January

I’m finally fully back and up and running after my vacation. I’ve uploaded my pictures and am now ready to blog again.

Oh wait, you weren’t expecting vacation pictures were you? Sorry, my vacations aren’t really picture worthy for the most part. I have a few of friends, but I don’t like to post pictures of other people I know because it’s their face and not mine I’m plastering on the net. It’s not polite imho. So, my pictures are mostly of the knitting variety.

There’s my Waves Scarf, or Scarf of Non-Doom:

which I just finished for myself. A note on this scarf, it’s lovely. I adore it. It’s soft and fluffy and cosy to wear, if a bit self-indulgent. It’s a bit like making shortbread. You dump in a decadent amount of creamy, wonderful butter to get really good shortbread; with this scarf, you dump in a decadent amount of lovely, soft yarn to get a wonderful scarf. It also needs to be said that although it’s a simple pattern, knitting it is not. It’s a 24 stitch cable which is virtually impossible to knit (unless you’re the better knitter than I am). Had it not been for my Options, I would never have finished it. The cable gets too tight to knit, forcing you to either ruin your hands for life, or become really creative. In order not to ruin my hands, I sort of adapted the Magic Loop method of knitting by pulling the needle and cable through so I could continue knitting the rest of the cable in relative comfort. Then, when the stitches were too tight on the next round, I swapped the needle with the stitches on it for a smaller size making it easier to get the stitches off the cable and back onto the needle. The trick is to remember to swap that needle back before knitting the next row at the wrong gauge. We just won’t go into that, no? The end result is an impractical scarf that I love to wear to work or anywhere where its bulk won’t get in the way (I do take it off at work, just in case you were wondering).

Next is the reason I didn’t finish the Scarf of Non-Doom earlier. I knew the neighbour (a US “neighbour”) was having a baby, I knew this. I was told. However, it didn’t register until it was there and I needed knitwear asap. This baby is in California, so it had to be cotton and since it is a she, it “had” to be pink. The result of which is that I dropped the scarf and knit The Pink Baby Blanket of OMG Most People Will Think It’s Really Cute Because It’s Pink variety.

The Pattern in the Arabesque Baby Blanket and it’s knit in Sugar n’ Cream Cotton yarn, colour Strawberry.

Then before Christmas I knit the following as Secret Santa Presents:
The Cherry Leaf Scarf for a person in Costa Rica (so it had to be cotton lace, Baby Soft by Bernetta Wolle):



and a couple of Cabled Ornaments:

And a Christmas Scene dishcloth that never actually made it to the recipient because I am silly.

I think I might do a couple of those as random presents for next year. It’s the sort of things that’s inexpensive, quickly finished, is functional and still says I cared enough to put in a bit of effort.

There’s also the last hat I knit for my aunt so she always has one even if she loses one again.

The pattern in the Coronet Hat knit in Bernetta Wolle Speedy. I think she likes the lace one better, but was happy to have this one too.

Finally, I’ll leave you with a picture of the lemons that lived behind my vacation villa (aka my aunt’s and uncle’s vacation trailer). They actually didn’t live there very long. These very lemons became a really nice lemon meringue.