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Since today is the last day of the year, I thought I'd live one of my favorite expressions "start as you mean to go" in honor of the next year.
Today I bought yarn (heeh), worked out (despite an icky cold) and will spend the evening out with friends. Awesome.
Happy New Year to all of you!
Yay for being back home! It feels like I've been gone ages.
Thanks for all the lovely Christmas wishes. We had a nice Christmas and I even made it home from the UK in time to RUN for a flight to Boston to have some yummy Christmas dinner at Claudia's. Kudos for clearing customs in record time.
I haven't worked on big, sweater type projects for ages. I'm jonesing to pick up my worsted weight fair isle and get that going. I may not have time since I've got to go back to work on the 2nd...Maybe if I don't leave the house or bathe today...maybe...
I did work on some blanket squares. I've got ten completed. I think I'll need 30 or 40 total, so that's good progress. Rather than boring you with some unblocked blanket squares, I'll just post my Rav link to the project.
Well for Christmas, Typepad just ate my post. Awesome.
I'd recreate it, but I'm a bit jet lagged. We had a good flight into London Gatwick today (24th). I forced myself to stay awake and hit the shops before early closing this afternoon. I only bought things for myself, so noone get excited.
County Mall here in Crowley, West Sussex pretty much has everything I'd need to survive indefinitely. I found some paperbacks at WH Smith, a cute boho sweater on sale at Debenhams and tons of snacks/food/wine at Marks and Spencer. Good times.
I started to walk about the High Street here in Crawley, but began flagging when the double espresso ran out of potency. I did find a lovely church to admire with the requisite mossy walls and tower thingy. I am content with the jetlag.
So before I run out of steam and internet minutes, Merry Christmas to all who celebrate and best wishes to all. Home (my sister's anyway) tomorrow for a tardy Christmas dinner and probably a coma :) Kisses!
Dear Winter:
I don't care for you.
Best regards,
Silvia
Me - yesterday - Detroit - 5 degrees FARENHEIT (wtf)
Tomorrow - London - 52 degrees Farenheit (love love love)
So I have to work on Christmas eve and Christmas day, but at least I won't freeze my ass off. See how you can find an upside if you look hard enough? Oh yes, I also had the opportunity to wear my new hat. Tons of upside.
Christmas is coming and that means I make caramel. I plundered came across this recipe via my sister's blog. Rosemary (aka Spindlerose) has an awesome recipe she posted last year. I've made it with great success, so you know it can't be hard.
I've made caramel for some gifts, and of course, eatin'. I'm still wrapping them up so I can send them off. I find a wrap 10, eat 1 ratio just perfect. Aw go ahead, make some caramel! Now I'm off to the gym.
I am a great admirer of the slouchy hat trend we are presently enjoying. I began last week to make up a quick hat with some leftover black stash yarn. After copious amounts of ripping and actually finishing an abomination of a hat, I gave up and went to work for a week.
I had been bested by the slouchy hat. Upon reflection, I decided that I didn't like the first slouchy beret because I looked like a victorian housemaid. I then embarked on the "less slouch is more journey".
I found a cute hat on the Anthropologie website that would be great if it wasn't $38 for an acrylic hat. It was a chunky hat and my yarn was worsted weight, but other than that it was easy enough to try to replicate.
I swatched, calculated and cast on while watching my 49ers lose (surprise). I'm happy enough with the resulting not so slouchy hat. A nice addition to my small hat collection.
I seem to be experiencing a general sock malaise for travel projects at present. I thought it best to seek out another portable project until my lust for the sock returns. I found a blanket square project-along-amajig to fill that niche. It's the Wolhemelblanket (rav link) started by a Dutch knitshop (signups are now closed though). Just the ticket.
I believe from my sketchy perusal of the schedule, it's a square a week and I'm about 10 weeks behind. Whatev. They're easy enough to make and are nice textured patterns and cables. I chose to use Woolease in the Fisherman colorway for its washer/dryer properties. I don't really think a non washable blanket is that useful in my world. I've used the Woolease once before for a blanket (see the white thing under the squares - that's it) and it worked out just fine. I've had that one several years and it's still clean and white.
I also made a black hat from a nice hank of reclaimed yarn that I had leftover from Ariann. In fact I started this hat 3 times and finally finished it yesterday. My own improvisation for the pattern. Where's the picture you wonder? I tried on the finished hat (mind it looked ok when I tried it on during the knit up) and looked like a huge dork. Huge. Hated it. It has been ripped and rolled up in a nice black ball of yarn. If you'd like to see what that looks like email me privately. No, I didn't think so.
Better luck was had with the cookies. What cookies? Why isn't the lead blog story? Settle down.
Every year my friend and I buy the yummiest Pfeffernusse from Trader Joe's at Christmas. This year they were nowhere to be found. We were inconsolable, as a face full of powdered sugar just screams Christmas to us! Not to be thwarted by the Trader Joe's buying office, I scouted for recipes and made a batch. Super freaking yummy, and better still, darn easy. I did omit the candied fruit because I'm the only one who likes it (in the whole world). I also switched the booze in the recipe to a dollop of kirsch. That's how my people roll. Apparently they keep for a week in a airtight container, or you can just eat them up (that's what we did).
Oh btw, those jokesters at Trader Joe's now have the Pfeffernusse in the holiday food display. They're hard to find, I've yet to find them in stock. It's kind of like stalking at this point though. Mmm, cookies.
Carolyn asked me the other day what I was knitting and I replied "everything". I keep starting things, but nothing is progressing. I suppose that means I'm either thinking about the evolution of the project or I'm mentally 4 years old. It's one of those.
In an attempt to distract you from my lack of knitting pics, I have layover pix from Kuwait City from last week. Man that's one far away place...Knitting progress next stop!
Some people have a great sister. Some have great friends. I am lucky enough to have both wrapped up Claudia. Today is Claudia's birthday so please go wish her all the best.
In our birthday blog tradition, I've found a nice photo of Claudia (and me) from September 1978! Those are both our natural haircolors! Holy moley! I'm pretty sure in 1978 we didn't get along all that well so this must be a rare photo during a cease fire. Luckily Claudia and I chilled out and grew to be good friends. Good, bad or ugly, my sister has my back. That's pretty great!
Happy birthday Claudia! Wishing you a fabulous birthday! Much love, Silvia.
Preblogged because I'm currently flying back from Kuwait. But that won't stop me from wishing my sister a happy birthday darnit!
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