Like an Elf

Edited to add pictures -- yes, you read that correctly - real, colourful, actual documentation of my life that don't contain words! YAY!

Despite my tendinitis, some of Christmas knitting has been finished -- it was just like having elves at work in Santa's workshop, except the knitting was done by only one, very talented, very generous elf. When she heard that I was off my game, my friend, and fellow Knitterpuddlian, Marti was so sweet and offered to help me finish my projects so my Christmas knitting would be finished. I was a little hesitant to take her up on her generous offer ... it IS Christmas, and often a busy enough time of year without having the added stress of working on someone else's projects, but she said she was done her Christmas prep. and likes to finish projects (unlike me who is primarily a starter of things -- let's not discuss the pile of partially finished socks, k?) -- so I took her up on it.

Because of my clever elf friend, my sister's tam will finally make it under her tree, after languishing on my needles for months and months (I think it was started right around Easter). I knit to the decreases, put it down for 8 months, and Marti finished it off (I am a miserable chart reader)
... isn't the decrease's star in the middle pretty? She did a great job!

I was also in a panic, because I had held off on starting a pair of Fibre Trends felted clogs for my sister in law (ecret-say esent-pray) because I figured they were something I could whip up in the last 2 weeks before Christmas, felt them and have them dry in lots of time ... then the arm thing happened, so I was really quite flustered that I didn't have the clogs started, had no way of getting the clogs knit with my bum arm, and had no other ideas for my SIL (in my mind, the clogs were THE perfect giftie for a hard to buy for SIL). Marti to the rescue ...

they turned out perfect. I picked the colours, and Marti did all the work (I could get used to this! Hardly seemed to take me any time, and my arm doesn't even hurt! LOL!)

It is good to have good friends ... Thanks Marti! You are a beautiful knitter and a wonderful, generous friend.

When Marti would have been about midway through the first slipper, I went to see my Physio therapist for my weekly treatment, and told him that after 9 days of not knitting (I only knit for 5 - 10 minutes on one day during that whole 9 days -- nearly made me insane not to touch the needles!), and the pain was no better, in fact it was worse. He said it is likely my posture at the computer, and told me I could knit again , but in small doses (20 minutes at a time) and no marathon knitting sessions. I decided to let Marti finish the slippers, to keep up with my exercises, and to really, truly try to do small scale knitting for a while -- I made 2 of these hats for 2 of my nephews, and when I can get to the LYS, I will pick up another ball of yarn and make one for the third nephew (they take about 2.5 hours, ears and all, and use almost exactly a ball of Patons Shetland Chunky, knit doubled on really big needles ... hardly any work at all ... I put the knitting down a lot, when my arm starts to complain, pick it up again in an hour or so, and knit a bit more). Pics to follow when I have all 3 done.

One of my nephews lives and breathes Shrek (or "Ch-wrek" as he calls him!), so I know they will be a hit with at least one of the boys! Baby O still won't keep a hat on his head ... but Jack loves his snowman hat I made him last year, and will wear nothing else. I think they'll be adorable in them ... and that's what matters, right? Kids in goofy hats = good times!

I am so ticked at whatever is wrong with my computer ... I can get at my pictures saved anywhere but in my Kodak file ... which is why I can show you the Baby O and Jack Christmas tree hunt, but not the Marti Pictures ... that tells me it is a Kodak problem. I'm going to try something ... wish me luck!

*** Bwah hahaha! I am a genius! Well, maybe a slacker because it took this long to figure it out, but I finally have, so I think I deserve some cred! I figured out how to force my Kodak program to allow me to post pictures to the web -- save them to a different program - duh! It is a temporary fix, and very time consuming to do, but at least I have some pictures on my blog again! If you are curious, go have a look back through the past month of blogging to see the loverly pictures of some FOs and m'o.

H