Gift Wrap 2012 (Part 1)

Merry Christmas everyone!

I know I know, it's Christmas day, I should be spending time with my family, not sitting in front of a computer writing something that nobody is sure to read until probably next year.

Well to that I have two things to say.  The first thing is that I already spent all day yesterday with my family, and I will also spend all day tomorrow with my family.  Today so far I have spent all morning and part of the afternoon with my family, and the trend suggests that I will also spend the remaining part of the afternoon and all of the evening with my family.  I think they probably won't miss me (and I them) for an hour or so.

The second thing is that now that much of the Christmas knitting that I did has been distributed to their intended recipients, I can't wait any longer to show the projects off!

As I have said before, I was a little overly ambitious this year.  Although I started out with good intentions and did not mean to nearly drive myself crazy with Christmas knitting madness, most of the gifts I started were with tiny yarn and tiny needles and it would have been fine if just one or two were like that, but there were only a couple that WEREN'T like that.  Big mistake.  One that I am not going to make again.  Actually I probably will make that mistake again but at least not until next Christmas.

So, here are some of the projects that have now found their new homes (many of them photographed using my new photo studio in a box!.. but edited on my dad's computer which does not have much of a photo editor on it so I can't adjust colours/levels as much as I'd like to, but gimme a break, it's Christmas.):

First up, Highwayman Armwarmers for the Enabler.

This is the first time I have succeeded in knitting something for him in secret, so I was pretty proud of myself.  The colour of the yarn happened to perfectly match the colours that he picked out for the Earth and Sky scarf (shawl) that I made for him earlier this year, so I knew this yarn had to be something for him.  He wanted fingerless mitts for driving, so when I found this pattern I knew it was the perfect choice.

Next is the Cuss Hat for my (not so) little brother.

My evil big sister side really wanted to knit one of the... um... less family friendly charts, but better sense prevailed and I stuck with this one even though the other ones would have been hilarious.  Maybe when he's older. 

And now one of the most knitting madness inducing projects I took on this Christmas, Deep in the Forest Mittens for my mom.

The first one wasn't too bad, but I gotta say that starting the second mitten took an enormous strength of will and I nearly didn't make it.  Totally worth it though.

The last thing for today has a bit of a story to go with it.  Last year I made my dad a pair of fingerless mitts that he (said he) loved, but couldn't wear due to the Itch Factor.  Turns out that he has a sensitivity to wool, which is not something that a knitter likes to hear.  I vowed to make a better decision for him this year, so I chose a silk/cotton blend and was going to make him another pair of fingerless mitts.  Then I realized that silk/cotton would not make very good mitts, so for some inexplicable reason I decided to knit a tie instead.

Yes you read that right, a tie.  This tie, specifically (with modifications).  Who knits a tie??  Apparently I do.  This was clearly a symptom of my knitting induced madness.

In my haze, I knit the tie.  All 60 inches of it.  Well okay, it was about 62 inches by the time I stopped knitting, but that's because I kept measuring it and it was 58 inches every time I measured it.  I swear, three times over the course of an evening I measured it, and it was 58 inches.  After the third time I knew it had to be getting close, so I knit a few more rows, measured again, and it was 62 inches.  At that point I did what I could to retain some semblance of my sanity, and instead of ripping it back I said "CLOSE ENOUGH" and grafted the end together.

Then I blocked it.  I figured that it would grow a little during the soak, so I tried not to stretch it when I was pinning it out.  I measured it as I went and still managed to keep it to about 64 inches which I deemed CLOSE ENOUGH.

Finally Christmas Eve came around and I gave my dad the tie.  He was initially confused, then excited (only my dad would be excited over a knit tie... my knitting madness must have known that).  He put it on right away, but it was immediately obvious that it was too long.  He grabbed one of his usual ties, and we measured the ties next to each other.  The knitted tie was 72 inches long.  As my dad is about 5'9", the tie was taller than he is.  Something had to be done, as I wasn't about to let the second present in a row be a failure.

I slept on it, and today I did a tie-putation.  I marked the 60 inch point with a needle and set to ripping the tail back.

It was actually pretty fun.

It didn't take that long before I'd ripped it back enough, got the stitches back on the needle and grafted the end back together.

Now my dad is totally ready to rock.  All the other dads on the playground are gonna be super jealous.

Best tie/shirt combo EVAR