Making

The mid-winter holidays have always seemed to me to be a time of making: making food, making presents, making memories, making light in the dark days. This past week has certainly been no exception.

Years ago, when Rick and I finally had a house together, and his Grandmom was feeling a bit overwhelmed by hosting his family's traditional Christmas eve gathering, I started doing it, with her, and then on my own. I didn't do it last year, feeling worn out by a bad autumn and too much to do, and as much as I think it was probably a wise decision, we all missed it. So this year I did it again. We had about 30 or so people over, and I spent most of Thursday and Friday morning getting ready. We make pickled herring (that's Rick's job), which is served with boiled potatoes and aqa vite, then ham and havarti and pickled cucumber salad, and red cabbage and hard bread and pork pies (my addition, in place of the Swedish meatballs that so tormented me for years - I don't enjoy making meatballs, but pork pies were our traditional pre-midnight Mass Christmas eve meal during my childhood, so I substituted). Dessert is butter cookies and rod grod and whipped cream (the kids love it). And Rick makes mulled wine. Mmm... The girls love it, and look forward to it all year - this year they even ate a little bit of the pickled herring.
As I cooked, wearing Grandmom's apron that she gave me when she officially stopped doing this party herself, I found myself missing her terribly, while being grateful at the same time for all of the memories I have of standing in her kitchen making this same food. I hope my girls, and maybe, depending on the way things go, their kids, feel the same way about making this meal themselves someday.

I also made my usual two huge braids of yeasted cardamom bread for Christmas morning. I didn't take pictures, though (sigh). And on Christmas day, I made fresh baguettes and duck and sausage stew with sage and potatoes and celery root. That is our very own Christmas tradition. And then on Sunday, I cooked not a thing - we have enough leftovers for a while, I think.

Other making happened, too. Of particular note is the fact that Older Daughter this morning presented her very first finished knitted garment ever. (I suspect her of turning on her light in the middle of the night to read and finish it; we've all wanted to do that at some time or another, haven't we?)
How about that? I'm so impressed, and now that she's actually finished an actual garment, I think there'll be no stopping her. Maybe she needs her own Rav page?

I, too, finished something.
There's the first Silk Road sock; the second is at the heel flap.
(The colors are more accurate in the second picture.) The second sock is turning out just fine, following my notes for the first one (this is not always the case), and I am 99% sure that I have figured out how to size it up with another four repeats and to still get the nifty lines on the heel and down the foot.
I don't know why, but I'm just charmed to pieces by the lines down the sole, and the fact that I worked it so that decreasing the thicker blue stripes on the bottom can coincide with decreasing the subtler thicker blue stripes on the top before the toe decreases.
The only thing that's stopped me from finishing the second one is the fact that I've also been working away madly at the Tibetan Clouds stole; I'm halfway done with the second side panel now, and with the end in sight, suddenly I'm over the whole process knitting mentality, and into full-fledged product mode. I want it, and I want it now. But I also kind of want the second of these socks.
While my knitting dukes it out in the den, I wish all of you a happy holiday season, and a peaceful week as we head into the new year.

Not so much with the holiday knitting

Which is not to say that I am not knitting - I am. But around August, I decided that I wasn't going to do any "holiday" knitting per se. Instead, I decided that I'd just give out whatever I knitted for people as I knitted it (you may remember that this started with the decision to give my niece her kitten mittens when I saw her this fall instead of waiting and sending them now). This has taken at least some of the pressure out of the holidays, at least in this one matter, and I get to know that the recipients are getting use out of the things I've knitted. My SIL, in fact, kindly sent me some pictures of the mittens in use, right around Hallowe'en.
Being a knitter herself (and much better with the artistic side of displaying knitted goods), she kindly got shots of all of the little nifty bits of these mittens.
Like the fish skeletons on the thumbs.
And the pawprints on the fingers. I really need to knit a pair of these for myself - I truly love them.

I also knitted a hat/mitts set for each of the girls, which I have duly handed over. And this weekend I finished a scarf for Older Daughter to add to her set. (I had enough yarn for that - barely - because she and I had the same yarn in our hats and mitts; there's a bit left over from Younger Daughter's set, but not enough for this particular scarf - I need to figure something else out for her.)
The hat and mitts are my own made-up patterns, but the scarf is Anne's latest fun pre-holiday release, the Cabled Keyhole Scarf. Isn't it fun? And it is such a quick knit; I managed to finish it up in no time, squeezed into the little bits of space I had available (a bit of time in the evening here, sitting at a feis registration desk there). It hasn't even been blocked yet, and it still looks good. (So if your holiday knit list looms large and you're looking for something quick to knit, consider this one.)
I love those chunky cables. And the keyhole construction means that it'll stay on right where it belongs, with no loose ends to get in the way and catch. It's pretty warm today (already 71 and due to get warmer - what happened to my winter?), so Older Daughter wasn't up for a long photo shoot in wool, but I'm betting I'll get some good shots of this over the next couple of weeks.

Meanwhile, holiday madness has, of course, set in. One of the reasons why I've been searching for another way to handle the desire to give hand-knits without making Christmas the time to give them is because of how nutty this time of year gets for me (I know I'm not the only one!). Grades are due on December 22nd, and I can't tell whether I'm going to end up pushing that deadline right to the wire. I feel like I'm as organized as I can be, but finals don't come in until 5:00 pm on Tuesday, and I am heading off to Tehachapi on Friday for one last linguistic work session up there before the holidays, so that's one less work day to grade. And, of course, both of the girls end up with activity piled on activity at this time of year, most of them scheduled at the last minute (thus eating into time set aside for things like shopping and grading and and and). Younger Daughter has long had a feis scheduled for this past weekend - it's her Irish dancing school's annual competition in Palm Springs, so of course we were planning to go. We'd decided to go overnight so we could volunteer and help with set-up, only to discover that while we were in New Orleans, her teacher announced the date of the school winter play, and (you guessed it), it was Friday night. By the time we'd figured that out, Younger Daughter already had her part and her lines memorized, so we ended up juggling - Older Daughter and I caught a ride out with friends so I could meet our volunteering obligations, and Rick and Younger Daughter followed after the play. Then, their piano recital ended up being scheduled for today (my theoretical shopping day), and Older Daughter's orchestra teacher scheduled a last-minute concert for this coming Wednesday night (I kid you not, we just got the date for that one less than a week ago - am I the only one who already has tons of things scheduled for this time of year and very little room to add more?!). That means I won't be going to the party at my LYS that night!

But, the feis went well. It's a pretty full day for Younger Daughter, with lots of concentration.
She has fun, though, especially once she's past her first dance or two.
And in the end, isn't having fun what all of this is all about? With that in mind, I think I'll relax with the socks that I'm knitting for Rick. They may or may not be done in time for Christmas, but they'll keep his feet warm whenever they get to him.

The new year approacheth

On little tip-tapping feet.

Or at least, that's how it seems to me. Where did this last year go? It's hard to believe that at this time last year, I was looking forward to my sabbatical, and now it feels like it's been eons since then, except that I can't really figure out how those eons all fit into one year. The same year that my daughters insist took forEVER (somehow the time between Christmases seems to them to be always too long). Physicists ought to study this phenomenon, it might lead to something interesting.

In any case, I don't know that I'm particularly ready for the new year. Or maybe it's that I feel like I already had my celebration of letting go of the old and planning for the new at solstice this year, when we all handed over those things that weren't working for us, and took up something new to work for this year. I'll admit to all of you that I chose to give up fear, and to work on cultivating hope instead. I don't know that it'll change anything about the world out there, but if it changes how I walk through that world, then it's worth the effort.

The girls and I have had a lovely start to our week; we've been trying to get out of the house so Rick can get work done (now that he works from a home office, these weeks when everyone is in the house at once all day every day can be a bit trying for him). The girls spent all last week begging to go to SeaWorld, and I kept saying that I was absolutely, 100% sure that the passes we got last spring surely would have the week between Christmas and New Year's blacked out. Alas, I was wrong in my assessment of corporate greed, and we were free to use those passes to go, which we did yesterday, along with fully half of San Diego county plus members of assorted other states and countries.

We decided to forgo the rides and to not sit in the splash zones of the various shows (I can tell you here and now that when a 5,000 pound orca decides to splash you, you get wet), as it was rather chilly. But we did get to feed the dolphins and the bat rays, which is always a huge hit with the girls (and I freely admit that getting to stroke a dolphin is high on my own list of Very Cool Things). (Feeding rays is a really weird experience, though, as they act a lot like vacuum cleaners and suck the fish right out of your hand, not to mention the fact that they are covered in a mucus membrane -- who knew? -- so touching them feels like petting a snotty piece of rubber.)(In a good way, though.)

Today we went to the bookstore, where Older Daughter had a gift certificate from Christmas (she's been asking every. single. day. since Christmas when we were going to go), then I took the girls to Q'ero for lunch (such a treat!), and to Common Threads to find buttons for Sprossling. I did find some that I think will work well, but got home too late to take pictures, so I'll have to do that tomorrow to share.

At the same time, I'll take some pictures of the two Sprossling sleeves (both in progress) to get your opinion on colors. All of the yarn for the sweater comes from the same dye lot, but when I started a new ball on the first sleeve last night, it seemed to me that the new ball is significantly lighter than the others. So, I ripped back the new yarn and a little way into the part of the sleeve knit from the other yarn, thinking that I'd start the new ball by alternating rows with the old ball. But then, just to be really sure, I decided to put the first sleeve on waste yarn, and to start another sleeve with the new yarn; I'll knit the whole thing and see if it seems different enough to warrant knitting both sleeves out of the new yarn (at least there'll be some purposeful-seeming consistency, because I'm not ripping out the two fronts and the back in order to knit the whole thing with alternating balls), as well as the collar and button bands. However, if it was just that little part of the ball that seemed particularly light relative to the little part of the other ball I had already been working with, then I'll continue that first sleeve by alternating between balls to start.

I'm not sure if that made sense, but it seems like a plan in my head. I'm halfway through the increases on the second sleeve (which puts me almost to where I was on the first sleeve before I stopped), so I have high hopes of getting through it pretty quickly. Which is what I'm going to go do now.

I was going to share pictures of the girls feeding the dolphins, but the camera ate them (this is what happens when I use the old camera, grrr...), so you can see this picture of Tilly instead.
I think she needs a walk.

Recovery

It has been a very good week. In spite of my desire to slow down, and in spite of the fact that I developed some weird kind of head cold thing (first time I've been sick in a long time, which seemed a hint of sorts with regard to the whole slowing down thing), I didn't quite manage it until Saturday. Before that, I spent a lot of Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday cooking, which was fun (and delicious), but not so much restful. In that time I made: pickled red cabbage, pickled cucumber salad, pork pie, rod grod, two loaves of cardamom braided bread, a duck, sausage, and celery root stew, three baguettes, and the most stunningly delicious chocolate cake EVER (I didn't make the marshmallows). (I have finally found the buttercream frosting of my dreams, and I am content.)

I also received a ton of knitting Christmas presents. I'll show them off a few at a time over the next little while; there was a lot of yarn, plus a few nifty gadgets and bags. For example, Rick and the girls got me this:
It's a Lantern Moon knitting box, and I love it. When they came in at Yarning For You I got a call to let me know (they remembered I'd been lusting over them but missed grabbing one from the first shipment; they are so good to me), so I took a picture of one and texted it to Rick, who very wisely went over that afternoon to pick it up. Good man. I particularly love the inside, which is a beautiful cheerful orange; I'll have to take a picture of that.

My really big present from Rick came as a complete surprise. I'd sent him my Loopy Ewe wish list, on which there were, apparently, a few things that I'd added without ever really thinking I'd get them (am I the only person who does that? It's a sort of vicarious pleasure -- I either dog-ear lots of pages in a catalogue and then throw the catalogue away, or put things on a wish list even though I know I'll never get them). But he completely surprised me, and ordered these stunning beauties:
Those are size two silver Celtic Swan dpns (there's a fifth in the set, as well). I love them. I have a set of size ones in bronze, one of the first really nice knitting tools I ever got (also from Rick), but these are truly a work of art. Of course, I couldn't not use these things, so I immediately put yarn into the box, grabbed the dpns, and cast on for the the Churchmouse Turkish socks (the third of the Churchmouse patterns I got at Yarning For You a few weeks ago), and knit a pair for Older Daughter, who loves short socks like this.
Aren't they cute? They're knit out of Sockotta yarn, which is a bit rough when knitting, but which seems to fit and wear well (it's a cotton/wool/nylon blend); it's nice to find a cotton blend yarn that's fun to knit with, living here in San Diego. I also love the colors.
I think she'll wear these a lot, and they were fun to knit (and the needles were a dream; what I love most about them is the folded part in the middle, which holds stitches on the needles like nobody's business, but the smooth tips make for quick knitting). And I'm pretty sure that I have enough of the Sockotta left to knit a pair for either myself or for Younger Daughter.

That probably won't happen for a little while, though, as I'm completely engrossed in Sprossling right now. I don't have any pictures, but I have finished the back and the left front, and am well along with the right front. I am really hoping to finish it up by the end of the week, but we'll see. I do have some plans to take the girls to do some shopping with their little bit of Christmas money, and to SeaWorld and the zoo during the week, none of which are particularly knitting-friendly, but that's OK.

Meanwhile, I'm enjoying a leisurely morning at home, wearing my other most-favorite Christmas present (from my sister-in-law and her family). Check these out:
Are those not the absolute best slippers in the world? They even have little tassels that hang down on the sides! (I am unreasonably pleased by those tassels.) They have soles, too, so they don't slip and they can go outside. I have been living in them ever since I got them; the moment I get into the house, the shoes come off and the slippers go on. And they're knitted! How cool is that? And I didn't even have to knit them myself.

Stick a fork in it

'Cause this semester is done.

Yesterday, I got up, filed my grades, went by the post office (still one more package to mail, but that might have to wait until after Christmas, we'll see), dropped a batch of granola off at Yarning For You, went to campus to put out a final that a student wanted to pick up, went to my last two meetings, and it was all over. Technically, grades were due today by 3:00, but since I'd filed, I called it done. What a relief. I survived the first semester of furloughs and all of the craziness that entails. There's a lot more to get through this year, and every projection I've heard says that next academic year will be worse, but for now there's nothing I can do about it, and I can live with that.

I spent much of Monday cooking.
That's the makings for my usual manymany batches of holiday granola, as well as two pots of lentil soup (one for Monday night's Solstice celebration, and one for last night's cookie-decorating party at a friend's house). This lentil soup is my all-time absolute favorite, and the go-to recipe for this kind of thing. I've yet to meet a person who doesn't like it (assuming they eat sausage), including kids and people who don't like lentils. In case you need a recipe like that, I've included it at the end.

Monday night's Solstice celebration (held every year at at the UU fellowship of a friend of mine) was truly wonderful. There is something about this waning time of year, the time of silent growth in the dark places, that resonates for me. It's a time to set intentions, to gather inward all of the energy that usually gets spent outward, and to use that energy to grow the new things that the next cycle needs. Celebrating Solstice reminds me to set those intentions, to be mindful of them, and to give them what they need to grow. It's a time to look back and to internalize what I've learned, use it to move forward. And it's a good time to remember that to the darkest times, light will return.

I've also been knitting. On Sunday, I knitted up that little beaded tam I mentioned in my last post, and I love it so much that I wore it both Monday and Tuesday (I decided that wearing it today would constitute some kind of weird obsession, so I desisted, but it was a close call).
It actually looks all right, even with my short hair.
And I absolutely love the colors. Love them. This goes with just about everything I own, no kidding. I could wear it a LOT.
And the best bit is, this was 100% a stash hat. I had a skein of Koigu tucked away that I'd bought ages ago and hadn't used yet, and these beads are left over from a project I did a while ago. So, this is the Koigu Beaded Tam (my Rav page), made out of a skein of Koigu (with a titch left over, as I did the small size, and the medium size is still one skein) and 90 beads, on size two needles (with size zeros for the band), plus an itty-bitty crochet hook for the beads. I like this so much that I might knit another one to go with my Spiraluscious mitts and neckwarmer (a matching set! imagine!); I'm just not sure if I have enough of the yarn left over, and I can't seem to figure out how to buy more online. Weird... In any case, I need to knit tams for the girls, first, and for that I need to go find more beads somewhere. Maybe early next week I'll take them to pick beads out to go with the yarn for their hats (I think I posted a picture of that last time?).

I also realized that I never showed finished pictures of the socks I finished for Rick while I was in Philadelphia. He's worn them several times since and says they're very comfortable, which is good, as I fiddled a bit with my usual sock pattern.
I knitted these toe-up so I could use up all of this wonderful yarn (March Hare), which I absolutely adored; I bought this at Sock Summit, and I am so glad that I got some for myself, too, because otherwise I don't think I could have used this on socks for anyone but me. I really love this particular colorway, too. Anyway, I ended up with about two yards of yarn left, if that, so I think I made the right choice.

The two main modifications for these was to adjust the toe increases on each foot to more closely match the shape of Rick's foot; first I did half of the increases evenly paired on each side of the toe, then I did all of the rest of the increases only on the outside of the foot. I don't think I have a good picture of that. The other thing I did was to put the heel flap on the bottom of the heel and then make the gusset decreases paired along the middle of the back of the heel. This makes them look as if they aren't gussetted socks (since Rick doesn't like that look), while still getting to put in a heel flap (which I think wears better); it also puts the eye-of-partridge heel on the bottom of the foot, where a little extra padding is, I think, rather nice.
I don't know if you can see there that the eye-of-partridge is on the bottom of the foot, and the decreases are going up the back of the leg.
I'll have to see how these wear as he uses them more. I may make my pair the same way, so I can try it. I made a pair for Older Daughter like this, about a year ago, and they've certainly worn well, so maybe it's a good one. We'll see.

Meanwhile, it's time to work on that next batch of granola, and to start some of the cooking for tomorrow; with luck, I can get the red cabbage cooked, and the cucumber salad made, and maybe even the filling for the pork pie. And the rod grod? We'll see... I probably won't post again until after Christmas, so I wish each and every one of you peace and happiness.


Lentil Soup Recipe:
You'll need: an onions, some carrots, some celery, red wine that you would drink (the best way to test this is to pour yourself a glass as you start cooking), lentils (I use the regular old brown kind), a big can of V-8 (or your favorite tomato juice with herbs et al in it), a big can of crushed tomatoes, and three or four hot Italian sausages.

Put the sausages in a skillet to cook.

Cut up the onion and start sauteeing it in some olive oil. Drink some of your wine to get over the onion tears. Cut up the carrots (as many as you like, I usually use three or so), and toss those in with the onions. You can throw a couple of cloves of garlic in there, too, if you like; dealer's choice. Cut up the celery (I like to include some of the leaves from the heart of the bunch, too, but go with what you like), and chuck that on in there. Let it all saute together for a bit until the onion is tender. If you've put in garlic cloves, mash them up. Turn the sausages over and have a little more wine. Now, put somewhere between two and three cups of lentils into the pot with the veggies and stir them in. Then add the can of tomato juice, the can of crushed tomatoes, and a very generous slug of the red wine. You can also put in some water, depending on whether you want it to be more soupy or more stewy (you can add more water at any point in the cooking process, as you wish). Bring it to a boil, then lower to a simmer and let cook with the lid on until the lentils are tender. Meanwhile, whenever the sausages are mostly cooked, cut them up and throw them in the pot to finish cooking with the lentils. Serve with bread and maybe some parmesan cheese and more of the wine.

Giving thanks

Thanksgiving is one of my favorite holidays. In fact, the only thing that keeps it from being unequivocally my favorite holiday is the whole remnant pilgrim/Indian thing; it continues to strike me as insulting (at best) to insist on that particular national myth, as if the founding of this particular nation did not take place on the bodies of those who lived here before. I find the happy pilgrim/Indian iconography deeply disturbing, given the genocide that it hides. It is entirely reasonable (and in fact, so much more reasonable) to have a holiday whose main goal is to focus on giving thanks for what we have, without adding that layer of denial.

If all of that extra layer of myth-making were wiped away, then what would be left is, really, a harvest festival, something of which I heartily approve. Quite simply, this is the time to turn inward, the time when everything moves towards its winter rest, the time of quiet growth in the dark. At its heart, Thanksgiving seems to me to be a chance to stop a moment in order to be quietly grateful that I have food to eat, a safe, warm place to cook it, and people I love to share it with. The core things. The things that really matter.

One of the best bits about celebrating up here is that my parents' home has amazing access to walking paths and to the American River bike trail. So we've taken several long walks each day (to Tilly's great joy; on the topic of giving thanks, one of the best ways to remember to be grateful for the small things is to watch the joy of a dog running after squirrels).
The weather has, until this morning (the rain clouds finally arrived), been perfect, which makes for beautiful views of the river.
The whole trail along the American is lined with piles of rounded river rocks. I don't know whether they were carried there by the river in past centuries of flood, or whether they were piled there by intrepid panners for gold during the Gold Rush (Rick's theory; I subscribe to the former). I also don't know that it matters; I love looking at them either way.
Right now, the salmon are running, so the upriver side of the bars are filled with seagulls and vultures and herons, eating their fill of the river's bounty. These turkey vultures are taking a break from all the feasting in the sun.

Last but not least, I should mention that this year I'm feeling grateful to have finished Elektra Redux. It fits, I wore it last night, and I'm so much happier with it. Ripping and reknitting was the right choice.
The yarn survived the ripping fairly well, I think, and everything blocked out quite neatly. I'm much happier with the color distribution in this version, as well.
To recap. This is Elektra Redux (Rav link), knitted from Twisted Sisters Petite Voodoo (a silk/merino blend), on size five needles, size extra small. So I went down a size, both in pattern and needles, and it's definitely not too small. It fits much better than the first version, and I think I'll be wearing this a lot.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Seriously? Where did *this* week go?

I have got to pull my blogging schedule together! Right now, my work schedule is pretty crazy; once I get to campus, I'm in either meetings or classes all day long. So the one day I work at home is the day that I need to get grading done. And by the end of each day, I'm ready to fall over, and I just don't seem to have any more words left in me. I keep thinking that if I can just get past the next deadline, things will open up a little bit, but something always gets tagged on to the end. At this point in my mental calculations, I figure if I can just make it until mid-February (when the last of my current deadlines will come along), then I can take a little break. (Laugh with me now, people, laugh with me now.)

However, knitting does continue. I finished the first sleeve of Elektra last night and attached it to the back. One more sleeve, and then it's just the two fronts, and if I remember correctly from last time, those go quickly. Still no pictures, but progress is being made. If I can get the second sleeve done before the end of the week, I may take it in to my beloved LYS and ask for some help with the whole mattress stitch thing. I know it's supposed to be easy but honestly, I just can't seem to make mine turn out the way I know it's supposed to. And I think I've decided that it's silly to keep banging my head against that particular wall when I can go and ask for advice from Carol, finisher of garments par excellance (no fears, Carol, I'm just asking for advice; I'll do the actual work myself, I promise!). I only wish I knew as many ways to put a garment together as Carol does (and herein lies the reason why I knit so many shawls, socks, and scarves: no seams!).

I'm also contemplating whether and how much holiday knitting I'm going to do this year. The list keeps getting smaller and smaller. I'm down to between one and three gifts, with a strong leaning towards the "one" side of things. It feels selfish, but given that I'm going to be out of town for the next five weekends, with somewhere close to 2,000 miles of driving and a trip across the country and a conference paper presentation included in all of that, I think I need to make some sanity-preserving decisions here (let's not mention all of the grading that's about to come my way; talk about chickens coming home to roost!)(and who assigned all of these papers, you may ask? I'll never tell). As for the one present I really want to knit, though, I've already bought the yarn.
It's a ball of the tweedy Zauerball (am I spelling that right)? I absolutely adore the colors, and I'll be using this to knit socks for someone else I absolutely adore: my niece. She's the only niece I've got, and it came to my attention that she has no handknit socks (she's not deprived of handknits, mind you; she has a gorgeous poncho that both of my girls developed quite the lustful relationship with while we were in Cincinnati). So it's my hope that I'll get a pair of socks knitted up out of this before the holidays, but if I don't get done in time, that's OK. There's always Martin Luther King Jr Day presents to be distributed in mid-January, right?

All right. That's the quick update. I'm off in twenty minutes to drive to Bakersfield and Tehachapi for work this weekend. I'd better go pack!

Today is what?!

I'm having some trouble figuring out what day it is. If my calendar is right, it's Tuesday already. How did that happen? Last time I turned around to look, it was last Tuesday, and now it's this Tuesday, and that's pretty disconcerting. I'm behind on just about everything: laundry, exercise, sleep, getting over this head cold, knitting, reading blogs, writing blog posts, email. You name it, and it's not done.

But it's been a great week.

My parents and my aunt arrived last Monday, and we had a lovely visit with them. They admired our tree.
(That tin foil star on top? Rick made it for our very first tree in our very first apartment together, lo these many years ago, when we only had enough money for a teeny-tiny tree, one string of lights, and a box of red ornaments. I love it, and we're never replacing it.)

We had our Christmas eve party, and it was declared a success by all, even those who don't like pickled herring. Of course, we also had aqavit, glug, pork pies, pickled cabbage, cucumber salad, ham, cheese, bread, and rod grod for dessert. Mmm...

Christmas went equally well. The girls got the things that they most wanted (walkie-talkies for their expeditions into the ditch which is the open space between all of the yards in this part of our neighborhood, plus lots and lots of books), as did I. I'll share pictures of everything later, but for now can I just say Golding spindle, roving, and yarn?

On Friday night, we went to the Wild Animal Park for the festival of lights, which was great fun. The lions were in quite a mood just at dusk, making all kinds of deep throaty huffing noises, to our shivery delight (we all admitted that we really liked the look of the inch-thick pane of glass between us and them). We took the bus tour, which is fun to do in the dark, as the animals do all kinds of different things than they do during the day. It was cold, but I'd warned my parents and aunt to bring warm coats, so that was no problem at all (and it was not cold, I am absolutely sure, by the standards of those of you living in more easterly and northerly directions than I). I forgot the camera, so no pictures, but it's not like you can get very good pictures of animals at night in any case.

On Saturday, they all left, and we flipped the house in a couple of hours to get ready for a visit from one of my very best friends who is out here this week from Hawai'i. She thought it was really cold, which made me laugh in the same way that all of you northern and eastern people laugh when I say it's cold here. We had a wonderful time -- her girls and ours get along really well, which makes it even more fun to be together. We went to the zoo on Sunday, where I handed the camera off to Older Daughter who is much better about remembering to take pictures than I am. Of course, it's sometimes hard to tell what she's taking a picture of... (a warthog?)
But she got some great shots of the pandas.
And the polar bears.
(There are better ones of his face, but I am terribly entertained that he lies there just like Tilly does when she's chewing on a bone.)
And the mountain lions.
And her sister.
And her dad in his new sweater.
Yesterday, I had brunch with another dear friend in La Jolla while our friends from Hawai'i went to Legoland, and this morning, we saw them off to Disneyland for the rest of their trip. The house seems very empty...

So, the girls are weeding the garden (they've suddenly decided that they want to grow their own herbs and vegetables, and Older Daughter spent hours last night researching what should be planted this time of year, so who am I to discourage this behavior?), and I am going to start some laundry and sit down to spin a bit. Then I'll work some more on my kimono (I'm twelve inches into the back). Then I think it'll be time for a nap. I can't kick this cold (of course, some people -- coughRickcough -- would argue that I haven't been trying too hard, what with all the activity and late nights and all), so I think that some rest is in order over the next few days.

I hope that you all have had as wonderful a holiday as I have, filled with much love and laughter and friendship and joy.

Swatched

I've managed to get everyone out the door on their various errands this morning, which gives me a few brief moments to post before I need to start all of the cooking that's to be done today.

I sat down yesterday to work on the first sleeve of Rick's sweater, but when I measured it, I realized that I'd gotten to the recommended 17 inches before starting the cuff. I thought I'd better get him to try it on before committing to finishing it up, which meant that I had time to knit up a swatch for the Dofuku kimono. I duly knitted it up: stockinette, then the garter ridge of the handspun trim yarn, then about an inch of the ribbing. I washed and blocked it, and then I took a couple of pictures to show you (as well as a few pictures of the Christmas tree), and I settled in to download the pictures and post. But my computer and my camera had taken agin' each other, and wouldn't talk, so that didn't work. I decided that any picture was better than none, so this morning I went for a photobooth shot, and here it is.
The colors are all wrong; the base there is more of a blue spruce color, but I think it gives a good sense of the way the yarns work together. I'm pretty happy with the results, so I think I'll go ahead with this. I'm using a needle one size larger than that recommended on the label, but I like the way the fabric feels; with that needle I'm getting about 5 1/2 stitches to the inch, instead of the recommended 5, but I did the math, and if I knit the larger of the two sizes in the pattern I'll end up with the measurements for the smaller size which is what I wanted, so that's going to be fine.

I also finished the first sleeve of Rick's sweater and am most of the way done with the sleeve cap on the second sleeve. Once that's done, the sleeve should go fairly quickly, and then it's just a few rows on the neck and I'm done. There's a small part of me that has hopes of finishing it for Christmas; we'll see. Does anyone out there have much experience working with cotton? Can I just wash it in the machine and dry it to finish it, or will it need a thorough blocking the way wool would?

The plan for today is to do most of the cooking for tomorrow night's get-together. That means two pork pies, pickled cabbage, cucumber salad, and rod grod (a berry pudding that doesn't translate well; imagine umlauts over those o's). Once those are done, tomorrow's work is mostly getting things heated up and put on the table, plus making the cardamom bread for Christmas morning, so getting most of it done today takes the pressure off.

This just in: we've just (as in, it's still getting loaded onto the tow truck) donated our (very) old car to the San Diego Rescue Mission. I can't watch them tow it away. It's an '87. I bought it from my dad after college, and I brought both my girls home from the hospital in that car (went to the hospital in labor twice in the back seat of that car, too). Before that, it was the car that I brought my carsick puppy home in almost fourteen years ago. I loaded our pets and plants into it when we moved down here. I got that car stuck in creeks (literally, and that's a story and a half), drove it on hundreds of miles of dirt washboard roads, drove it through blizzards and freezing fog on all kinds of adventures, took it to do fieldwork, and got more speeding tickets in it than I care to count. I've owned that car longer than any of my homes. It was freedom and speed and the open road when I most needed all of those things. It was road trips and loud music and adventures. It's time to let it go, and it's to the right people, but I can't watch them tow it away.

Uncle

Well, aunt, really, I suppose. But uncle's what I'm crying.

To be honest, I cried it yesterday, and was going to post about that fact but didn't.

On Monday night, I cast on for my aunt's shawl. In veryvery fine, veryvery black, veryvery slippery yarn. I wasn't having fun, but I believed that I'd get far enough to make this whole thing work. On Tuesday morning I woke up knowing that I really just didn't want to be knitting this right now. What I really wanted was to be working on all of the projects that I'd set aside so that I could do holiday knitting, most of which are really simple stockinette-focused projects, the kind of projects that bring sanity to an insane week, rather than one more degree of craziness (and yes, a lace shawl on slippery black yarn would be an added checkmark on the crazy list; that way lies madness).

I wrote to a few people, all of whom were supportive and each of whom kindly told me that choosing sanity was not a cop out (I love you guys). And then Anne came up with the brilliant suggestion of giving my aunt a shawl pin as a sort of promissory note; the shawl will come for her birthday in September. By chance, I was going to Balboa park to some museums, and then to La Jolla for some holiday shopping, and I was sure I could find something in one of those places; if not, then I could rethink the giving up of the shawl. Long story short, I found a shawl pin, and a small pretty scarf (woven, not knitted), and I'm now covered.

My friend and I and our two older kids had originally gone to the park because this past Tuesday was the Museum of Man's free entrance day this month, and she'd thought her son might like the Egyptian exhibit there; I know that Older Daughter always does, so we went along. I like that museum (it's the anthropologist in me; they once had an exhibit on body art around the world, and it made me want to run out and get a tattoo instantaneously; gorgeous photos and beautiful art are a far worse influence on me than alcohol), and I think the mummies are pretty nifty, so that was all good. Then I saw a huge banner advertising an exhibit of kimono as art in the San Diego Museum of Art, with some on exhibit in the big museum, and some in the Timken, and it turned out that it was their free entrance day, too, so off we went.

People, those kimono were magic. Stunning. Rich and textured and layered in color and full of depth. I could have stood staring at them for hours. I wanted a bench, and for everyone to just Go. Away. so I could look at them as long as I wished. The artist used tie dye and overdyeing and hand painting and gold leaf and embroidery, all on textured silk (some of the silk was woven with thread-of-gold as the weft). I developed a case of covet like I rarely do in museums. I want those colors in my everyday life, I want to be able to rest my eyes on them and draw inspiration from them. Part of the exhibit is a set of some 30 kimono which are part of a larger group depicting all four seasons; they had fall and winter arranged around the edges of the room, each kimono's colors and themes blending into the next. Older Daughter was awestruck and kept commenting on how that's exactly what the real seasons do. The colors. Oh, wow, the colors. The exhibit closes on January 4th, and I think I'm going to try to get Rick down there before then; he'd like it. And I want to see them again.

I've been getting my checklists together for all of the things that need to happen between now and next week, and I was starting to feel like I could see how all of it was going to get done, when I got slammed yesterday by one of those really yucky head cold jobbies; you know, the kind where your head feels like a balloon, and your throat feels thick, and it hurts to swallow. I took a nap and had a yummy dinner (a soup made of baked mashed pumpkin with turkey broth and hominy, with tomatillo salsa and sour cream on top, and cheese quesadillas on the side), in the hope that I could drive this thing off post haste. I failed to get magically better over the night, though, so I'm downgrading certain expectations. A cookie decorating party on Saturday is now right out, and I'm giving myself permission to buy the dessert I'm taking to a friend's for dinner tonight if I don't feel like running to the store and then baking today. This is sanity. I'm going to do some knitting this morning, and then maybe take my puppy for a short walk (she's dying with all of this rain and no walks!), and then we'll see where we're at.

In the meantime, I've finished the sleeve cap of the first sleeve of Rick's sweater, which took forever. I finally got to spend some time last night with my drop spindle and the lovely Bunny and the Beast batt that Fuzzarelly sent me (that yarn, I think, is destined to be soft cuddle pillows for the girls' beds). I also found a couple of edgings in Nicky Epstein's first edging book (which may have accidentally slipped into my bag when I was buying my aunt her shawl pin -- oops) that I want to swatch for The Sweater for myself. And I think I'm going to knit myself a kimono from Knit Kimono (wonder where that inspiration came from?) out of another mess of yarn I have while I play around with swatches for The Sweater; I might even need to spin myself the yarn for the little bitty trim bits. That should keep me busy. (List O' Things To Do Before Christmas? What list? Shhh.... I'm knitting...)

Progress on the list

On December first (two weeks ago that is now, but who's counting), I laid out an ambitious holiday knitting plan (OK, I realize that it is in no way ambitious compared to the pros, but it felt big to me). I would first like to state for the record that prior to December the first, I had planned no plans with regard to the knitting of gifts. In fact, I think that it would be safe to say that my general attitude toward holiday knitting was something along the lines of, "I have plenty of projects on the needles, and I really want to knit myself a sweater, so if people want handknit gifts they can whistle for them". Actually, my thoughts were a bit more charitable than that, and what I really figured was that knitting for birthdays is a more sane plan of action, as they tend not to all happen on one day at the end of the year right after grades are due.

(This is only partly true, as there are an appalling number of June birthdays in our family, but I'm going to stand by that statement for now.)

Then the yarn sale happened. What I guess I'm trying to say here is that this is not my fault. Anyone, upon walking into their very favorite LYS in the world and seeing every single skein of yarn on sale, would have succumbed to the desire to purchase yarn. And anyone who feels guilty when buying large amounts of yarn this close to Christmas might find that it alleviates that guilt to insist to oneself that the purchasing is being done for the benefit of others.

(This doesn't exactly explain away the purchase of this yarn right here; but I'm not talking about that right now.)
(And anyway, can you say hello kestrel colorway? I had to buy it.)

Of course, many of you, being smarter than I, might have also realized that the haze of goodwill generated by yarn fumes should not blind one to the fact that the aforementioned yarn is, after purchase, still in need of knitting before it can be given to most people (this is not true if the recipient is a knitter, but I didn't have any of those on my list, alas). I, however, still under the influence of those fumes, trundled home and laid out the following ambitious plan:
A Swirl Shawl scarf for my sister-in-law
Mittens for my brother-in-law
Mitts for my niece
Icarus for my aunt

I may also have mentioned something about finishing Rick's sweater, and maybe some socks. See what I mean about those yarn fumes? More dangerous than a good single-malt, they are.

However, I am here to announce that two weeks later, I have achieved the following:
A swirl scarf for my sister-in-law
Mittens for my brother-in-law
A hat, which I'd intended to go with the BIL's mittens, but which looks so good on Rick that I think he's going to get it instead (don't tell, though, it's a secret)
Mitts for my niece.

This leaves me with Icarus for my aunt (her request), which I will be casting on tonight, just as soon as I'm done posting, and Rick's sweater. I think that I have reached a state of acceptance with regard to the sweater; it's not going to be done. As for the shawl, I'm engaging in some backup planning that involves wrapping up the unfinished knitting in a beautiful bag and giving it to my aunt for two minutes before demanding its return so that I can finish it. That should work, no? (Please tell me that there's someone else out there who's done this? I haven't tried it before, but I have read of it...)

Look! I even have photographic proof that I have, indeed, knitted as I say I have knat. (Can you tell I'm a bit giddy?)

First, the scarf. This is the Swirl Shawl pattern, which I modified to make narrower so as to knit a scarf instead of a shawl. I used Jojoland Melody yarn, which I found unexpectedly delightful; I'd definitely knit with it again. I ended up knitting a grand total of 31 swirls, which means 62 ends to weave in. I think I'm discovering the zen of end-weaving. I also did them a few swirls at a time, so that my zen wouldn't wear off (I know it's not supposed to, but I guess mine's not so solid yet).
(I should mention that these are all nighttime indoor photos; I have to send most of these off tomorrow, and with the rain we've been getting, there's not much in the way of good daylight in the daytime anyway.)

Then there were the mittens. We all know how traumatic that experience has been for me. I'd like to mention here that I asked Rick to try them on one more time tonight before weaving the ends in, and dang if they didn't fail to fit him again, but in a new and innovative way this time. I told him to go away and take his frightening mutant hands with him. How could I have known him for twenty years and never realized that he had mutant hands? Hear me now: I'm never knitting mittens for this man.

These are Anne's Lacunae mitts, made into mittens, and knitted from Cascade 220 yarn. I'm not so fond of the yarn, but the pattern is wonderful. The best bit about these mitts is that those warm little honeycombs almost completely disappear when they're not stretched out over a hand, and they just look like k2p2 ribbed mitts; but put them on and presto! You've got honeycombs! Love it.

The hat is also from the Lacunae pattern. I was requested not to do a full-face shot, as he's feeling rather scruffy today.

And then there are the mitts for my niece, being modelled here by Younger Daughter, who wants a pair. These are Tendrils mitts from MaryLou of Yarnerinas; I love this stitch motif, and had such fun knitting them that I'm thinking I might need to knit a pair for myself; I wish I could get a picture in better light so you can see how cute they really are. I used Lorna's Laces sportweight for them. I might actually be able to get another child-sized pair out of the skein. (Lorna's Laces, I should mention, has become one of my new surprise favorites; how did I miss how much fun it is to knit with?)

So there you have it, everything that got done in the last two weeks. I now have a week to get this last project done if at all possible. That and the rest of the holiday shopping, three plays, a party, cookie baking and granola making, and getting ready for Christmas eve and the big day itself, as well as for houseguests; oh, and I'd like to catch up on my blog reading. Crazy.