Somebody stop me! Before Christmas I have the following on my plate: three exams and three term papers, one promised Christmas sweater (about ½ done), an appliquéd square for my Round Robin group (barely started), two hats for our knitting group’s Christmas project, assorted Christmas parties, and of course, work, housework and normal daily responsibilities continue. And this doesn’t include the two sweaters sitting in the basket waiting to be sewn and the two (yes, count ‘em, two) Norwegian sweaters started. Oh, and the Mediterranean Shawl sitting in my sewing room with the border half frogged. Yet, all I want to do is start something new. I bought Cat Bhordi’s book, Magical Knitting (see sidebar) and all I want to do is cast on for one of her beautiful Moebius scarves. I need to have my head examined!

However, I am making progress. This is the first of the two hats for the Christmas project. Our knitting group is making hats for Children’s Hospital in Seattle. This is such a great project. The 12-year-old son of one of our members has a number of serious medical problems and has to make regular trips down to the hospital. He dreads these visits so much because they are never pleasant. But we have made him our emissary and he is responsible for delivering the hats. His mom said for the first time he is so excited about his visit to hospital because he gets to hand out hats. Neat, huh? So far I think we have over 50 of them!

And this is a picture of the side panel for the Christmas sweater. The pattern is Tilt and is great fun. The yoke takes a lot of concentration, but the lower side panels are a no-brainer. Haven’t looked as far as the sleeves yet, but putting it together is a breeze – three needle bind off throughout with the bind off showing on the outside.

I did discover one time saving device. If you haven’t signed up for Bloglines yet, do so now. It is so nice for keeping up on your favorite blogs, especially those (like mine) that don’t post daily, or even on a regular basis. I have put a link on my sidebar. I’ve found that it doesn’t work for all blogs – you have to have an RSS feed. But please don’t ask me what that means or how you get it if you don’t have it!! One other thing that I would love to learn more about, but simply don’t have the time.