Finishing off 2007 with a bang!

I managed to complete all my knitting in time for our holiday in Western MA! And, except for SIL's booga bag (which was a hit, and coincidentally, is the same colorway as the bag features in the pattern), I even have pictures!

So, first, the mini-fetchings. All were done in Debbie Bliss Cashmerino, all using Knitty's Fetching pattern. For the red pair (for the youngest recipient), I did 16 instead of 18 rounds on the palm. I used the Magic Loop technique, and I used Addi Turbos, 40" in size....I can't remember, I think it was size 3 (which I think is 3.5 mm, but I'm not sure, and I'm too lazy to go look, sorry). I was down to the wire on these, and regretted breaking my "no knitting after 9:30 pm" rule, with the last thumb on the black ones. I've never really figured out how to successfully pick up the thumb stitches, and I always have little holes. Well, on the last black thumb I also ended up dropping stitches here and there (it's REALLY hard to see what you're doing when the yarn is so dark!) and it was sort of a disaster. BUT, the black did hide most of the errors, I got them all fixed (one way or another), and the recipient (a 7 year old boy) was *thrilled* with them. All three kids loved them, and slept in them every night! :) I was fully prepared for the kids not to be too excited so it was an added bonus that they were such a hit.

This hat is the Irish Hiking hat pattern that I can't find again (my google-fu seems to be lacking today), but it was a nice pattern, and an easy knit. I accidentally knit it on size 9s instead of 8s, and dropped one of the cable repeats because it seemed SO huge. I made it deeper than she called for as well, because, well, I like hats deeper. It ended up fitting my husband (who has a huge head) quite well, but was too small for the recipient (my BIL, who has HUGE head apparently), so my husband is keeping it and I'll do another one for BIL. I think I'll drop the needle size and add back an extra cable repeat and add at least another inch, maybe two. It looks sort of weird but it does fit well.


Here's the fetching inspired-inspired hat, which I am loving. It's not quite as wind-proof as my fleece hat, but it's quite warm for most weather and I love it. (Not the best picture of me...)

And, I finished the monkey socks! I love them so much!!! I am really happy with how they came out. I started these in August and I've been working on them on and off, and it's so great to have another pair of socks done! I have been loving all the handmade socks I've done so far, and wearing them a ton (pretty much all my other socks are old and sad, and slowly getting thrown away due to holes) so I really need them! YAY! I promised SIL a pair of handknit socks too, so I'll have to figure out some good yarn for her. She really liked these but I just couldn't waite find it in my heart to give them to her. I am a bad person, I suppose.

I also managed to get two cable repeats done on my Double Braided Cable scarf, and I think I'll do two more, probably, since the recipient (who doesn't know he's getting this!) seems to like shorter scarves. I am a bit unsure how to block this, as it's superwash wool. Is that an issue? It needs some blocking because even with the garter stitch edge, it's still rolling a bit. It's quite pretty though, and I'll have enough left over to do some hats or something.

So, I'm feeling pretty good and inspired at the moment. :)

I am so smart (not).

I have a lot of knitting to do in the next week and a half. A LOT. Well, a lot for me, because my available knitting time is really small. Perhaps if I had full-time childcare and no job (and, you know, some random, seriously lucrative source of income to pay for said childcare), I could get it all done easily and perhaps toss of some more socks for myself as well. But that, sadly, is not my life situation so my knitting time is mostly limited to the evenings, and it turns out that by the time evening rolls around, I Am Fried. Today was a particularly busy day, as it involved not only some Christmas shopping (I relented after I asked my husband to go purchase his gift from me and agreed to do it myself as well as get the present for his dad), but about 200 phone calls between my real estate person, my mortgage person, and my lawyer to work through a last-minute hitch in our house-buying experience. IT WAS SO FUN. Then I had to go to my husband's office to print out a revised P&S, get him to initial some stuff, initial some stuff myself and fax it to our mortgage lady (who does rock my world). So instead of having a fun afternoon hanging out with the boys at home, I was doing all that. It's sort of good that I don't actually have paid employment, because in my grown-up life, I'm a psychotherapist and not really available to wrangle a million phone calls.

So, yeah, what's left? About 10 more rounds of Fetching 2 of 6 (sounds so Star Trekian) plus the thumb, the rest of the Fetchings (4 total), 32 rounds on the Booga bag plus 6 feet of i-cord and felting, and a cable-knit hat for my BIL because apparently I am NOT CABLING ENOUGH.
I am doing my BIL's hat out of some sort of craft-store yarn (Patons worsted weight wool). I actually do like this yarn. It feels pretty soft, they had the color I wanted (a charcoal grey), it doesn't break the bank, it is actually 100% merino wool, and I was AT Michael's and didn't have to go make a special trip anywhere to get Fancy Nice yarn. He won't care at all. Do I sound defensive about using craft store yarn? :)

What else. The Frog has a nice heartbeat. It looks like our house deal is going to go through. Perhaps our condo will even sell. It's all good. It's all going to be okay. *deeeep breath* Tonight, I think I'm going to climb into bed and read and do Sudoku and go to sleep early.