Too much knitting, not enough photography

Happy 2009 from your favorite procrastinator, who intended to spend her day off today cleaning house. So far, she's gone grocery shopping, forgot to buy hand soap refills (which is why she went grocery shopping in the first place), done some dishes, cleaned cat boxes, and called the post office about a package that's gone missing.

Knitting-wise, last month was busy, but I didn't manage to photograph most of the results. Again, blame the procrastinator: Most of the items were Christmas gifts that were finished at the last minute and gifted immediately. I made a cowl for Cheeky that I cast on in the morning on the way to visit friends and bound off that same day 10 minutes before she pulled into the driveway at my parents' house. The same with the fingerless gloves I made for a friend deploying overseas: I got the message duplicate stitched on one cuff a few hours before giving them away.

I finished another sweater for the spouse, which has not been photographed because a) I'm lazy and b)it needs blocked. I'll get to that right after I finish cleaning house. . .

I have been on a glove kick. I need to take a picture of all the mateless gloves lying around my stash room. One is a fingerless mitt with a jolly roger on the outside (for a friend or her teenage son; haven't decided which). Another is a fingerless mitt with blue and grey lattice stranding that I knit on the last guild yarn crawl and out of scraps left over from something or other (those were for a friend but after finishing the first one I decided they'd be way too big, so they're now mine). Yesterday I spent most of the first day of 2009 finishing a dark brown glove for the spouse. He's still wearing the hideous dark green acrylic ones that were my first attempt at glove knitting 4 years ago. Judging by the first one, these are much better.

You would think that, after December 08, I would be sick of gloves - after all, a chunk of the month was taken up by 000 addi turbos and 00 hiya hiyas, making these:



But no. Those just made me appreciate my trusty six-inch US 5 bamboo DPNs and how miraculously fast I can knit gloves on them.

This year I'm vowing yet again that if I'm going to knit Christmas gifts I'm going to start earlier, but so far my track record is none too great. I actually had to buy one of those camping lights you clip to your hat so I could finish those black gloves while we were driving across the state in the dark. I texted Cheeky that I was knitting on the highway with "a spelunking lamp" and I think I almost killed her. I'd been meaning to make those gloves since October (it's a long and nerdy story that starts out with LOLcats and, in my world, ends up with size 000 addi circs. . .) but of course I didn't actually cast on until two weeks before I was going to be seeing the intended recipient.

Cheeky gave me this book and three (!!!) skeins of Malabrigo laceweight in greens and browns. Can. Not. Wait. to get over my glove obsession and knit a humongous, intricate, delicate shawl. Note to self: Order a magnetic chart keeper. . .

I don't know about you, but I am happy to put 2008 behind me. It was a difficult year, on a personal as well as a global scale, and there are some dates that will stick in my mind forever.

Obviously it wasn't all bad - there were a lot of rewarding moments, and some opportunities I had that I would have regretted had I not taken them when I had the chance. I spent the last week of the year going home to see family and friends, most of whom I see far too rarely. I thought about how you never know when such a visit could be your last with someone. I don't mean that in a morbid way, it's just... something to think about. I want to do better about making such things count. Time goes by so quickly while I'm not paying attention. My friends have babies and then suddenly they are friending me on facebook and blogging about silent movies and early 20th-century fashion trends. . .

Anyway, as usual I get self-conscious when I get mushy, especially regarding people who have no interest in my yarn obsession and therefore don't read my ramblings. Thank you all who made 2008 fun with KITH, yarn crawls, UFO night, and other fiber-filled adventures. I wish you all many blessings in 2009.

Next up: Team Jo collaborates on a narcissistic 2008 minute trivia quiz. . .