Holiday Gift Roundup

My holiday gifts did not go quite as I had planned. Who would've thought that uprooting my entire life would have gotten in the way of my hobby?!

Dad's Fisherman's Rib Hat.

Pros:
It's super squishy and really warm.

Cons:
It's sort of big and used A LOT of yarn.
Because I did it in the round, there is a seam where I switched from K1b to P1b. While this does hold the two layers of the hat together, the tension got a little weird around that spot and it sort of looks like there's a hole.
The decreases aren't as fancy as I wanted. Problem: the Brioche Stitch (Fisherman's Rib) can be done two ways ... either you Yarn Over on one row and then decrease on the next row, or you knit or purl into the previous row's stitch. It ends up looking the same, and because I was doing it in the round, it made sense to just knit into the previous row on every row (alternating between knitting below and purling below). However, all the decrease instructions I found used the Yarn Over technique. So I just ended up doing a SSK with three stitches at a time, slipping the stitch below just as would have knitted the stitch below. I did this every other row; on alternating rows, I did a normal purl stitch below. It turned out ok, maybe a little sharper than normal because I was decreasing 2 stitches every other row, instead of decreasing 1. But it was so squishy that I don't think it mattered.

(also, again, I can't seem to find the good pictures. I KNOW I took pictures with the good camera, and now I don't know where they went. Grrr.)


Mom C's House Slippers

Mom was actually the only one to receive slippers. I ended up not having enough time for the other ladies in my life, though I promised that they would get them eventually.


Jess's Spiral Rib Hat

This turned out really good. (The one in the picture is actually my test version of this; Jess's version had a brim). I'm going to do a pattern post for it as soon as I take some tutorial pictures of the stitch.


Eleanor's Play Food

These come out SO GOOD!!! I think I'm going to make some more for Rowan. My favorite is the broccoli.


Emily and Zoe's Headbands

These came out really cute. I hope they like them. (I didn't end up finishing the Lattice Garden Scarf like I had intended, but at least I got to use some of the flower patterns I found).


Finger Paintings 

(Credit goes here)

For the Grandparents,

Uncle Josh and Tia Wendy,

and Daddy.

Coloring Books for the kiddos

I took pictures from their parents' Facebook pages and turned them into coloring pages. (Tutorial here)

Chris made Gingerbread Coffee Syrup for all the coffee drinkers in the family. It was a great idea, until Rowan decided to hand out presents.

And a little something for myself ...

Post-Christmas Rush gifts for Rowan, Gipper, and Chris will follow. Ro needs a new hat, Gipper a new sweater, and Chris asked for a red scarf.