My Holiday Stress is Over!

I am a huge fan of the Holidays but lately they have turned into a ton of work.  Last year, my entire family showed up for Christmas.  It was so stressful, that when the last one left, I came down with a cold and spent the rest of my winter break on the couch.

This year, it was just me, Jeff and our nephew Alex.  We participated in our neighbourhood block party (we did dessert) and held our annual party on the 23rd.  Both were amazing successes.  Jeff and I have leaned to to entertain quite well.

Our good friends and neighbours , Paul and Gail, had us over for Christmas dinner.  It was so nice not having to cook that meal too.  Even with the lessened work from last year, I'm still tired.  However, this has not stopped me from knitting. 

I've been jumping around from project to project of late, not quite being able to get interested in just one.  For some reason, I am being sucked into this vortex of lace knitting.

I know that I said that I wasn't fond of it after completing my sister's shawl but I'm changing my mind.  I think the problem with the shawl was the pattern; not enough going on, too much of the same over and over again.

I am now fascinated by knitting lace doilies and circular shawls.  I totally blame MMario for this.  It was his Queen Ann's Lace pattern that got me going.

I really enjoy teaching all about circles in my Geo class and I really like circular trig and I think this just falls in to that realm.

In order to understand the process better, I am working on a lace doily and sort of dissecting it while making it.  I have been taking copious notes on what stitches to what and when and how increases are happening. etc.  It has been super informative even though Jeff thinks I'm a total dork for doing this.

On the yarn front, I'm finding as I progress through my knitting experience, that I'm not finding the colours that I like at my LYS(s) or, if I do find yarn that I like, they never have enough and it's super expensive. It's driving my nuts.

I'm really into kettle dyed yarn in one colour group. I just love the way one colour flows from light to dark and back again. Anyway, I think it's time to take matters into my own hands. That's right, I'm going to start experimenting with dying my own yarns. But don't worry, I'll be f'ing up my own kitchen and not yours. The only problem now is that there isn't going to be enough time to do all of my fiber related projects. Sigh...

Also, on the yarn front, I have been hanging on to this skein from Curious Creek Fibers called "Happiness Is."  It was gifted to us at the 2009 Men's Knitting Retreat.  Well, I set out to get a bunch more of it to make it into something beautiful.  Thank the Universe for Ravelry and Men Who Knit for all the kind sellers and donors who enabled me to piece together a enough skeins.

The yarn is a lovely blue-purple.  It's more blue or purple depending on the light.  Here are two pictures that illustrate what I am talking about.


Yum, can't wait for them all to get here!

Okay, enough ranting for now; back to the doilies!