now that usps has done their part

 

One of the best things about knitting for another knitter is that you know they will appreciate the gifts – one of the worst is you can’t talk about it/work on it anywhere they might be (like Ravelry).  Today I learned that all the packages I sent out last week arrived and so I give you an outline of my secret crafting from last year.

December 2007 I decided to make crayon rolls for two girls I know; I went out and bought the supplies but never made them before Christmas.  Later that year I discovered Craft Apple’s tutorial for a Little Artist Drawing Case (since then she has removed the tutorial and has included it with a pattern you can purchase) and decided to make these cases for the girls instead.  And that sat and sat until one little girl came to visit me (I started the project the weekend before her arrival and finished it while she was at my house). One drawing case done (November 2008) and one to go.
Late December 2007  I also started knitting my first tomten from Elizabeth Zimmerman.  The pattern didn’t really appeal to me until I started seeing great examples on Zimmermania.  Since I wasn’t sure who was going to get this sweater I did actually blog about some of the progress.  I finished the knitting sometime in the spring but it sat and sat waiting for the zipper to be sewn in, so finally in October (?) I told my friend A that I would send it to her – I put the zipper in and then it sat some more waiting for ends to be woven in and washed again to be certain it wouldn’t fall apart.

May 2007 (oh noes I better start knitting before the baby arrives in June) I start knitting the peapod baby sweater.  I was one of the lucky ones who grabbed it from Knitting Daily before it was removed from their files (the pattern is currently unavailable to the dismay of many Ravelers).  The knitting went fairly quickly and I was so happy that I was going to get this gift to Tattva1 in a timely manner.  Then the sleeve+gauge fiasco hit and the sweater sat for a long time.  Finally this fall it occurred to me that Pigeon was going to be 6 months old in December and my theory of a size 6 months should fit somewhere between October and April was going out the window.  But I had to finish her sister’s turtle.  Oh yes, and the drawing case…

June 2007 I started knitting what I dubbed the Pretty Pink Princess Turtle.  I’m glad that I learned that Ladybug was interested in a red room in her new house because she almost got an Eeyeore themed turtle (I had bought dusty purple and dusty blue yarn for it but found out about the love of red in time for an exchange at the LYS).  This too started out as a quick knit.  But somewhere along the way it got shuffled to the bottom of the pile and I procrastinated putting it together.  It lived in my yarn bag for a long time, but every time I took it out I would realized I was missing something (generally the stuffing).  Finally I grabbed all the supplies I needed when I was invited to go for a day trip to Seattle.  And so 6 months later I finished the turtle. Which brings us back to January 2008.

February 2008 Just last week I finally put together the second drawing case (to be packaged up with two of the hand knits shown above).