We had a Christmas with Brian’s family last Saturday. We had Christmas with my brother, Eric, and his wife Diana/Otterwise, on Friday/today. I’m not done with Christmas yet, will still see the family of my Godchildren and then I think I’m done.

If holidays are for relationship, I think it may be more sane to spread it out a bit. Too much/too fast seems counter-productive in general, I’d say.

Maybe I’m finally getting mellower at age 50. If I am, this would be a good balance to the first 49 years of my life. I think it’s only balanced sometimes, to be honest… but it’s a start.

Wool!

Since Diana and I are both knitters and our spouses are both into good wool, it was a bit of a wooly holiday. Diana couldn’t wait to tell me what I was getting but until you see it you can’t know. First, notice the very warm slipper-booties she made me from Brown Sheep Lamb’s Pride (a very warm yarn, good for slippers).

Then check out the incredible ColorJoy-ful wool hug/blanket she made me. She based it on the idea of my Kristi Comfort Shawl/Lap Blanket pattern. It is squooshy and warm and super colorful. I wrapped up in it tonight and really felt loved and snuggled in all the right ways.

Now I understand the appeal of afghans. We never had them when we were growing up. When I met Brian he had some acrylic ones he’d picked up at garage sales, mostly crochet (not so stretchy and a bit coarse), and in so many colors my mind had trouble sorting out the over-stimulation. Well, I’m a wool fanatic (it’s stretchy) and I love knitting (it’s stretchy) and those afghans didn’t push my happy button as much as a good wool blanket.

A wool blanket is warm and wooly… yet not stretchy. This lovely pink-and-purple-and turquoise wrap from Diana is all of the above. I’m in love, totally converted in one moment. Thanks, Diana!

Tiny gifts

So what did I give Diana after she did all that knitting for me? This:

It is a Jayne hat, from the TV show Firefly. I don’t know anything more than I just told you, but I’m surrounded by people who think this show and this hat are the coolest (admittedly geeky) thing ever.

Diana knit a guy-sized version of this hat for my brother, and another for a good friend of theirs. I figured she could have one of her own. She intends to make it into a pin, I think.

It was much fun to knit. In order to get yellow, orange and red, I found two sockyarns in each general color range and held them together while I knit. I had a warm and cool yellow, a warm and cool orange, a warm/cool red.

This yarn-mixing gave me a nicer color impression than if I had one thicker yarn in each color. I think the tassels at the bottom of the ear flaps turned out very well this way, too.

Joe the Penguin

Eric Oscar (my brother) got one thing from me but I’ve probably been working on it off and on (and losing parts and finding parts) for months and months. I finally got all of the wool and alpaca parts sewn together Thursday night and bought buttons for eyes on the way home (at JoAnn Fabric where my friend Marie is manager… she helped me find the perfect buttons of all time).

So the eyes got sewn on in the car on the way to Ypsilanti… Brian is a very, very good sport and he usually drives so I can knit in the car. He’s the best in many ways.

Now, this is not just a cute stuffed animal. First, it’s a Penguin which is a symbol of the computer operating system called Linux. Eric’s a geek of highest degree and goes to Penguin-con with other Linux geeks, all for a good time.

But we also had a camp song when we were kids, about a penguin named “Joe… he got so sick of wearing black and white, that he wore pink socks to the dance last night.” Eric will never get tired of singing middle-school camp songs. So his penguin’s name is Joe and of course he had to sport pink socks!

Much Fun For All

We met for sushi and then we had tea elsewhere for several hours. We talked and sang and laughed. Then we headed home. It was all a holiday should be.

This entry was posted on Friday, January 9th, 2009 at 1:33 amand is filed under Knitting, Relationships. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.