Pics Or It Didn't Happen: I Still Make Stuff

Wow. It's been nearly a year since my first "I Make Stuff" post. How can that be? I don't even know. But the Internet never forgets, kids, so here's what I've worked on in 2010:

In March, I made a pair of mittens for myself. I had been stalking admiring the ones made by mom blogging rock star Angela over at FluidPudding and finally worked up the courage to give them a try. They were scary because I had never made anything with terrifying words like "thumb gussets" or using the "magic loop method", which frankly all sounded like dubious sexual acts and/or contraceptive methods. I only managed to get a photo of them (the mittens, not the sex acts) while in progress, but I made another pair later in the year, so you'll get to see those later in this post. They are called "Bella's Mittens", because the pattern was inspired by mittens worn by the Bella character in the Twilight movie. Don't hate, y'all - the pattern is gorgeous.

In May, I thought I'd give felting a try, finally. I spent much time and energy trying to decide on a mix of complementary colors, and in the process learned that I am really bad at it. I did not know that about myself.

And then suddenly it was summer. If you're a parent too, you know that summertime for parents is the exact opposite of summertime for kids. This is because there are no buses or hot lunches and it's eleven million degrees outside and everybody has to be driven to seventeen different places a day, and yet I still had to go to, oh I dunno, work. It's the summer days where my office is truly a vacation, people.

But you may recall that I made a condensation sleeve for CJ to take to camp, in June.

And I vowed that 2010 would be the year that I got the jump on Christmas knitting, so naturally I started with birthday and hostess gifts instead. I ended up making two of the rainbow bags for Renee's birthday (which, TO BE FAIR: December) and the purple one for when Rachel and Thom moved to Maryland.

Also in June I got the bright idea to hand knit by hand with my own hands a set of grocery bags for everybody's favorite vegetarian bunny huggers (our dear friends Tracy and Aaron). I figured: How hard could it be? Turns out: Pretty hard. Not that the pattern itself was all that hard, it just took forever to make four of them and by the time I was done I was so very, very, done. I finished the fourth bag on October 17. You may have already calculated that the duration of time spent knitting these bags is equal to that of a metric shitload. Of time. At least they're pretty.

And then it was later in July, and whoa! Jonesy and Donna were having a baby shower in twelve days. Twelve days to knit a baby blanket? CAN DO.

Meanwhile, the grocery bags were ongoing, and I was losing my mind, so I started knitting warm washable hats for the homeless. See, my friends are really good people, and they gather up food and go feed people who need to be fed on Thanksgiving day, in a local park. We call it Thanksgiving in the Park. The hats were sent along, except climate change hates us, hates us ALL, and it was nearly 70 degrees that day. So nobody really wanted a hat. Sadface. Thom and Rachel took them back to Baltimore, though, to give away up there. I hope they are getting used. Meredith models one of the hats:

OMG, Christmas knitting! Teacher gifts! Friend gifts! Crap! Now I'm behind, but I'm still knitting grocery bags! September sidebar: The Bella Lana Reversible Cable scarf, holiday gift for Meredith's primary teacher Mrs. P. I'm told she liked it!

In October, the grocery bag project was ongoing. Still. Forever. Teacher gift #2: A set of Bella's Mittens, this time for Mer's dramatic arts teacher. Purple and dramatic are totally her. She likes them, and is thankfully not allergic to 100% wool (I was worried).

It's still October! It's still holiday knitting! I'm still knitting grocery bags because they take forever! With my hands, by hand! Also Ginny really liked the yarn color I was using for Mrs. P.'s scarf, so I bought some in worsted and made a Very Braidy Ginny Cowl for Christmas. It looks really great on her, if I do say so myself.

And then it's October 31, I'm finally done with the grocery bags (hallelujah!), and my cousin and his wife welcome a beautiful baby girl. My cousin Brent is the first baby I was really around with any regularity, when I was a kid. He holds a special place in my cold shriveled heart, and now he's someone's DAD. OMG. This blanket was pretty difficult, at first, but I eventually got the hang of it. I started it on her birthday, and finished it December 6. I think it turned out great, and just look at sweet baby Claire!

The last project of the year was a last minute, weekend-before-holiday-break scarf. Mer came home from school on a Friday and said "My teacher says you’re very talented, and could you knit a scarf for J (her 6 year old)? It should be greens and white stripes. Thanks." So that’s what I did over that weekend. Mrs. P. later clarified that she meant for Meredith to ask what I would charge in money dollars to make such a scarf. I couldn't possibly, though.

So that was the knitting in 2010. If history is any indication, I probably won't post about knitting again until 2012. If you want to follow along in real-time, you should friend me on Ravelry.