Catch up post

Well, it's been a while, for various reasons, so here is a post laden with some yummy knitting goodies. I am in the middle of furiously knitting christmas gifts for various family members, and in fact the only thing I have on my needles for me is my second baudelaire sock. Sigh. Still, this will be remedied after christmas, when I shall knit myself lots of goodies (he he he).

My christmas pressie list is currently running at 6 WIPs, all, for some reason, in really muted colours. Perhaps this is because I am knitting for men, but it really is no excuse. Dad's scarf (don't look dad) is the closest to being finished, as I am running out of yarn. It's a zig zag pattern I picked out of Jan Eatons ripple book, and is turning out lovely, although I am still struggling with the whole 'carry yarn loosely up side of work' aspect of things - it always ends up looking messy so I think I will have to fold the edge under and seam it before I am satisfied.

Secondly, I am in the middle of making warm things for my little brother, who is off to Iowa in January to visit his girlfriend, and where I am reliably informed it will be -23degrees. Thus, we have the very warm hat (Zimmerman)
The outside (or inside) is Freedom Spirit wool in pale grey, blues and a little brown (not really shown in the photo, oddly enough it was rather too bright!). The inside is some lovely silky Wensleydale DK in a very dark navy. For DK it is rather thin, which mean that the knit lining will be quite loose gauge, but I think this will work nicely - don't want his head getting too hot. I do hope this fits - its quite a tight fit on me but I do have quite a large head. Blocking will be the order of the day methinks.

I have also decided (perhaps misguidedly) to make him some thrummed mittens. Thrumming is the process of knitting in bits of fleece (in my case combed Shetland tops) into a fabric See the yarn harlot for comprehensive information.

I'm using the Manly Mitts pattern from knitty.com as my basic mitten pattern, but have added a few extra stitches to accomodate the thrums and the fact that the wensleydale needs smaller needles than you'd think for a DK (not that it isn't lovely, just slightly uninformative - no gauge or needle guide whatsoever on the ball band). So far, it looks like something from another planet, but rest assured I have not murdered some small space creature for the sake of my brothers paws.
We shall see. It could end up huge and ridiculous, but then, I don't think I have made the equivalent of Mark Darcy's cringeworthy jumper in Bridget Jones yet so something had to go pearshaped.

I also have a Kiri shawl (pdf) on the go for my nanna, in some glorious Drops Alpaca, but it currently looks like an crumpled mess so pictures will have to wait until I have blocked it.

Finally I can show you this:

lovely bagsket I made for Jen (she of birthday fame in previous post). I've been holding off posting this, although it turned out that she doesn't even read my blog so I needn't have bothered!

It was well received I think, but the next one I make will not be cylindrical - I have discovered that I am physically incapable of sewing a straight edge to a curved one - much sweating and swearing went into this pressie!

I love making pressies for people, there is something infinitely more satisfying than just nipping to the shops. And it gives me an excuse to create!