Back to Christmas

Four months to go.

Fortunately, I have another gift done!

Anyone who doesn't want to know what I'm giving my niece should look away at this point.

While we are waiting for those-who-wish-to-be-surprised to avert their eyes, I give you this delicious picture of my newly-minted two-year-old:

Yes, TWO. When did time start going so quickly?

At any rate, yes, the Christmas knitting. My plan was to make the Good Tree Cardigan by Laura Brown, using glow-in-the-dark yarn as the contrast colour. When I went to buy said yarn, however, I discovered that no one makes glow-in-the-dark yarn anymore and that it is very yard to get your hands on any. I think this is ridiculous, since I imagine that there are children all over the world who would go absolutely crazy if someone gave them anything made out of glow-in-the-dark yarn, but there you have it. I was therefore forced to resort to flourescent yarn instead. I found a fabulously garish yellowy-green ("neon yellow") from Caron ("Simply Soft Brites") and also bought a royal purple of the same yarn to go with it, and in very short order, I had a cardigan. Yesterday I wove in all the ends, today I bought a matching button and sewed it on, and therefore, I present:

The photography cannot possibly convey how glowy the neon yarn is. I think it all looks super-cool together. Nothing that I would wear, of course, but when you are ten going on eleven I think it is probably the height of awesome.

New year, new reasons to panic

So let's see...in chronological order, here are the people that I might knit presents for this year...

• DH: wedding anniversary
  
• cousin: baby shower (no "might" about this one, though)
  
• DD2: birthday
  
• DD1: birthday
  
• DD3: birthday
  
• DH: birthday
  
• tons of people: Christmas
  

Plus, of course, I'm hoping that I will be getting some design acceptances, which will mean having to knit sample pieces and write up patterns. So with any luck, it will once again be a busy year.

I think, though, that might not be knitting for my wedding anniversary. It's going to be our twelfth, which - as I've just Googled - is the "silk" anniversary. So I think DH may be getting yarn. :) (Or maybe a silk shirt.) My LYS has also just announced that they're hoping to bring Koigu into the shop soon (!!!), so that will probably work as a nice birthday treat for him.

For their birthdays, DD1 and DD2 will probably get socks for their ever-growing feet. :) DD3 I'm not sure about, but I have been hankering to make the Whirligig Shrug for ages, so I might use her birthday as an excuse. :)

Last night I discovered a major flaw in my plans for my cousin's baby's gift, though. I was charting things in anticipation of the yarn showing up next week, and suddenly I realised that I had set myself up to do intarsia in the round, which is impossible. (Damn. Why can't I bend the laws of knitting physics?) Fortunately I figured this out before casting on, so I've been able to come up with an alternate construction solution which I think (HOPE) will work okay.

As for Christmas - urg. I'm going to once again try to do the Durrow sweater for DH, which will mean finding new yarn first.

For my dad, I'm planning to make socks out of this:

For my mom, I think the time has finally come to use the Handmaiden Sea Silk that I bought for her years ago:

I'll be using it to make the Maja shawl by Anniken Allis. The pattern requires more yardage than I have, but the notes say that it can easily be made smaller or larger. I might start that pretty soon, actually, to try and get a jump on the end-of-year knitting.

My brother, as I've mentioned before, is getting a scarf to match the hat he got this past Christmas. The BILs, though, I'm not sure about. I'd like to make them both sweaters (BIL#1 one of my own design which is coming out later this year, and BIL#2 Kilkenny by Lorraine Condotta), but that might be too ambitious, especially with multiple other big projects planned. So we'll see. I might just end up doing socks instead to save my sanity, and save the sweaters for another year.

For my niece, I'd like to make Good Tree Cardigan by Laura Brown. I was thinking it would be extra-cool to use glow-in-the-dark yarn for the contrast colour. :)

I've no idea what I'm going to knit my girls for Christmas, but I'm sure it'll come to me. (And knowing me, I'm sure it'll be ridiculously over-ambitious.) The various teachers and care providers in our lives will also, of course, get handknits, but what exactly they'll be remains to be seen.

So...a big year ahead.

Yeah. I think I should probably start my mom's gift right now. Excuse me...