Having finished the hat this weekend, I have two projects on the needles: the sweater (I’m nearly done with the back) and a pair of baby socks I cast on for today at lunch. I love baby socks because they just move along so quickly. Plus, my cousin is pregnant and I’d like to send her a little something in lieu of actually going to her baby shower in Connecticut. Actually, I so despise baby showers that I’m delighted I have a ready-made excuse not to attend.

(I’m just not a cute kind of person and have little interest in oohing over your diaper genie or in playing a game that involves guessing how huge your midriff has become. Why is this game fun? No one invites guests over to their Christmas party and asks them to guess how many pounds the host has gained in holiday weight….)

A project I need to start soon is the socks for my Bloomin’ Feet pal. The premise, sponsored by intrepid Yarn Aboard host Amanda, behind this particular swap is that no one knits for the knitter. So each of us in the swap has a secret pal for whom we are knitting a pair tailored to the person’s foot size and fiber and color preferences. My pal is very easy-going, so I’m remarkably lucky in that regard. I am, however, a little nervous because I’ve never knit socks for feet that weren’t within reach.

I hunted around the web for weeks before finally ordering two Woolarina yarns (because I can’t get enough of the Woolarina) to choose between. I have, I believe, settled on the one on the right. It seems bright and springy and is a half merino-half tencel blend that I’m eager to experience. The one in the middle was my other option; it’s lovely but turned out to be darker in person than it appeared on the website. I have some ideas about what I’d like to knit with that, but there’s no rush on it. (The one on the left is not sock yarn and was an impulse purchase. I don’t know what I’m going to do with it, but it was purple and pink and on sale and it hopped in my shopping cart and asked to go through the checkout with me. Who am I to argue with a charming skein of soft yarn?)

Now that I have my Bloomin’ Feet yarn, I’m hunting the elusive perfect pattern. I have my eye on a couple and just want to stare at the yarn and the patterns simultaneously to see if one rises above the rest.

The most recent yarn to wander into my life is this birthday gift from Gramma:

One thousand yards of a mauvey variegated sport-weight alpaca yarn, from the farm of one of the owners of my mom’s local yarn shop and weaving studio.

Now I just have to figure out the perfect project for this squishy yarn. Does anyone have any suggestions?

Many of my readers who stop by the blog who don’t know me personally come for the knitting. Judging from the paucity of knitting-related posts thus far in 2007, readers might be justified in thinking that my needles are stuck in a bag somewhere.

Not so, my friends, not so.

I’ve merely been negligent in recording the knitting that’s going on…

So let’s rectify that, shall we?

First, a couple of knits from the end of ’06:

My River Rapids socks that I finished way back in November instead of working on my NaNoWriMo manuscript. In fact, I wove in the ends as Karen was loading her story into the system for verification. These would be the most recent pair of socks I knit.

This is the scarf I gave Mum for Christmas. It’s knit from baby alpaca yarn in a deep green color (the detailed shot is closer to the actual color) and is my first project that I designed myself. This project refused to cooperate with my vision in the original yarn (a sport-weight alpaca in baby blue), but was remarkably compliant after I picked up this yarn at Springwater Fiber Workshop in Alexandria. If anyone is interested in the pattern, I’m happy to write it up.

The cross-over project for 2006-2007 was originally envisioned as a Christmas present for Rudi, but instead lasted all the way to Valentine’s Day. They’re Knucks (without the writing, as of yet) knit from Rowan Felted Tweed. Rudi picked out the color when we went to Webs earlier this fall, although at the time he didn’t know he was picking the color for this project. The pattern was one that I’d seen and thought might be a good present for Rudi. He then found it separately and asked me to make him a pair — and, in fact, bought some Solitude wool one weekend from our farmers’ market for me to use for them. Oops. I guess that will either be a second pair for him or a different project of his choosing. Luckily, he’s both supportive and excited about hand-knitted clothing.

And this is my most recent project: the Santa Cruz hat from the February issue of MagKnits, which I knit up this weekend. I made a few alterations — using a worsted weight yarn with the sport-weight pattern and increasing the pattern repeat to 2 1/2. (In retrospect, I ought to have done 3, as you can see from mousing over the shot on the right that the hat is a bit short to fit my gigantic head.) The yarn is Karabella Marble, a wool-alpaca blend, in a lovely sea-colored combination of blue, green, and white.

And, yes, that is Papa Smurf you see there on the left. He oversaw the project and is quite pleased with how Smurfily the hat turned out. (Want your own set of Smurfy stitch markers? Visit Creative Muffin at etsy to buy some.)

Unfortunately, not everyone was so pleased with how the hat turned out. Della thought that Oscar the Grouch would have been a better mascot for the project.

Hey, not everyone can be happy, right?

ETA: Rudi asked Posey to try the hat on last night and she happily obliged. Like me, she looks good in hats. Della would prefer you not bother to check out how laid back Posey looks in her shot.

It has been a rough week month year here in the Burrow, but even in the throes of depression, we can still find beautiful things to share. Here are three from the last week:

1. This morning, it occurred to me that, since moving to D.C., I have allowed my personality to become sublimated a bit. (Those of you who only know me from D.C. may find it shocking that this is a paler, quieter version of me. But it’s true…) So this morning, I pulled the price tags off some new shoes, broke open my purple mascara, and dug out the gold sparkly lotion. I’d stopped wearing it when a coworker told me that whenever I wore it I reminded him of the stripper from his bachelor party. But he doesn’t work here anymore and, even if he did, that would be his problem, not mine. Watch out, D.C.; my effervescence could be catching!

2. I haven’t talked to BW since before Christmas, but we finally managed to catch up with each other last night and spent a while chatting on the phone. It wasn’t as good as a cocoa break in person, but it was pretty close.

3. Missing tv episodes can be frustrating because you miss key storylines or character development. I caught up with two favorite shows this week — Ugly Betty in the old-fashioned way on the rebroadcast and Heroes in a more modern streaming fashion. How fantastic to have the choice between waiting for it to come around again or seeking it out online for an immediate fix!