Gifting

Time for secrets, and gifts to be made. It's hard to share without giving too much information, but besides:
This, for a little girl.
Using up stashed yarn, and getting dangerously short on white yarn, so the thumb is very colorful.

  

And:

Pies!  From a pumpkin!  Never did this before.  Six pies total.

In two shifts/days:

And:

A Sock;  someday there will be two... Again: ran out of yarn for the very end of the toe.  This is a great selling point for knitting socks "toe-up".  I'll have to decide whether it's worth it to undo the leg and remove a bit.  

And:

Something for Norway in January!  Stunning!  Pattern is Kilm Gloves from Interweave Knits, Winter 2007.  (Again, awaiting a mate.)

And a LOOONNNGGG term project:  A cardigan for myself.  No rush to finish.  I enjoy the mosaic color method.  The sleeves have a different design than the body.  A true knitter's dream project.

Happy Early Winter!

What happened to September?

Somehow, September became the shortest month of the year!  It takes a four-year-old to do that.  Her 12 hour days are cyclonic!
Much time was spent in the hot tub.  Grandpa helped her learn to use a snorkel, mask, and flippers.  I've never heard such silence!  She spent a lot of time UNDER water!!!

The sewing machine got lots of use, too.  Two crib/lap quilts were assembled.

A pullover that I knitted in 2007 returned for an updated collar.  It was "thought about" more than worked on, so it's still here needing to be tacked down.  I hope that the finished look will be this.  (It was a regular rounded neckline, with striped garter stitch.)  Ravelry link

It's a Loop-d-loop pattern.  A tricky fair isle with short rows.
I often become a "bag lady"... Used a pattern (from a previous post) to make a larger version as a satchel.  Dang... didn't take a picture of that either!  Maybe the owner will send me one!
And then there was the knitting that I carried around.  Didn't get much done...
Socks for the four-year-old, which if I don't get them in the mail soon, they won't fit.

Yes, photo is complete with cat tail...
And my Mystic Mosaic Jacket.  Ooooo... I love the colors which don't seem to reproduce well in photography.
I managed to finish both sleeves, and started the body, but yesterday I (again) thought that there seemed to be A LOT OF STITCHES.  Well, of course, there are a lot of stitches in the body of an adult knitted jacket... so yesterday, as I finished off row 10 of the chart I thought I ought to check gauge AGAIN!  The sleeves are fine... but the pattern is different on the body, (mosaic patterns), so I pulled some inches off of the needles and measured.  My calculations showed that with the number of stitches I had (which should give me a 46" diameter body, I confess---LARGE) I probably had close to 60" to wrap around me!!  I took it completely off the needles:

 Yikes!

 It was almost 60"!  Below I'm holding it out to show my friends... "Do you think it will fit?"

I spent the rest of the evening frogging and casting on.  Crazy lady... but better than discovering it later.
To my Shelridge Farms friend: I'm going to try casting on using the size SMALL, with lengths adapted for me.  WHEW!  Disaster averted, ....again and again and again and again.

Color!

Stunning colors, even though the shading isn't correct.  In reality (or to my eyes) it is darker and more like jewels.  I saw it made up in blues at the Kitchener-Waterloo Guild Knitters Fair, last September, and thought I might like the reds...they had a swatch, and here it is.  I'm starting a sleeve and in LOVE with the colors.  They remind me of "Oleanna" colors we saw in Norway.  The mosaic technique is scrumptious.  Have to go ....knit, or ... 

Two days ago, the first day of classes at the local college, I got the call.  Just as several of you have asked, "Are you teaching this Fall?"  "No," I answer.  "My first semester without ANY sort of class."  Then the call... One class slipped by without anyone noticing it had no instructor.  So, I'll do it.  This is also the first semester when I haven't planned a trip on the other side of the world, so it isn't a problem.  Just a few hours, two days a week.  Unfortunately, it gets me off the sofa and into the real world of non-knitters.

My Olympics!

Who has time to join with the Knitter's Olympics?  I'm too busy knitting!

I didn't intend to cast on anything, and then... Miss Marple came along and snagged my needles.  Cast on first sock on Saturday, and today cast on the second one.  Knitted as mosaic on the leg and heel (one color at a time), and lace on the instep.  

It looks super funky and misshapen until I put it on. Lovely warmth!