Christmas Break Knitting

Since school starts tomorrow, I thought I'd show you what I've been knitting over Christmas Break. First up is the handspun sock yarn, which became this



on Christmas Day while sitting on my Grandma's couch listening to various family members talk about other various family members. Grandma is a great crocheter, by the way, and it is her I have to thank for my embarassing ability to turn out large, perfect, hideous, crocheted doilies at a moment's notice. Grandma, now that arthritis has ended her doily days (like salad days for other people, but primmer) has been churning out the same afghan pattern for about 10 years now. I think she's made 53 at last count, and given all but three away. I have two that she made, one my graduation gift from high school, blue, and one our wedding gift, green.

Here is the second sock, begun on the 26th at Tim's family Christmas in Portland.



Modesty forbids me effusing over my own handspun, but let's just say that I love this yarn more than I love either my dog or my cat.

All non-sock knitting time has been devoted to this



Tim's Christmas gift to me, 10 skeins of Elann's Sierra Aran in Dark Indigo. He picked the color himself, and I must say he did an excellent job. It is swiftly becoming this



A wadded mess of lace, which will block into Elann's Aran Weight Lace Cropped Cardigan. I'm on the two-sleeves-on-two-needles part, which is a major pain. This is what I'd term an advanced pattern, not because the knitting itself is difficult, but because the pattern is little more than two lace repeats written out and some vague suggestions as to how to use them.

Here is a detail of the lace



I'm having fun with it. All in all, a productive break, with knitting time dented only by learning Sid Meyer's Civilization IV, my Christmas gift to Tim. It's not as bad as I thought it would be, especially since I get to play the Mongolians, my favorite historical barbarian culture.