A Chullo for Christmas

I decided to do an additional Christmas present for DH at the last-minute - this is the Andean Chullo from the Knit Picks kit that is unfortunately no longer available. I made some changes after reading some of the Ravelry comments about the hat. 1. I added 3 colors of teal to the beige and brown colors that came in the kit. 2. I added 16 sts to the cast on number. 3. I made the hat much shorter. 4. I striped the top decrease section. 5. I made the I-cord ties longer. 6. I did thicker applied I-cord to make sure the ear flaps won't curl. 7. I used this Raveler's method for the I-cord so the cast on edge wouldn't show through the I-cord.

I think it will fit him really well - the hat is wet in the photo but I'll get a shot of him wearing it after Christmas . When I got the kit several weeks ago he was the one who decided on adding teal for some extra colors and he also specifically requested no alpacas. (There actually is a very small alpaca motif near the top - the alpacas are black - but I doubt he'll notice.) Best of all it will be a surprise because he never pays attention to what I'm knitting.

Knitting the chullo was so much fun; I immediately went and downloaded Mary Ann's Polar Bear Chullo and I think I'll get Shirl the Purl's Blossoms Chullo pattern as well. Plus I want to make another one of the Knit Picks chullos with the alpaca patterns.

Another FO is this gingerbread house we made from a kit we received as a gift. It was DH's wacky idea to use cheerios on the roof but my piping skills for the window frames were non-existent. Plus DH kept eating the candy during assembly so we ran out.

Bubbles is modeling one of her Christmas gifts - a new plush bed. She currently has about 12 in all shapes, colors, and sizes and she never actually manages to get her entire self in the bed. She prefers to position only her front half or back half in a bed or sometimes she will stretch out over two beds. It's a pretty tough life for our large white house bunny.

I hope you all have a wonderful holiday - I will try to return next week with more about floats.

Christmas Knitting

I am not doing much in the way of holiday knitting this year but I did make a few items for DH. I'm planning a backpacking themed Christmas stocking for him this year. I bought a little firestarter, a tiny battery-operated reading light, and a fleece neck gaiter.  I'm going to make him some homemade trail mix and energy bars. Above you can see the knitted items I'm adding to the stocking. I did some worsted weight socks (Valley Yarns Northampton) with the requested 10 inches of ribbing (snore) and also made some fingerless mitts. They look strange but he has a pretty wide thumb angle so I think they'll fit him well. Actually it turns out I have a bit of yarn left so I might add a quick ribbed headband in the same yarn.

Bubbles would like to wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving! As usual she's starving and hopes her Thanksgiving feast starts as soon as possible.

Bubbles is fat!

I haven't been doing a good job of photographing Ms. Bubbles lately and I really need to. For some reason I can see how fat she is in photos but not in person! Perhaps she is like me and far lazier in the warmer months. DH says I spoil her rotten but he's the one always giving her extra treats. She's actually more active than many of my previous rabbits zooming from room to room, ripping up her beloved phone books and tossing hay around so I get to vacuum constantly.

Orange Socks, White Rabbit

I recently joined the Solid Socks group on Ravelry. I have all this really old bright sock yarn that has long since been discontinued. I think of it all as candy colors or circus colors and I am not sure I want to use all the colors together in colorwork. Anyway, the group has challenges each month and June's color is orange.

Here are the Puppy Love Socks designed by Pauline Schultz from the Joy of Sox. I used Froehlich Blauband (color 59) and size 2.75 mm dpns. I did do a few mods - I made the legs longer by adding three pattern repeats, I did a longer toe, and I did a regular cast on for the triangles on top and just picked up the stitches. It is a nice, easy pattern that is perfect for these hot days where I keep the house pretty dark.

Bubbles actually came over and plopped her large bunny self right down next to the socks during the photography session. She usually doesn't like the camera but I guess she felt her photo hadn't been on the blog in a long time. In other important Bubbles news, this summer we learned that she hates watermelon but loves blueberries.

I'll post some pillow photos this week as soon as the pillow forms I ordered show up.

Spring Fever

I'm almost finished with the latest pair of gloves. I was sure all the Red Sox/Yankees games would help me knit faster but I think spring fever is distracting me.

In lieu of knitting content here are two photos of Bubbles. She really is difficult to photograph unlike my last rabbit Peaches who was a camera hog. One thing I noticed is that when I get out the camera Bubbles always puts her ears back as in the photo below. She looks a little concerned, doesn't she?

In this photo I was trying to get an Easter type photo of a bunny and a basket and I added the greens to get her interested. I actually thought she had lost some weight but in this photo she still looks quite pudgy.