Up to my ears

Wow, time flies quickly at the holidays doesn't it?  Thanksgiving was a week ago already.  We had a nice time in Newton, Mass at my aunt's house, catching up with family, taking the traditional post-meal walk to a local park to see the tree planted for my grandfather many years ago, and of course, eating:

Ooh!  I forgot to take a picture of the dessert I made but this is what you do:  Melt 2 cups of white chocolate chips, fold in 1 1/2 cups roasted, salted almonds and 1 1/2 cups craisins.  Drop by spoonfuls onto waxed paper and put in fridge for 20 minutes.  YUM!  They were a big hit.

This year Paul and I decided to stay overnight in a hotel instead of making the 3-hour trip each way all in one day.  We stayed at the same hotel as my sister and 3 nephews so it was nice to watch them playing in the pool and then having breakfast with them the next day.  My youngest nephew, age 9, kept saying, "I love this place!" since they had a free candy/snack bar from 5-7pm as well as all you can eat breakfast with every kind of breakfast food imaginable.  His plate:  3 pastries, frosted flakes and a soda.  He wanted to go back for more but my sister had to draw the line somewhere - so he picked wheat toast with cream cheese.   That's kudos to my sister -  he knows what's healthy!

Here is what adults think is great about the hotel:

Silly!

Crabtree & Evelyn products!
(I totally took them all home.)

Ok, so now it's after Thanksgiving and I'm in full on what-has-to-get-done-for-Christmas mode.  My knitting gift list seems to be growing.  I've got that oh-i-could-totally-knit-fifty-things-by-Christmas frame of mind because "It's still November."  Ha!  Until tomorrow.

The good news is I made a pair of thumbless mitts for Benjamin and Michaela's new cousin:

And I only have the toes to do on the socks for I'm-not-telling-you-who:

I know.  They look totally weird - like the leg is too narrow or something.  But, that's because the leg of the sock has  a ribbed pattern.  When they are on a foot, I'll take a picture and they will look normal.

Then I have to finish something else already started for someone else.  Start and finish something for another someone. And make something out of these for three other someones:

Don't you just love that?  You're totally getting no information.
Needless to say, I'll soon be up to my ears with knitting.

Then there is tree shopping and shopping shopping. For tree shopping, we help Paul's mom get her tree and so we get ours at the same time.  She likes to go to a local fire house in order to support them, but we have to go early in December before they run out (last year we got there too late) so it looks like we may be doing that this weekend.  And we'll likely make it a group trip and bring Paul's brother and his family (including my two doodlebugs, M & B) with us!  For shopping shopping,  Paul and I try to pick a strategic Sunday morning as early as possible since it seems to be less crowded.  Preferably the Sunday after a Saturday night snowstorm.  That year was the best for getting all our shopping done with no crowds.  Took the 4 wheel drive truck to the mall and saw about 4 other people there.  I hope that happens this year.

In Book News:
I read The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes and really enjoyed it!  A thought provoking story about a man who reflects on his high school/college years with friends and when some of those friends come back into his life much later, how his perception of what happened is re-framed.  That's it in one sentence.  A fairly quick read - the book is only 176 pages, but it's packed with so much story and things to think about.  It's not my usual mystery/suspense/detective book packed with action, which seem to be my favorite, but it was great.  I think it would make a nice holiday gift if you know someone who loves to read. Click up there or here to get it on Amazon:

And now I'm on to another mystery/suspense book, but I'll tell you about that another time.

That's it.  I'm off to knit.

Triple Double...

....Neapolitan Oreos!

No. Joke.  Vanilla cookies with strawberry and chocolate fillings. Paul and I discovered these in Target the other day.  Want to know how?  We were out doing errands after work, trying to hurry so we could get home and have dinner.  I need to run VERY QUICKLY into Target to get cat litter.  The pet aisle is very near the check-out line, so really, it would have been a lickety split trip.  The minute we walked in the door, Paul said, "Are you sure you don't need anything else?  It seems like  a waste to be here and not just browse around a little to see if we need anything."  As an aside, it is a general agreement between us that he really can't come grocery shopping with me because we end up with double the amount of items that are on the list.  And the extra items are usually treats, i.e. "third desserts".  So browse we did.  And we came home with these Oreos.  Which we definitely "needed". Quite yummy, surprisingly.

In Knitting News:
My Lucy Hat!:

I still haven't sewn down the brim.  Part of my excuse is that I didn't do the best job blocking it because I really need a head/hat form to dry it on.  I've been looking for one at all the flea market/antique shows we go to, because I like the look of the old-fashioned ones, but either they are very expensive or not for sale (just displays for the hats that are for sale).  On the other hand, I could have purchased a styrofoam one online or likely have borrowed one from The Spinning Room yarn shop, but I didn't think of it at the time.  Plus I was impatient and wanted to see how it turned out.  So.  I love it.  But I will love it more when it is blocked correctly.  Did I mention that the main color is yarn I spun myself????!!!!?!?!?!

Also, my SKYP socks are coming along slowly.  Not too much knitting got done this week since I was quite busy with babysitting my little doodlebugs. Pause the blog to say:  They are so darned cute.  We are in the read-this-book-10,0000-times-in-a-row stage.  Also, starting to try to say words: I say, "Benjamin, can you say 'book?'" and he says, "BA!".  I say, Benjamin, can you say, 'dog'?" and he says, "BA!".  I'm reading a book that says, "Bubbles, bubbles, POP, POP, POP!" and Michaela says, walking around the room with her stuffed Clifford dog, "POP POP POP POP POP POP POP".  They just make me laugh so much!
And so, here are the socks:

And a closeup of the skyp pattern:

Sorry.  Not great at closeups with my camera (not a great camera...), but I think you get the idea.  A pretty, subtle pattern.  And, despite not getting far, I got this far pretty quickly.  It's a very easy and quick, two-row pattern.

Oh, and I had another shopping "accident".  Except it was planned.  The Spinning Room had a Cascade Yarn Tasting and all the Cascade yarns were 20% off.  I know! Right????? I had to....

The light must be good in here today because
that is exactly what the colors look like.

Six skeins of Alpaca Lana D'oro - enough for a sweater, i hope; and 2 skeins of Cascade 220 Superwash Sport -maybe for mittens or a hat.  Oh my gosh.  This is really bad, though.  My stash has seriously gotten out of hand.  Especially recently - I've made several purchases of yarn for sweaters.  When will I knit them all????  Maybe I'll get a picture of my stash for next post.

In Book News:
I finished reading .
I learned about these Carl Hiaasen books from listening to the 2 Knit Lit Chicks podcast.  One of the women on the podcast loves these books and thinks they are hilarious so I thought I'd give one a try.  This one was definitely a fun read with lots of excitement and humor.  A perfect next-book after reading
Chaz Perrone is a self-involved, inept, marine biologist who throws his wife off a cruise liner.  Unfortunately for him, she is a great swimmer and survives the plunge into the ocean.  It is then her mission not to turn him in, but to get revenge.  Excitement and hilarity and some romance ensue.  There are a few sub-plots mixed in, which add to the humor, one of which involves the detective investigating the wife's disappearance.  He is apparently a recurring character in Hiassen's books.  I will definitely read another.

But now, I'm off to start: