The Reveal

I can finally start posting some pictures of my holiday projects now that most of them have been received.
The first if a Forest Canopy Shawl for Paula in Baby Silk by Elann.

And...socks for Nana in Merino Handspun for her wee little footsies.

Holiday

The cats are resting in front of the heater this Christmas morning and I haven't even had my first cup of tea, but I wanted to wish everyone a Merry Christmas.

Christmas Eve consisted of WAY too much good food at Paula's and a little watching of the Yule Log on PBS and an attempt at knitting. We opted for calling it a night because we were way too full and tired for even that.

All season I have been knitting so much that my hands are pretty tired today. I'll post my work after all the presents have been opened! Since I haven't posted since the 14th, it almost looks like I've been a slacker...but you all know better.

Now on to the first cup of tea and taking photos of some knitting before the last minute wrapping begins....

Testing, Testing...

This lame swatch is something I knit to test how these different yarns would work together in one Nordic sweater. I'm doing a KAL, sponsered by Donna Drachunus and am in the planning stages, trying to use my existing stash. My idea is to go with a Pacific Norwest tree theme instead of a snowflake theme, but we'll see how that does. The thing with designing at the DK gauge is that your motifs have to be simpler because you have less stitches to "express yourself", so to speak. I'm not usually a big planner, but I don't want to spend all this time designing a sweater only to have it not quite work out or not fit or the yarns not work well together. So, here I go on my adventure.

Meanwhile, the focus is on holiday knitting. I just got an email from my brother and I'm horrified to hear that the toes of his socks from last year blew out. They were knit from my dad's handspun. I asked him to send them back to me so that I can re-knit the toes. I'm dying to see what happened there!

Purple-ness Blocking

I have no proper blocking thing set up for larger pieces like this 71"x21" shawl, so I had to do it bit by bit on my ironing board in front of the heater. I used Clover Flower head pins and that worked quite well.

Soon, I'll get a picture of it modeled so you can get the full effect.

Leaves, not Snow

So, this is my answer to why Portland doesn't have hardly any snow equipment. They clearly blew the budget on LEAF equipment. Somehow for the past two years I've missed this ritual, but here it is in color.

(This post is meant for my out of state friends and their interest and edification)