Sick Day.

Poor Walker. He started throwing up at 4:00am. Poor Katherine-mama too. And Nephi-papa, a little bit. Here he is in what passes for a bathtub in our single-bathroom shower-only house: a large Rubbermade container and some soapsuds, his mohawk a bit askew. He had to miss his school Solstice party today, which was deeply disappointing (he attends a school which sidesteps the whole religious holiday issue deftly and completely). But he's feeling better now, some 15 hours later, excited for Christmas and an uncle coming from New York to visit. Katherine-mama is excited for Christmas too, since she bought her own presents this year (thanks to a new soon-to-be tradition: Right of First Refusal. Props to Susan), and there are many a knitting goody underneath the ol' tree. 

A Tale of Two Hats.

Two hats finished. Walker is modeling the light pink fuzz ball. It's way too big for its intended, Dear Little Niece Emma and her four-year-old head. So now there is a great gift for a certain cafe-owning, pink-loving, girly girlfriend who lives in one of the Arctic Lower 48. The second hat, modeled by Little Dinosaur Who Is Now Blue Horsey, is a darker, dare I say hotter, pink, and it will fit, we pray, the head of Dear Little Niece. Her sister, Bigger Niece Lillian, got a furry pink hat last year, and now it's Dear Emma's turn. I used Susan's grrrrrreat top-down Be Brave, Don't Swatch hat pattern and it was so fun to knit. It went crazy-fast too. I used a half-linen stitch on the sides (holding the Fun Fur on knit rows and two strands of Moda Dea on pattern rows) and though you can't see it in the photo, the top is not furry but is knit two stranded with Moda Dea something or other. Hope the kid likes it. How can she not? 

The Ballad of Nico and Skye.

Tokyo Joanna came over on Monday and brought the charming Nico with her. Skye is exactly one month older than Nico, but Nico already has a couple of teeth so broken in that they've practically lost their shine (although not quite). Skye only got his two front (bottom) teeth this week (I guess his Christmas present is all taken care of). The kids batted at each other and laughed a lot but pretty much didn't notice each other too much. Walker was at school, but Camille was enchanted by Nico, mostly due to Nico finding her so damn funny. She neighed like a Blue Horsey a lot and shrieked at the babies and knocked Tokyo Joanna's latte over. She also tried to eat all of the biscotti and take Nico's playthings away, but we tried to mostly prevent that.

Margene brought her ballwinder and swift to Stitch'n'Bitch last night and really bailed this girl out. I bought yarn for Christmas knitting but forgot to wind it before leaving the yarn shop. So I sent out a general plea and Margene came to the rescue. Since Margene was bringing the whole enchilada anyway, I brought a Whole Ton of yarn to wind and got lots of skeins taken care of that have been wanting to be knit up but haven't been due to their skein status. So a big fat thank you to Margene (who is known as M.A.C.K. during December only).

Snowy Day.

This is a photo of the Sleeping Skye and Piano. I don't have a photo to illustrate anything that I was going to blog about, and I took this photo last Thursday, and since we all know that blogs without photos are boring, here it is.
Stitch'n'Bitch was really great tonight. We're having our first big snow dump of the year and the roads are assassin roads tonight, so there were only five knitters at the Jitterbug tonight, including myself. Also including the lovely Joanne! Who, get this, sat next to my older brother's best friend Philip on a flight from Tokyo to Salt Lake City back in July! It was a chance encounter, to be sure, but there is no doubt. Small world, my friends, it's a small world. I still can hardly believe it. Joanne is in town to visit family and decided to pop in, and I'm so glad she did.
Right now I'm working on fancy hats for Christmas, and fighting off some sort of repetitive stress thingy in my left wrist. What can I do about that? Any ideas?
I made Jammy Cake Shortbread cookies last night, and brought some to Stitch'n'Bitch tonight, and they are SO good. So all ya'll who didn't come missed out. But maybe I'll make more and bring some next week. Nothing cheers me up like sticky yarn! 

Big Fat Fingerless Mittens.

I'm knitting these babies up in Brown Sheep's Burley Spun, in the Strawberry Fields colorway. I kind of made up my own pattern after gauging and knitting up a glove or two and ripping them out again. I took this photo yesterday, and I'm already almost done with the second mitten. I was intending to sell them at the Women's Art Center boutique (www.womensartcenter.org) but I realized today that I made them to fit me and my big-ish hands. They're huge! So I doubt if anyone would want to buy them. Too big for most women, too pink and red for (most) men. But maybe someone will like them. Now how do I figure out a price?