Holiday projects

Dear Cynthia,

I can totally relate to your experience of continuing to knit even though you have a queasy feeling that things are just not right, only to end up having to rip out even more knitting. Bummer about ripping back, but hopefully you are more at peace now :-)

Again, a thank you to our commenters. Sometimes staying at home with young children can be a bit isolating, and even though it is a virtual community, it's so nice to have knitterly friends to interact with during the day.

I finished my acrylic mittens. I've been wearing them, and they are working out just fine and not irritating my skin at all, which is nice, because after I wear wool mittens, the only thing that really works to clear up the red itchy blotches is steroid cream...so nice to be able to avoid that. They do not even come close to offering the warmth that wool mittens do; however, most days they'll work just fine.

We've also been doing some projects to get ready for Christmas. The boys love art projects, and especially get excited when they find something in a magazine which we get to make. Here are some candy cane mice out of a Martha Stewart magazine, though the pattern and instructions is also available here. Cute, fun project, and to make them less "breakable", on some of them we substituted pipe cleaner candy canes for real ones by twisting together a red and a white 6" pipe cleaner and making it into a candy cane shape.

We are also working on placemats which look very nice on the table, though we keep spilling on them.....

And finally, the body of Hardangervidda is off the needles!!! YAY! I blocked it yesterday, and the trick has been to conceal it from dh. Today, after he left for work, I moved it out into a common area to a place having more air movement for faster drying. In a rare turn of events, and much to my dismay, shortly after 8:00 dh walked in the door and said that he had forgotten about a meeting he had which was going to be starting at 8:30 and at an offsite location only minutes from our home. (This type of thing happens only maybe once a year, and so naturally it would happen on the only day I have his Christmas sweater on display in the middle of a hallway...) And so, I'm quite sure that he must have walked by the blocking sweater..... though he didn't say anything and he probably had other things on his mind, so he might not have noticed? In any case, this may or may not be a surprise when he opens it up at Christmas. On a positive note, the size is perfect, right on gauge, and even though I used the same size needles for the plain and colorwork sections, there is no "pulling in" in the colorwork area. I couldn't be happier about how it is working out. Still finishing up the second sleeve.....

Well, lots to do today, including trying to locate a Dale of Norway zipper to sew into the placket.

Have a great Tuesday!
Warm regards,
Laura (YarnThrower)