Tag Archives: snowflake by tin can knits

Grateful Every Day!

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Tuesday, December 3, 2024

It started out to be another gray morning here on the lake but then the sun came out! Yay!!! I’ve been struggling with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) which is like depression and it’s been a rough week or two. I’m fighting to get stuff done in advance of the holidays and around the house … falling behind leads to a nightmare and I’m happy that I’ve been mostly keeping up. Anywho … the reason for this post is to share our wonderful Thanksgiving with our family in Massachusetts and that’s what I am going to focus on.

As always, we had a ball with the family. My brothers and their wonderful wives, nieces, nephews, son and his fiancee, and my sister-in-love’s brother and his girlfriend, two of her children and his daughters, too. Add three little kiddos and five dogs and you’ve got our evening! There had to have been 25 of us! And for the second or third year, there was a polar plunge involved. “We” (not me and not my hubby) jumped off the commercial dock in Marblehead and everyone survived. We guessed the water in the harbor was in the 50 degree range, but that’s a guess. It was cold for sure. My brother, two of his sons, my son and his fiancee all jumped in. I’m in awe!

We had a lobster feast for Thanksgiving because it can be cooked outside and the menu was incredible: shrimp cocktail, clam chowder (from the Causeway Restaurant in Gloucester, MA .. the best we have ever had), steamed clams, lobster, and salmon, a salad and grilled ciabatta. John B. brought the traditional Marblehead Thanksgiving desserts – cannoli and ricotta pie from an Italian bakery in Lynn. If anybody didn’t have fun, it’s their fault! I’m so grateful to have an extended family that I love spending time with and my hubby said yesterday, “I had a good time at Thanksgiving!” That says a lot. There’s never enough time when we’re all together and that, too, says a lot. How incredibly lucky we are.

The second night we had a pulled pork taco night. We brought our “insta-pot” down with us and went out to gather ingredients on Black Friday. And then on Saturday we had a traditional turkey dinner with all the fixings. I came home with an extra 5 pounds. LOL.

And what would a beautiful turkey dinner be without some turkey stock cooked right after the clean-up? The kids filled two “handles” with stock to carry back to New York City and I thought the idea to package it in the empty liquor bottles was brilliant and a bit funny.

On the way home, DH and I stopped for lunch with a friend from summer camp way back in the dark ages and then we stopped at Costco … spending time until we could pick up the dog at the kennel at 6pm. It was a nice, easy, no traffic ride home.

AND!!! I’m so happy to report that I finished a pair of socks for my darling sister-in-love in Massachusetts. She’s very knit-worthy and I’ve never made her a pair of socks so I had some Christmassy Raggi sock yarn in my stash that needs to be knitted up and I made her a pair of socks. I loved the way the yarn did its self-striping thing and the socks will keep Annie warm this winter inside her 200+ year-old house.

I also finished Sylvie’s Christmas sweater and sent it and her Advent calendar that I made on to New York City. I love the sparkly buttons and I am really fond of the sweater pattern (although the button plackets were a bit weird!) I hope it’ll fit her.

Snowflake by Tin Can Knits in Berroco Vintage DK

While we were away, I was given two more knitting for Christmas assignments and went in to Marblehead Knits for some yarn. One color had to match ST’s “signature” nail polish color and will be his running mitts. I’ll probably make a headband, too, but it may be after Christmas so I can measure his head. I also am replacing a hat for BS that he (mistakenly) washed with his laundry and felted. One more chance, B! LOL. Both of those projects will be easy to complete before the holidays but today is going to be for seaming my Lane’s Island pullover. I’d love to get it together before Christmas so I can wear it. It’s the perfect weight for being inside with a shirt and light sweater. I’ve got my first Lane’s Island on today, in fact.

I’ve finished a little pair of watermelon socks for Sylvie’s Advent calendar and I’m working on a pair of shortie socks for her mom or me … and the Octopus hat from hell has been sent and is much loved despite its horrible history. I’ve written about it on the last post. And I’ve now felted superwash yarn. And they say it can’t be done. Ha!

On my needles … all stuff that I have to really think about (except for the pair of shortie watermelon socks) so I have made precious little progress. I’ve got to finish the Arne & Carlos MKAL stocking and may get to it this weekend. I’ve got to make a bit of progress on the Fair Isle bag “swatch” for my Fair Isle knitting class, too. I’ve got a few rounds in and then stopped. I did very little knitting while we were away. I’d still like to make a pair of socks for my DH for his Christmas stocking. I have to get him a gift, too. Have I ever mentioned that I don’t love Christmas? It feels like tremendous pressure just thinking about it. We won’t put up a big tree (we have a little pre-lighted fake tree) but I’m going to get my Advent mini-jumpers hung this year. I really want to see them hanging!

I need to get off the computer and get some “work” done so I can knit. I have minutes from a meeting to upload and the laundry needs to be moved from the washer to the dryer but I wanted to reflect on how very grateful I am … even still today … after our Thanksgiving visit with family. We have remarked that we never seem to have enough time together and that, in itself, is such a blessing. I hear so many people who don’t want to have to spend time with their family and we can’t wait to have more time together!

Gone knitting.

What a Week!

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Monday, November 25, 2024

Well, the last one has been a tough week. I seem to be suffering from a bit of a depressive episode, not atypical for me at this time of year, due to the stretch of gray days and less light. I’ve hooked up the light thingy that I have and hope that will help and today it’s actually sunny which will also help. I also lost a dear family friend this week. We met when our kids were little at the beach in Weekapaug, RI. The Shelby family quickly became good friends because my eldest daughter and their youngest daughter bonded immediately. They’re still close all these 30-some years later. Anyway, Linda was a dear friend, always laughing and sarcastically funny, bright, creative and just a great woman. Linda got Alzheimer’s Disease, just like my mother, at an early age. She passed away Thursday at 72 years of age. Way too young. I will miss her and I’m grateful that she’s no longer suffering. That’s also brought up feelings around the loss of my mother at 76 back in 2008. I’m glad it’s Thanksgiving week and I don’t have to be anywhere so I can just be … and work through the feelings as they roll in. Nobody said that life would be easy.

I’ve had a big frustration with a commission that I had, too. I was asked to knit an adult-sized “Have You Seen My Octopus” hat for a high school friend who saw the one I made for our granddaughter. I bought the Malabrigo yarn and after ripping the hat back more than once, finally got the knitting done to my satisfaction. I blocked it – and it GREW! I’ve never had anything grow like this hat. If a hat is too big for my big fat head, it says a lot. So, because there’s no los when the hat is way too big, I wet it again and put it in the dryer alone. Twenty minutes and no change at all. SO I threw it in with a wet load of laundry and let it go … and it felted up to a decent size but it was too fluffy and looked “worn”. I reached out to my customer and told her about it and we decided that I’d send it to her so she can see what it looks like and it’s up to her to keep it or not. I’ve got almost $40 in yarn and about 10 (probably more) hours of work into the hat … ugh.

not really the color but the size is good
the color is washed out a bit and fuzzy

Yesterday I took the second part of the Fair Isle knitting class online with Janette Budge. What a generous teacher she is! I started knitting my bag/swatch after the class and ran into a color conundrum … if I continued knitting as planned, I’d have a yellow/gold motif colorway at the middle of the design AND a yellow background color. I didn’t think that would work. So, I emailed Janette and had a thoughtful answer back in a very short while. I am very grateful and can continue knitting now with renewed hope that the colors will work.

This is the gathering of colors that I chose. In the front are the background colors, theoretically a gradual shade change from white to yellow. In the back (at the top of the photo) are the motif colors. Again, they’re supposed to be a fade from dark to light. The bag will start and end with navy and the salmon color will be the “pop” of color in the middle of the motif. As I’d planned it, though, the yellow of the background colors and the third or fourth motif color (the golds) would be at the middle of the motif at the same time with little contrast and too much yellow! I think I’ll just leave out the yellow for the background (and hope I have enough of the beige.)

My Christmas stocking MKAL is ending today and I’ve fallen behind. I’m on day 17 or so and have several days to catch up on before knitting the afterthought heel and finishing. But I’ll get there. I have been enjoying the project … until the darkness got the better of me.

I’ve cast on a new pair of Christmas boot sock for my sister-in-love in Massachusetts. She is very knit worthy and I think she’ll enjoy the warm wool socks. I hope she can remember not to dry them. LOL. I have several skeins of Raggi sock yarn that I bought at my LYS before we couldn’t get it in the USA and this pair of skeins with a Christmas theme will be perfect for her. I haven’t taken any photos yet but the first sock is finished. I love knitting worsted weight socks! They knit up so quickly.

I’ve finished the knitting on my pink version of the “Lanes Island Pullover” and just have to start seaming the shoulders. Maybe I’ll get to that today. I’d love to have it to wear over Thanksgiving weekend. We’ll see how I do – the shoulders are the most difficult part to seam. The rest is a piece of cake … and I will have to knit the collar at the end. Send me good seaming juju, will you please?

I’ve still got to finish the Christmas sweater for our granddaughter, too. Not much to do there, either. I think I just have to knit the button plackets and add the buttons – the ones I got a really fun! Another project that shouldn’t take long to finish but I’ve not had the bandwidth to do anything other than simple simple simple whatever. I hope today will feel a little bit better and that I can conquer at least ONE of these undone projects.

Gone knitting.