewing seams and knitting....

Even when the knitting is slightly boring and never ending, I'll choose knitting over seam sewing any day of the week.  There may actually be an end in sight for Squish.  I guestimated its length this morning and it looks like I only need to add four more color stripes.  And that means, by next Friday, I should, hopefully, be showing off a finished Squish.  Fingers crossed!

I'm not sure if I ever mentioned it, but my husband gave me this book, Selbu Patterns, by Anne Bardsgard for Christmas.  How he knew I wanted it or where to find it is beyond me but he really came through this year! 

 

And of course I had to immediately cast on a hat.  It's not a true Selbu designed hat, but it is using a Selbu design element.  This is the one knitting project without a deadline or a waiting receive so of course, it's the project I want to knit on most.

I could have knit this hat 16 times by now but I'm struggling with the chart color vs my yarn colors.  See how the chart is black and white?  Actually, it's charcoal gray and white.  My yarn is charcoal gray and yellow.  On the chart, the background stitches are white and the pattern is gray.  But my yarn, the background is gray and the pattern is knit in yellow.  I can't tell you how many times I've had to tink back and switch my colors.  

I'm at the halfway point of the chart though so 16 more tinks and reknits .... and I'll be back to solid color knitting.  If I focused, I could have this hat finished by next Friday too!

Wish me luck and happy knitting!

Mimosa Part 2

Knitting on the Mimosa sweater continues.

I don't understand why it's taking so long to knit this sweater.  The fabric grows quickly and it's the only thing I've knit on since Christmas.  I'm sure it has nothing to do with spending 90% of my spare time eating leftover Christmas cakes and candy instead of knitting.

The body is completed, except for sewing it up, and I've started the first sleeve.  I don't think I've ever knit a cuff-up sleeve before.  This one looks like a giant mushroom.

I'm waiting to do the sewing until the sleeves are done.  I knit the required number of rows on the front and back but they look a little short to me.  Hopefully it's just that I'm freakishly tall and the sweater will be plenty long and oversized on Sarah.  But if not, I have a plan to elongate the shoulders.  Hopefully that plan will not need to be executed because I'm afraid it will look weird once the sleeves are attached.  We'll just have to wait and see about that.  

Hopefully by next Friday I'll be writing about a completed sweater.  I'm just about out of Christmas candy. (Thank goodness!  I'm not sure my waistband can stand much more!)  Hopefully I'll be spending a lot more time knitting and a lot less time opening mini Reese's wrappers this week.

Happy knitting and happy Friday 13th!

Almost ready for Santa

There has been a lot of Christmas progress around here over the last few days.  And thank goodness for it!  I was in quite a panic up until last night.  But you know how when you have WAY too much to do and you're all stressed out about it but then  you sit down and map out an actual plan, a plan with priorities, a plan with sensible priorities, and then you focus on that plan and start following the steps and it suddenly all comes together and you realize you are actually going to survive as long as you can remain focused...?  Yeah, that happened.  I just hope I haven't forgotten anything because one single missed task and my whole world is going to fall apart again.

Anyway, the tree is up and decorated and Leroy is hanging front and center where he can be seen from the 'good' chair.  I painted Leroy when I was a young kid - six or eight years old, I'd guess.  Dad named him Leroy and he always had to hang where Dad could see him from his seat on the couch.

The gifts are all wrapped.  Well, most of them are.  Okay, 90% of them are wrapped.  But the rest are things that will most likely go in gift bags so not a hugetime consuming issue.

I thought I still needed to go stocking stuffer shopping but I met with Santa yesterday and it turns out I already have more stuff than I need.

Nine batches of rum balls have been made.  I need to make four more batches but I ran out of ingredients and what with the traditional shot of rum between each batch, I wasn't in any condition to go to the grocery store.

This set of miniature stockings has been completed...

And the final knitted gift is on the needles.  I'm afraid to say it but I shouldn't have any trouble getting it finished in time.

There's still 8,000 batches of cookies to bake but thank goodness for awesome daughters who volunteer for that duty.  She even gets the first five or six thousand made without complaint.  Ususally.

So what's left to do?  

I still have to deliver the gifts.

And of course I need to finish wrapping the gifts.

We need to go ride around looking at other's lights.

I need to help Hayden make gifts for her parents.  I really want that to be a tradition.  Have a Christmas Craft Night (or day) with her each year so that (A) we can have craft time together, (B) she can hand-make something for her parents and later in life, her friends or whoever she wants to make for, and (C) it will give her parents an evening or afternoon to go do adulty things.  Growing up, I had that tradition with my God Mother and I have some wonderful crafty memories.  I want the same for Hayden.

I need to do the final Christmas dinner shopping and some last minute baking.

And of course, I need to finish that last knitted gift.

Oh, and I should probably at least vacuum before Santa arrives.

I have two days off from work between now and Christmas.  I should be able to get all that done, right?

Right??

I sure hope I haven't forgotten anything.

And since I can feel the panic starting to slowly seep back in, I'm going to go ahead and make the decision to take next week off from blogging.  I hope you all have a wonderful, safe, fun and happy holiday.

🎄MERRY CHRISTMAS🎄

Flying

 The needles have been flying!

The thumb splint was due to be removed on the day after Thanksgiving but I took it off a day early.  Sarah still did most of the cooking but I helped a little and did most of the dish washing.  The warm water felt really good on my thumb and I think it was a big help in getting some mobility back in it. 

Our Thanksgiving was pretty peaceful.  We only had three in attendance because everyone else had the flu.  

After dinner clean-up, I sat down and knit.  And knit and knit and knit. I'm making a Garter Squish blanket, a free Stephen West design.  Of course I'm not following the pattern exactly.  I added a few extra stitches for little bit of extra width and I'm changing colors much more frequently than suggested.  

It's only been a week of knitting and the blanket is already too big to fit into my sweater plus a hat or two sized knitting bag.  Being knit with two strands of worsted on large needles makes for a wonderfully thick and squishy fabric. (Thus the design's name.)  I'm not crazy about the way my color stripes look when it's bunched up in my lap or knitting bag but it's better when spread out over a bed.  I think - I hope - it's one of those magical projects, like a scrappy mitered square blanket, where the colors clash and look awful until you finish and suddenly, presto-magic, they all blend together perfectly.  That's what I'm hoping.  But even if it turns out ugly, it will be warm and snuggly.

I'm knitting the blanket with two strands of Brava held together.  One strand is Custard throughout and the second is a mish-mash of mini skeins from multiple sets.  It's a very relaxing knit and the fabric knits up super fast - obviously!  The pattern has a knit as you go i-cord border which is pretty cool.  I've never seen it before and while it's not visually noticable, it is super easy to do and does make the edge neater and somewhat sturdier.  

Squish has been a wonderful project to be working on this past week.  It's mindless and exactly what I've needed.  Remember how I said everyone had the flu for Thanksgiving?  Hayden was one of the 'everyone' and it hit her hard.  Really, really hard.  She ended up being rushed to the hospital in an ambulance and gave us a all a pretty good scare.  This year's flu is no joke.  

She's home now, after multiple days in the hospital hooked up to all kinds of tubes and wires.  She's feeling better but still isn't her normal bouncy self.  Now, if we can just get her parents well.... I'm not sure who I felt more sorry for - Hayden hooked up to all the life saving gadgets or her parents, having to sit and worry about her while they dealt with their own flu symptoms.  Zack seems like he's making a little progress getting better.  His fever has finally broken at least.  But Hayden's mom, honestly, I'm not so sure she shouldn't be hanging out in her own hospital bed.  

Meanwhile, I have a giant snack basket with enough snacks to sustain me for several days and I'm hiding out in my room, doing everything I can to avoid their flu germs.  Thank goodness I have a closet full of yarn and my thumb is healed and I can knit once again. 

Oh, and just to make sure my thumb would allow me to use regular sized needles, I cast on a .... well, the first of a set of four somethings for a Christmas gift.   Also being knit with Brava.  I've never liked acrylic yarns but Brava is pretty nice.  I've knit almost exclusively with it since the start of summer and have had zero issues with it.  It's soft, seems to wash and wear well and comes in lots of pretty colors.

Oh, and I started to decorate for Christmas.  I didn't get very far before Hayden got sick.  And apparently I forgot to water the brand new pointsettias.  Hopefully they will bounce back.

I hope you all also had a peaceful Thanksgiving, although for different reasons.  (I've been too busy knitting and praying for Hayden to read many blog posts.)  I also  hope you can stay far, far away from the flu germs but if you do get sick, take care and take it seriously.  It's a nasty, nasty bug this year!

Gift knitting

 So, the gift knitting continues.

Can't show anything more than the pile of  yarn on my desk because these items are pretty obvious what they are once they have a few more rounds.  Even in black and white, it's obvious so ...

Meanwhile,

My friend, Monica, demonstrated her spinning talents at our booth this past weekend.  It was a slow weekend because it rained Friday night, POURED down RAINING Saturday and Sunday was Freezing cold.  I don't know how Monica sat there all night not even wearing a sweater, much less a coat.  As you can see, even the men were bundled up in their hats and heavy coats.  I even had to scrape ice off my windshield when I got out to my car.  Brrr!

But hey - I'm not complaining about the cold.  Well, maybe I am a little.  But it's nice that the weather feels like Christmas time.  😊

Hope your gift knitting is going well and on schedule!

On the needles

Besides that Winterfest sweater, I have a few other things on the needles.

There's the Merry Xmas Tree shawl.  The yarn is actually called Merry Xmas Tree and I love the way it is knitting up.  I bought the skein at a fiber festival several years ago and am excited to finally be knitting with it.  The yarn has just a bit of sparkle in it as well as tiny dots of color.  There's no pattern, it's just a heart shaped/triangular shawl with a few eyelet rows thrown in for interest.  I can't wait for it to be finished.  I'm dying to wear it to Winterfest.

And there's a little bit of gift knitting happening.

Can you guess what it is?  I hope the recipient can't.

And so that I'm not closing with a black and white photo...

I'm sorry for the blurr.  It was dark outside and the car was rolling through the line...  

But, have you ever noticed that the stop signs at Chick Fil A have a different font than normal stop signs?  I'd never noticed it before.  Apparently it's a thing.

I hope your Christmas knitting and/or crafting is going smoothly.

Busy, busy, busy

It's been a busy week.  Of course, not busy with any of the things I'd planned to accomplish or the things I really needed to accomplish.  Just busy.

We said goodbye to The Gray Ghost.  Some twenty plus years ago, my husband traded a a broken down boat with a cracked engine for a broken down jeep.   He had great plans for turning that jeep into a beach buggy but.... A year or two later he traded the jeep for an unused whirlpool tub.  That damn tub sat in our drive way for a few years until he finally traded it for The Gray Ghost.  I don't know the details as far as year and model, but it was an older Chevy pickup truck that barely ran and had more rust than metal.  And, you could see where at one time, "The Gray Ghost" had been painted on the tailgate.

My husband yanked the engine out, put in a racing engine and proceeded to race it at the dirt track every weekend.  The Gray Ghost actually won the championship one year!  Life got busy and Mike stopped racing.  And then my dad's car died and rather than having a 78 or 79 year old man buy a new car, Mike offered him The Gray Ghost.  My dad LOVED that truck!  Well, he HATED putting fuel in it, but he sure did love driving it.  At some point, Dad put a bumper sticker on it that said "If it wasn't for flashbacks, I'd have no memory at all."  We all thought it was pretty funny. Specially if you knew my dad...  When Dad died, the truck came back home to us where it has sat for 15+ years except for the occasional run to the dump or the occasional deep snow rednecking adventure.  That truck was made for rednecking in the snow, I tell ya!

Anyway, Mike finally came to the conclusion that the truck would be better off in the hands of someone who'd drive it occassionally so he listed it for sale.  And someone who plans to fix it up and restore it bought it this past week.  It was a very sad moment in our lives as the new owner towed The Gray Ghost away.  We all have fond memories of that truck and I sure hope the new owner takes care of him.  I know cars are normally girls but The Gray Ghost was way too rusty and tough to be a girl.  

I finished a shawl that I don't think I ever showed you the beginnings of.  I didn't follow a pattern but it's somewhat similar to a Reyna, which is my go-to shawl pattern.  I've never noticed it before but I love the way the *yo, k2tog*'s look like crossed stitches.  I've knit, maybe not 100's of these, but more than 20 and I've never noticed that before.

I knit this one with two strands of Whisper Lace held together.  The shawl is a gift and I was under a deadline so I needed it to be a quick knit.  The colors I used are Ocean Torrent and Harbor.  One was a solid and one was a self-striping yarn.  I love the way the stripes ended up being so muted.  And, as ususal for my photos, the color is off and the photo doesn't do the shawl justice.  I swear, one of these days, we will move into a house with good lighting.

And last of all, Hayden got markers.  Thankfully, washable markers.  She likes to color her hands almost as much as she likes to color on the paper.  And we learned that the ink really does wash off.  It also smears.  The dog came up and licked Hayden on the face and she wiped the dog slobber off with her colored hand and ended up looking like she'd gone three rounds with Rocky Balboa.

Now we just sit back and wait to see how long before the walls are covered in marker.

On and off the needles

My knitting has been all over the place lately.  The pinched nerve in my back is still pinched and I'm still taking massive quantities of extra strength Tylenol and the occasional muscle relaxer.  And, CBD gummies.  I'm not sure I want to admit that here, but they are legal and they were purchased at a real store and I'm over 18....  A friend suggested I try one because the massive quantities of Tylenol and muscle relaxers aren't solving the problem.  They help, but I still can't sleep or walk properly because of the cramping and spasming muscles.  Anyway, the CBD gummies actually help.  It may all be in my head but they do give me some relief.  Each gummy takes 20 minutes for me to feel and the sense of calm and relaxation lasts for about an hour.  The muscle relaxers simpley make me foggy headed for hours on end and only half-way help with the muscle spasms for about 30 minutes.  

Anyway, the result of all that is that I have another orthopedic appointment this afternoon and I can't seem to concentrate on any one project for more than a few minutes.

The lack of concentration has produced two F-bombs (poorly photographed as usual) instead of the planned 15 to 20.  I plan to list them in my Etsy shop and to sell them at Winterfest.  They seem so silly but everyone who sees one seems to want one, or more, to give as gifts.  Apparently lots of people have siblings and co-workers who would appreciate asocially acceptable way of dropping the F-bomb.

And two Christmas gnomes rather than the 20 or more I want to have on hand.  These guys are simple but extremely fiddly to knit.  I'm not 100% sure I'm going to ever make 20 of them.  But I did buy all the supplies so maybe when I'm not so foggy headed...

And I started a glove/mitten/fingerless glove during Sunday's football game.  I haven't decided what exactly it's going to be yet.  I'm also not sure if this will be for me or the shop.  I'm supposed to be concentrating on knitting for Winterfest but...  I really like this color.  It's an unusual green and I love anything tweedy.  "Tweedy" is a word, right??  The yarn is City Tweed  Artichoke, it's DK weight and should knit up relatively fast.  

Well, that glove would knit up fast if I only put down the cookies and picked up the knitting.  Again, it may be all in my head, but CBD gummies give me horrible junk food cravings.  At least I'm blaming the gummies and not the fact that I am Seriously sick and tired and totally over this pinched nerve nonsense.  I'm really not sure if it's CBD or pity party junk food cravings that I'm experiencing.

Anyone else out there tried CBD products?  What's your experience been?
 

I won!

 I'm pretty excited!

I finished the pink gradient shawl.  I finished two days ahead of schedule, and, I won at yarn chicken!  I was sweating it out once I'd bound off the first half of the shawl. Even my hands were sweating over the last quarter.  It was only over the last five or six stitches that I began to calm down and have a little faith that I'd win the game.

I hope my mother-in-law will like it.

Pink is her favorite color and she wears head to toe, multiple shades of pink most days.  She even has pink shoes, a pink hat and even a pink coat.  The shawl should complete her outfit.

Oh, and did you notice - I finished it then got it blocked two whole days ahead of schedule!  I don't know what to do with myself now.  I don't think I've ever finished Christmas gift crafting early.  Ever! Normally, I'm sewing seams or blocking things on the car heater vent on the way to deliver the gift. How am I supposed to fill those extra two days I've created?

I want to have a special #ChristmasEveCastOn project but I don't want to wait until Christmas to knit something.  I also don't want to knit on anything from my UFO pile.  Should I start something new that I won't finish?  Do I force myself to knit something I don't want to knit?  Or should I just go eat rum balls and cookies for the next few days?

Decisions, decisions!

Three on Thursday - Eight Days

It may be Three on Thursday but we only have eight days until Christmas.  Eight!  Where are the days going??

I'm feeling pretty good about it though.

The stockings are lined and hung.  I didn't do the best job in the world hand sewing the linings but the stockings will only get used once a year and I made sure to, at minimum, make my stitches small enough so that a Barbie shoe couldn't pass through.  I couldn't think of anything a young lady might like that was smaller than a Barbie shoe.  Maybe beads, but I figured Santa wouldn't be dumping loose beads into a stocking.  If Santa does ever decide to give something smaller than a Barbie shoe, he'll just have to put it in a box.

I finished four pair of beaded socks for Hayden and Fred is enjoying showing them off.  I will make more at some point - either when she requests a certain color or she's moved up to the next size socks.  That girl is growing like a weed so it will probably only be a matter of months, if not weeks, before she needs new socks.

The shawl for my mother-in-law is coming along and should go much faster now that it's the last Christmas item on my list.  I'm not sure I've ever posted a photo of it before.  It's a Very pink, very simple garter stitch, triangular shawl. 

I'm using Stroll Gradient Duos in BFF to knit the shawl.  My MIL's favorite color is pink and this colorway is very pink!  To make the shawl, I started using the yarn from the outside of one skein then from the inside of the second.  I've just made it to the middle shade on the second skein but the idea is that the shawl will fade from light to medium to neon pink, then fade back to medium then to light pink.

The last shawl I made for her wasn't received well but she is ALWAYS cold and pink is her favorite color.  This one is definitely pink so hopefully she'll like this one better.  But just in case, I'm not bothering with any fancy lacy bits on it and thankfully, the yarn is machine wash and dryable.  Yay for that!

I hope your holiday projects are going as well as mine, (Gosh, I probably just jinxed myself with that shawl!) and I also hope you'll join me over at Carole's for Three on Thursday.

Eight days and counting....

Tiny Tea Leaves

Tiny Tea Leaves is officially finished.  It's knit, it's blocked, it has buttons, and it's even wrapped and under the tree.

I'm not sure why I'm using a black and white photo when I've already shown other in-color photos but...   ...And, the yoke lines up much better than it appears in the photo. 😊

This was a great little design and I'm so thankful Karen from Pumpkin Sunrise gifted me the pattern a while back.  Despite it taking me ages to complete, it's a simple little cardigan with easy to follow instructions.  The pattern is written for sizes ranging from 2T up to preteen and I can see myself making many more of these in the years to come.

I used a heathered yarn for this one but the pattern is designed so that you could use just about anything and even multiple yarns.  I'm thinking it would be really cute with the yoke and garter edging knit in a different color from the body.  I'm also thinking Hayden will need one knit in her favorite sports team colors.  Her mom and I will have to battle it out over who her favorite football team is though.  Hayden's mom is just as sweet as she can be but she has very poor taste in football teams. 😊

Crud!  Now I'm thinking about all the color options I could knit and I'm about ten seconds from tossing aside my next assigned project to cast on another Tiny Tea Leaves cardigan.  Aack!

On the Needles

Just a quick OTN update.

Remember Tiny Tea Leaves?  It got shoved down to the bottom of the knitting bag while I knit Christmas gifts.  I only have a sleeve and a half left to knit.  And well, I guess the button band.  The point is, I should be able to knock out this baby in time for Christmas too.  I better!  Hayden is only eight months old, almost nine, and already wearing 18 month size clothing.  She's slim but tall.  Anyway, I thought I had until late summer of 2021 to get this little 2T sweater knit but apparently not.

If you're interested, I'm knitting it with Blossom Heather Wool of the Andes.  I'm not normally a big fan of pink - I may have mentioned that a few times before - but I LOVE this Blossom Heather colorway.  I have knit many, many hats and mittens for my Etsy shop as well as for various gifts.  I'm not sure it will look too good with my skin tone but one of these days I'm going to knit myself a sweater with it.  It's just such a pretty, pale heathered pink.  It's just perfect!  It's a delicate, pale pink without looking the least bit babyish. And after I knit the sweater for myself, I just may knit a blanket and some pillows and maybe a skirt.  Thankfully it will take me a lifetime to get all that knit because if I'm going to wear a knit skirt, I'm going to loose 100 lbs first.  I have time!  😊

That time of year

 It's that time of year...

That time of year when all the knitting photos are in black and white.  

I am officially done with the Smitten mitten ordeal.  I was starting to think bad thoughts and wish the receivers ill will so I decided one Advent garland a year would suffice.  The extra little mittens I'd managed to knit will become ornaments and/or package toppers and the rest of people who were supposed to be getting Advent garlands are going to get something store bought.  I decided store bought is better than giving them ill will vibes.  Even if I have no earthly idea what to buy them because I am THE worst at gift shopping.

To add a little color to this post,

I have a new friend.  His name is Fred and he sings and dances.  He sings and dances about as well as I do, which is not saying much!  I can't wait for Hayden to meet him, although he may terrify her.  He looks like he's going to break a hip when he dances and his singing isn't much better.  But I think he's adorable anyway.  I can't quite decide what he is though.  I think he's supposed to be a lama but his face looks more like a camel to me and his body/fur looks like a sheep.  Whatever he is, I love him!

And then there's our tree.  Our Griswald/Rockefeller tree.  

I don't know what happened this year.  First, my husband usually buys Christmas bushes, not trees.  Second, he normally waits until just a few days before Christmas to buy it - which might explain why he always ends up with a bush sized tree instead of something decent.  But this year, the morning after Thanksgiving, he went out and bought this monstrosity.  

Don't get me wrong.  The tree is Gorgeous!  It's perfectly shaped and definitely Not a bush.  But good Lord!  There aren't enough lights in Walmart to light the thing up.  We put 1,000+ lights on it and it only barely lit half the tree.  We bought another 1,000 lights and now it's fairly well lit, except for the top three feet.  We can't reach the top three feet with a five foot stepladder.  We're going to need a real ladder.

I really can't get over the size of the tree.  It's either going to be The most gorgeous tree in the history of trees or it is going to be the most ridiculous looking tree in the history of trees because it won't be decorated or lit at the top.  Only time and my nagging my husband to bring a ladder home will tell.

A light at the end of the tunnel

 There's a tiny little light at the end of the tunnel.  The Christmas gift knitting tunnel, that is.

The hat is finished, blocked, tagged with washing instructions and placed in a box waiting to be wrapped.

All that's left is six pairs of beaded socks for Hayden, those #$&&#! never ending Smitten mittens and a shawl.  Oh, and I still need to line the stockings for Hayden and her mom.

It's a good thing Hayden is so adorable because she's a lot of work!  😊

Actually, Grandma Nana (I'm having trouble getting used to being Nana) is always happy to knit for Miss Hayden.

Good thing I'm happy to knit for Hayden because I just remembered there's a sweater on the needles in the bottom of the knitting bag for her.  Best get that finished too.

So yes, that light at the end of the tunnel may have just dimmed a tiny bit but there's one good thing keeping my spirits up.  I am NOT the one that's going to have to wash the sticky candy cane out of that fuzzy blanket!

Happy December knitting!

Christmas knitting

Remember the scarf for the eight year old?  Well, I finished it.  And even blocked it!  Then promptly packed it up and put it away in the Christmas gift box.  Notice a missing step there?  Yep!  I completely forgot to take a photo of the finished scarf.  Oops!  Maybe my great niece will send me one after Christmas.

I quickly moved on to knitting a hat for her younger brother.  Not to be left out, he's getting "special" yarn too.  I'm using some fingering weight superwash merino from Neighborhood Fiber Co.  This yarn had also been in my stash for a while.

I'm pretty excited about my Christmas knitting all coming from my stash.  Well, okay, I bought a few skeins of Wool of the Andes from Knit Picks back in the late summer with the intention of maybe knitting the Smitten mittens but I hadn't even printed the pattern at that point.  There was nothing firm in my plan and honestly, I was thinking of knitting socks, not mittens.  Because the yarn sat in my stash pile for more than two months, I don't count it as "new" yarn.  It's stashed yarn.  And that means every gift I've knit, or plan to knit, this year will be from my stash.  I'm pretty dang excited about that!

As for the Smitten mittens status, I've knit 24 so far.  Only 48 more to go.  I'm fairly certain I'm not going to make that goal.  99.9999999% sure of it in fact.  But I'll keep knitting anyway.  Maybe there'll be a Christmas miracle.

Meanwhile, I wish you all a happy Thanksgiving.  I'm so excited to not be excited about it this year.  We have a couple of dishes that we always serve that never get made the rest of the year and I'm always so excited thinking about the food.  But remember the new meds I'm on that take away my appetite?  Well, they are working!  Thankfully the over active butterflies in my belly have disappeared and I'm feeling pretty good.  And not the least bit hungry.  Well, that's not true.  I do feel hungry occasionally, but a very small portion fills me up.  And I'm not craving all things sweet and carb filled.  All I really want is raw green vegetables which is VERY, very not typical for me.  While I am looking forward to that turkey sandwich on Friday, just the thought of all the Thanksgiving food is kind of making me queasy.  It's pretty cool and quite exciting.   It's going to be interesting to see how I actually do on the day.  

Happy Thanksgiving!

Smitten

 

Seventeen and a half down, fifty-four and a half more to go.

I'm not so sure how smitten I will be at the end of this Smitten mitten project but I am happy to be using up lots of odd balls and bits from my Wool of the Andes stash.

NaKniSweNope!

Are you doing NaKniSweMo?  I'd planned to.  I had the yarn and pattern picked out and at the ready.  I'd even balled the skeins of yarn, swatched, and set the proper needles aside for safe keeping.  Yes, you read that correctly.  I swatched!

And then I realized the reality of my pre-Christmas knitting.  NaKniSweMo quickly turned into NaKniSweNope! 

I'm knitting a pink Stroll Gradient shawl for my mother-in-law.  Pink is her favorite color.

I'm knitting the Mountain Colors scarf for my great niece.  And if I'm knitting something for the great niece, her brother will need something handknit too.  

The not so great cowl for Sarah got frogged.  She says she'd rather have socks.  It's a dammed good thing she likes to cook and grocery shop!  

There's the poinsettia needlepoint that needs to get finished and turned into a pillow.  

There's the two Christmas stockings that still need to be lined.

And last but not least, let's not forget the seventy-two Smitten mittens I need to knit.  And as if seventy-two mini mittens wasn't enough, I'll need five garland cords to go with them.

Yeah, NaKniSweMo is definitely a nope this year.  But hey, on the positive side, I've already got my Christmas Eve Cast On project ready to go.

Bodice Ripper

I do love a good, trashy, bodice ripper romance novel.

Specially if there's yarn involved.

Okay, so I saw that on Facebook the other day and thought it was funny.

Sadly, James is not in my world.  This Minnetonka cowl is though.  I have the feeling it is going to be a Huge disappointment.  How can such a beautiful skein knit up into such a dreary and boring piece of fabric?  I wanted so desperately to doctor the photo up to make the colors look better but the truth is the truth.  And to really be truthful, I was outdoors and the sun was beginning to set and so the light was a little funny.  In all honesty, the real life look is even more drab.  The poor thing looks like Army brown camo that has been washed and heavily bleached about 18 gazillion times.

And the big question is, do I keep knitting and hand it over Christmas morning and say, "Too bad if you think it's ugly.  You chose the yarn."  Or do I show it to her now and ruin the surprise?  Or do I frog the whole thing and say, "Ha ha, you're not getting a knitted gift after all."

Decisions, decisions.

I sure wish James was here to help me decide.

Smitten

Please pardon the typos and any weirdness in this post. The house has used up all its internet for the month and I'm blogging from my phone. Which I've never done before.

 

I've started working on the Smitten mittens. Five down, sixty-seven more to go.

Good grief, I wish I hadn't calculated that!

Moving On

Okay, I'm going to try to make this super quick and short.  Zeta's remnants are blowing through today.  We've gotten a little over two inches of rain so far (I know - not much for a hurricane  but it's a lot considering all the other rain we've had,) the wind has already blown down several fairly large tree limbs and the power is blinking.  But one of my goals for October was to not miss a blog post so...  Here goes.

Shoot!  I just realized I failed to take a photo of the second finished stocking.  You'll just have to take my word for it.  I finished it.  And I finished a pair of Christmassy beaded socks for Hayden.

Wow!  Are you seeing what I'm seeing?  A big giant blur?  Something must be wrong with my phone camera/computer.  The photos look nice and clear on my phone but when they transfer to Google/my computer, they get all pixelated.  Or something. I'm lacking in camera knowledge!  

Anyway, since I got the two stockings and Christmas socks for Hayden done, I decided to move on to Christmas knitting instead of having a strong Socktober finish.  The big blur is Minnetonka and I'm knitting it with some unlabeled Malabrigo I bought several years ago at Sarah's request.  Back then, the yarn was supposed to turn into socks for her so I feel like it's okay to be using it to knit a cowl here at the end of Socktober.  

So, NaKniSweMo starts on Sunday, November 1st.  First of all, can you believe November is on Sunday?  Where did October go??  Anyway, will you be participating?  I hope to.  I have a pattern picked out and the yarn has been wound and is sitting at the ready.  But while I'm excited for NaKniSweMo (National Knit a Sweater in a Month) and I have a sweater I really want knit, I'm also beginning to panic just a bit about Christmas.  What are the chances I can get Minnetonka knit in the next 48 hours?

Well, maybe if I focused on knitting instead of eating Halloween candy.  Yeah, right.  That's not likely.

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!