The Best Present

The best Christmas present I got this year came from someone I never expected anything from. I got $$$ to buy more yarn, and some lovely earrings from Buster, and some other fun stuff from various people, but this wrapping paper wins. What came in it is also the coolest: tongs for tea sandwiches. Stay tuned for pix of these amazing utensils. Thank you, Sean!!!

Flying HIgh

Whenever I have a big party, I set up the bar first. Then everything else seems to fall into place somehow, and I'm certainly in much better spirits just envisioning the happy whistle-wetting which will soon take place. This year the holiday is at my house. Some time ago, my mother-in-law gave me a nativity set which has 3 St. Josephs, 4 Poor Shepherds, and 2 Baby Jesuses. I turn the extra St. Joes into more Wise Men, and the Poor Shepherds become a crowd scene. But you can't have 2 Baby Jesuses! So I took one manger boy away and put him on the bar between the Tanqueray and the Maker's Mark. His little fists are outstretched towards each bottle, like he can't decide which type of booze he wants to sample first. Bourbon or gin? Gin or bourbon? Sacrilegious, sure, but it makes me laugh. Happy Birthday, Baby Jesus!

Pictogram

Wait! Is anyone else out there as shocked as I was when I figured out what this picture is trying to say? Take 2 seconds....Does anyone else think it was worth the 5 bucks I paid for such a cheap (in all senses of the word) laugh?

Hats

I have a serious addiction to making hats. Knit, sewn, crocheted, whatever. But mostly knit. All heads need hats, even hats that don't fit. "Seriously." Why is "serious" always the adjective of choice for "addiction?" Probably because it is rather dire when one stops doing absolutely everything else one is put on this Earth to do, including bathing and eating, but especially working and doing chores of any sort, in order to pursue the fix. I'm just very grateful my addiction is to hats and not to other more dangerous substances. Which isn't to say I don't need intervention! But here are some good things about hats as the substance of choice abuse: they won't rot your teeth or your liver, and they're handy for quick costume/mood changes. I really could just lie around making hats for hours and hours and hours. By doing so I've learned two-fisted Fair Isle and other haute école knitting skills, and my hands have gotten stronger. But my aerobic capacity has definitely plummeted and the publication date of Lucky Find Gazette #13 has been postponed until some hazy far-off future date. Ground Hog's Day? And I haven't read even the cheesiest, breeziest romance in months. Uh-oh.

Saggy Snood Saga

I knit this Chistmas hat for someone with a big noggin — but not that big! He'd have to have a head circumference of 29" in order for it to actually fit. The trouble began when I read my swatch as 6 stitches per inch instead of 5 stitches per inch. I don't know how I did that. Wine? Weak glasses? Partly it was due to the alpaca yarn, which looks thinner than worsted. So I had a preconceived notion that it would knit up smaller on #7 needles than my usual wool on #9 needles. It did not! Weird. Blame it on the defenseless yarn! I picked up stitches on the brim, decreased, and added some ribbing. Now I wear it as a snood. If I had 25 pounds of dreadlock to stuff up into it, it would look much better. However: it's soft, keeps my head warm, and hasn't been wrapped like every other hat I've knit this season.

Garden of Snowpuffs

This is the same shot of my garden as featured two days ago, six months later. It's snowing outside! One of the best things about growing weeds (i.e., "native plants") is how little work you have to do for four seasons of wild beauty.

Cold Weather Dreams

I dream about my garden in the summer sun when it's this ass-biting cold out. My hands are chapped from the weather and shredded from Christmas decorating and Christmas hat knitting, so I like to remember the soothing days of mud manicures while I relax with some wassail of the evening.

Yellow Chin

As I plan all of my holiday dishes, I realize that I'm going to have to go out and buy a lot more butter. Mashed sweet potatoes with spicy browned butter. Green beans almondine sautéed in butter. Butter-basted turkey stuffed with onions, garlic, thyme, and lemon. Cornbread stuffing baked with butter. Hot buttered Meyers rum. You get it. The only thing I'm cooking that won't be laced with sweet creamery butter is the cranberry chutney. How could something that makes stuff taste so dad gum good possibly be bad for you? I'm sure they'll someday discover it isn't.

Me On Vodka

Yes, that's me in the orange dress, at a holiday party over the weekend. I deviated from my normal red wine and had a (few) virtually calorie and carb free vodka cocktail(s). Vodka is not my drink. I don't feel the slightest bit inebriated after a (few) vodka cocktail(s). But somehow my face has turned red, my ears are full of high-pitched steam kettle whistles, and when I try to walk, I fall over! Without feeling even a little tipsy. Huh?

Would You Wear This Hat?

Now, here's a really ugly hat I have a pattern for. But I'd never give away a copy of it, because no matter what color you knit it in, it would still be ugly. Even the model's lovely lipstick and well-shaped brows can't make it pretty. The world is already full of ugly hats, especially around this time of year. I know because I've just knit 10 for Xmas gifts!

Here, Kitty, Kitty!

Last night Bigfoot screamed to be let out at 2 AM, so we let him out despite the frigid temperatures, because what Bigfoot wants, Bigfoot gets. (If we hadn't let him out, he would have just jumped up onto the headboard, yowling, and dive-bombed us from there. Until we cried, "Uncle," and opened the front door. We know this from personal experience. ) I was worried about the cold, but not enough to stay awake. "He'll just scream when he wants back in," I thought as I nodded off. But this morning, instead of his usual screaming at the front door, he decided to scream from a new vantage point: the screen to our bedroom window. Which is about 5 feet from the ground. How he jumped and hung on without ripping the screen in two is a mystery. I opened the window and pulled him off the strangely intact mesh, and he immediately began purring with pride over his own athleticism and ability to keep us guessing.