Christmas is coming....

Ever notice that time flies when you need it not to? Only 3 days til Christmas. Yikes. Glad to report that all but one knitting gift is done. That's right, I'm good to go, except for the Mittens of Doom. But now I can't put off working on them any longer. Wish me luck.

So onto things I can show you. Here is the Christmas tree decorating sequence.
Just the tree, all plain looking.
Jazzed up with some lights.

Ornaments too.

Some felt that I needed to be decorated as well.
All sparkly and done.
Fun huh? In that last photo, I hope you all noticed the mandatory lean, and that the tiny star is touching the ceiling - even though more than a foot and half was trimmed off before it was put up.

Other stuff I can show... ooohh, my Christmas cards! They've been mailed, probably not yet received, but I'll show them anyway.
I think they came out very nice. But I might be a bit biased.

Yarn acquisitions. Last week at Knit Night, we had the gift swap. I got this from Maggie:
It's a cotton bamboo blend, very cool and I love the colorway, haven't seen anything like it before, and I've seen my share of hand dyed yarn.

And this is a photo of the two Amazing Race presents I've gotten so far. The green is some fabulous alpaca silk from Blue Sky Alpacas, and the pink is some suede yarn that came with a pattern for a little bag. Yay fun!
Yesterday I got to baby sit for Miss Kaylee, first time in ages. I can't believe how big she's getting. She graciously allowed me to stage some photos. Even smiled, what a well behaved 2 year old!
She's starting to talk more and more, and not just talk, she first attempts to spell out new words before she will say them. That's right, my 2 year old god daughter spells more than she talks. for instance, "Kaylee, can you say balloon?" She responds "B-A-L-L-L-O-O-N" (She tends to add extra L's). Seriously. "Kaylee, who's that? (me pointing at dog Seamus)" She responds "D-O-G, dog" Crazy.

I'll leave you with the fun photo mistake, this is what happens when Annie plays with her camera attempting to take a pretty pic of the tree and accidentally puts on a timer.
Merry Christmas if I don't get to post again before then!

Overextending

So I might have over estimated my knitting ability. See, I just took out the Gift Knitting Calendar I made way back in October (see I had good intentions) and I am very very very behind. Oops.

Why? Because I didn't stick to the schedule. I got ahead of schedule in early November and stopped pulling it out every couple of days - bad me. And then there was the incident with the knitted item for the hand that I've already talked about. Yeah, I just can't seem to make myself knit that particular item.

The week of Thanksgiving didn't help either. Knitting time was limited (happily so) due to the kiddos, and the fact that recipients were present most of the time. And I just haven't gotten back on track with my knitting. Very bad me.

It would also help if I would stop adding things to my list. Or decide on what a recipient is going to get so that I could just knit the thing. I don't think that my lack of Christmas spirit is helping me either.

All of this stops today. I have revised the knitting calendar. And I will be sticking to it - no matter what (who needs sleep anyway?). No more excuses. There will be much knitting in the 15 days remaining until Christmas. Much knitting.

Holy crap! Do you believe that there's only 15 days until Christmas? Where is the time going? Guess that means I need to get to shopping for everyone that I'm not knitting for. Yeah, sleep is definitely overrated.

PS - On a happier note - my couple won the Amazing RAce! Which means that I've got 10 presents of fibery goodness (or gift cards to fibery stores) arriving soon! I'm sure that I'll post the haul when it's all received. Yay! I love the Amazing Race!

Secrets Revealed

Like the new look? I'm trying to feel festive - it's just not computing that it's December and that Christmas is really almost here, so I'm trying to do everything to get myself in the Christmas mood. Even if that means making my blog look a little garish.

Anyway, I promised some knitting updates. And some secret knitting can finally be revealed. So in the last post you saw the Scurvy Pirate Mittens. Here's the close ups.
These were so cute and fun to make. I used Smooshy "Midnight Derby" again, held single this time, with more of the Swish DK in white. And despite all my worries, they fit!

Next up was my birthday present to my brother - a Notre Dame hat.
Sadly, I didn't get any "action" shots of this hat, but it fit - not as well as I would have liked (which probably means that sometime in the future I will make another version of this to satisfy myself). This was my first attempt at designing my own pattern. Just a basic hat with some colorwork thrown in, so it's not like I attempted to climb Everest the first go-round. But I'm pretty pleased with it.

And now we move onto the pink hat. That's right, I made a pink hat for my little brother. I figured since he's been in warm climates for the last few winters (South Carolina, Okinawa and now North Carolina), he might like to have a hat to wear around home while visiting.
It's the Turn a Squarae hat pattern from brooklyntweed. Love the pattern. And it's amazingly quick and easy. An action shot.
I won't show the first picture I took - it's not nice, and this is a family blog.
Both the Scurvy Pirate hat and the Pink Hat in action. What you don't see pink? Neither do I, but Tommy does. (PS - all he wants is a jolly roger hat - why can't he have a jolly roger hat like C4?)

I did manage to finish my Thanksgiving socks in time to wear on Thanksgiving. I don't have photos, because I forgot to take some while they were in use, but maybe next post. And then after those were done, I had a whirlwind of a weekend of selfish knitting. Yep, instead of working on Christmas knitting, I knit for myself instead.

I cranked out these Iro Mittens in like 24 hours - so fast and easy. And more than one person has mentioned how much they like them.... hmmmm....
And then in a little over 24 hours, I managed to make another Turn a Square.
This one's for me, to match my Noro Vacation Scarf. Love it. It's so pretty. Might go back and rip out a couple stripes to make it shorter - haven't decided yet. Right now it's a bit long, but it fits over my ponytail easily. We'll see, I may just leave it due to the amount of knitting I still have to get done in the next 21 days!!!

Pretty presents to show and then I'm done. My second shipment of the spindle and fiber club came. It's amazing, again.
That's 3 oz of mohair in a colorway that perfectly matches the merino I got in the first shipment, some silk in "Bright Peacock", and the class whorl spindle. So pretty.
Now I just have to get my gift knitting done, and finish at least one of my spinning projects so that I can play with my new stuff. There just aren't enough hours in the day!

Wow

The last week and a half have just flown by. Sorry about the silence, but playtime with the kiddos comes before blogging. Where to start? With the kiddos I think. The Jersey family arrived the Saturday before Thanksgiving. And there was much fun. The pictures will tell most of the story.
C4 and Ellie made a cake in honor of the Charlie's recent birthdays - the fun checkerboard one from my birthday.
I gave Charlie his presents (finally revealing some of the secret knitting!) - a pirate fleece blanket and some scurvy pirate mittens to match his hat. Arrrrr!
Elliott and C4 helped blow out the candle.

Sunday morning, C4 and Sarah hung out with us. I had been spinning when they arrived, and C4 was most intrigued. I got him to try a little bit, but he was bored quickly - mostly because he couldn't do it all on his own. So then the fiber became a plaything.
Wrapped around train tracks as a kind of obstacle. Until it got stuck in the train's wheels and was therefore a hindrance.
Sarah mostly slept. Grandma didn't seem to mind.
Charlie is big into games right now. Sorry and Sorry Sliders being his favorite - and we introduced him to Battleship which was a big hit.
Sarah's favorite game happens to be "Where's the kitty?" She would put her arms out and shake her head and then wander to Maddie's likely hiding spots. She's quick. Maddie did not appreciate the game.
Charlie made a craft with Grandma, at some point that week. I'm still not understanding the pirate wand myself, but whatever.

Thanksgiving was wow. I don't know what other word to use to describe it. The entire clan was together for the first time ever.
And the last time that the then entire family was together was October of 2005. Crazy. So, Thanksgiving was loud and crazy and typical for us.
The boys.
The best picture of all 4 of them. Contentedly watching Backyardigans.
What's better for a late night snack than an Uncle Tom sandwich?
The Sarah-mobile.
That child needs a hand knit hat! Poor Mason!

Friday was the last day with the Jersey folk. So we decided to go bowling.
There is nothing better than watching a four year old bowl for the first time. He was so funny about it. Unhappy that he didn't knock all of them down.

Granted, we played bumper bowling, but I would like to point out, that I had the high score. And didn't need the bumpers to get it.



And that night Grandma and Aunts were left in charge. Which meant that there was a lot of screaming and dancing and running around and camera flashes and belly flashes and general mayhem.

But dang it if they're not cute.

I'll post later this week with all the secret knitting that I can now reveal, as well as all the stuff I've gotten done for me. This post is just too long already.

Nothing to show

No pictures in this post... so weird. I usually don't blog without at least one photo. Oh well, it can't be helped. I really have nothing that I can show. I've got another gift knit done - yay! Making good progress one another one - double yay! And then there's the bad knitting.



The knitting the takes place in the land of denial. It has to do with a certain knitted item for the hand. I knit the right hand object back in September. Then got busy with other knitting that needed to be finished by a certain date that was before this left hand needed to be finished. So last week I finally got around to the left had. And a little voice in the back of my mind told me to pull out the right hand and compare when I had a few inches done. But I told that voice to shut up and continued to knit. And knit. And the voice kept coming back, and at one point I thought, "Hmm, maybe I should take the other one out, just to make sure they're looking alike" and then I would forget or move on to something else... Anyway, I got most of the way done, and actually pulled the right hand out and put it down next to the left one. And stared at them not wanting to believe what I was seeing.



My eyes were obviously messing with me, I mean, with my eyesight being what it is they are only decorative. But no. The right hand was obviously knit at a looser gauge. Noticeably looser. That's just not good. And the real problem? I like the look of the left mitten which means going back and ripping out the actually completed object and not the only partially completed object. SIGH. Did I mention that once upon a time, back in September, I knit most of the right hand on a bigger needle before deciding it was going to be too big and ripped it to redo it? Yeah, that means by the time I'm done with this project, if I'm lucky and there are no more mishaps, I will have knit the freaking pattern a total of FOUR times. Enough to have TWO pairs and not just one. I hate knitter's denial.



I just started a new sock for me though. I had started a pair last week but I'm not loving so they'll be ripped and the pretty yarn will be put aside until after the holidays. The yarn I'm currently using is more of the Knit Picks Imagination yarn, this time in the "Seven Dwarves" colorway. It's very autumnal, and makes me think of all the colors you see in a big Thanksgiving cornucopia. So these will be my Thanksgiving socks. They may not be done by the holiday itself, but it's the thought that counts. I've decided that I need a pair of socks for every holiday. I've already got Christmas and Halloween, these will take care of Thanksgiving. I've got the yarn for St. Patrick's day. My first ever pair of socks - the pair that I made without really knowing anything about sock yarn and needles - is technically a pair for Valentine's Day, but I may do a different pair. I've got yarn that could work for Easter too. Now I just have to get some for the 4th of July. And actually knit all of them up.



Had enough of my mindless dribble yet? Sorry, it was a really long weekend and it's back to Lake effect snow warnings every day around here. Trying to prepare for imminent Jersey invasion. Can't wait.

It was only 2 days

Wow. What a difference a weekend can make. Friday was not that long ago, and yet so much has changed. Friday, the day started out mild and gorgeous (it eventually started raining, but it started out nice). Friday, my nephews were playing in the leaves.


Today, I woke up to this:

Hmmmm. Seriously.
Friday, it was still the fall sports season. Friday, my volleyball team beat last year's state champs to get into the state finals. Friday, the football team was still practicing. Today, it is officially the winter sports season. Today is the start of basketball, and the continuation of hockey. Saturday was a bad day - both volleyball and football lost, pretty badly. Very depressing. Bad weekend in general for my sports, ND and the Steelers lost as well.

So to counteract all the yuckiness of the weekend, today I am wearing a new pair of socks.
The Wicked socks. Yay! Nothing better than handknit socks to cheer you up. Except maybe for this: