Happy belated holidays. As you can guess life has been busy. I had a lovely holiday season with my family and friends and I got extra special Christmas gift this year - a job! Yep a job. It’s a contract position for now, but could become something permanent. So far I really like the company so we’ll see what happens. The cool thing is I have officially registered as a company so I could be proper vendor for this job. This means if it doesn’t lead to permanent work I’m all set up to continue on as a freelancer.

Okay enough about boring life and onto knitting. I have been knitting like crazy over the holidays, sadly it’s been mostly on the same gift . I had a lot of trouble with the Cable Swirl Tam and Mittens from Creative Knits. I don’t know if I just didn’t understand the pattern for the tam or if it’s actually in error. It took three attempts and several unmentionable words to get a good tam out of the pattern. I ended up changing the pattern to make it work. The mittens were not an issue which makes me think the problem was the user (me) and not the pattern. Anyway here is the lovely set all done (please note I’m not modeling it since I don’t look good in tams or this shade of pink).

I’m continuing my work on the Welt sweater I started before the holidays and I can’t wait to wear it. The next project is going to be a Dr. Who scarf for my husband who has been complaining the I never knit him anything - which is sadly, almost true (maybe I fear the boyfriend sweater curse).

My latest gift is Cable Swirl Tam and Mittens in the recent edition of Creative Knits. I love the look of the pattern, but I found the written pattern to be a bit difficult to understand. It didn’t make sense in a few spots and didn’t explain that it’s pretty hard to keep the marker for the start of the round when the swirls have to cross over that spot. All in all I figured it out though and I think the recipient will really like it.

I’ve put the Scoop Pullover on hold so I can get my holiday knitting done. I have the extra time to work on projects since I’m out of work so I’m hopefully to have lots of handmade things by Christmas.

I’m almost done these wrist warmers which only took a few hours of knitting:

The pattern is in the current issue of Creative Knitting and called Drop the Gaunlet. It incorporates dropped stitches in the pattern which I’ve never done before. It’s pretty cool to purposely drop stitches and ripped them down. The set includes a scarf but I don’t think I’ll have time for that.

Well I suppose I should have been more surprised when I got laid off this morning. I guess I wasn’t shocked because, I almost saw it coming. For more than a year now I’ve been ignored and I’ve felt like no-one gave a crap about what I did. I guess this is the kick in the butt I needed to move on. Now I have the time and resources to do so.

I’m not sad that I won’t be working there anymore, but I am sad that we’ll will be struggling financially once again. If anyone needs a designer for freelance work or a knitter for just about anything let me know so I can feed my children.

It’s been a busy Fall, but not too busy for knitting. Here’s the red lace scarf completed:

And my latest project is Scoop Pullover from Interweave Knits.

Now that the basket weave scarf is done and in the hands of my good friend, I’ve started my next scarf. This one is also for a dear friend who helped me through DH’s illness. This is called Strangling Vine - yeah kinda a creepy name for such a lovely scarf. You can find the pattern here on allbuttonedup.com. I’m using the same yarn as the basket weave scarf - a mystery red mohair from my stash.

I’m about half way through this scarf for a dear friend who helped me alot through some tough times. It’s the Adobe Table Runner pattern from Interweave Knits Summer 2009 magazine. It’s rather pretty - I want one for myself. I’ve been toying with the idea of putting an nice picot edge on the ends.

Sorry for the not so great photo. I had to take this at work using PhotoBooth. I’m very happy with the finished result. Several people have given me compliments about it. One co-worker practically ripped it off me - stated that the colour would go perfect with her red hair (although this is true I’m not giving this one away).

I have very good reasons for my lack of posts this past month.

The main one being that my husband had a 12 day stay at the hospital 2 days after we moved into our new house. He spent 5 days in the I.C.U. and an additional 7 days in the general hospital fighting a frightening strep A infection. This is the same strain of infection that can lead to things like the flesh eating disease and rhematic fever. Several people haved died from it already this year.

I have a new respect for single moms. It’s been stressful trying to finish off a move, take care of very sick husband and do the day to day things needed for my girls.

It hasn’t stopped me from knitting though. Knitting has helped keep me sane.

Here’s little A’s finished owl.

And my new project is a lovely short sleeved top for me.

This is from Creative Knits - Spring issue. Sorry no link. I can’t find anything but their most current issue. You’ll just have to wait until it’s done to see what it looks like.

Here’s little G’s owl all done.

And little A’s owl is almost done - it just needs some eyes and feet.