When doing toe-up socks or top-down hats or top-down sweaters, you want to be sure you have a nice stretchy edge. Which means you'll need a stretchy bind-off. Denise Powell has two stretchy bind-off's on the Sock Knitter's website. She taught the class at the CSNF that I attended.

I am off to attempt this technique on a hat for him. :)

Ummm… cat toys?

This morning I shovelled snow, made coffee, made some Christmas gifts, and made some Christmas goodies. Here’s what I did and things I would differently next time!

Rachel’s Chocolate Mint Balls

1 pkg chocolate (I used Decadent semi-sweet chocolate chips – this is too sweet! Use UNsweetened chocolate!)

condensed milk (again I used sweetened – use UNsweetened!)

icing sugar (this is why everything else needs to be unsweetened – this is your main ingredient)

Peppermint extract

In a bowl, mix icing sugar, condensed milk and some drops of peppermint extract. You’ll have to keep tasting it until it’s a nice After Eight’s kind of minty. You need the mixture to be thick enough to form it into small balls.

Melt the chocolate. I melted it in the microwave on Med. for 2 minutes - check it – then a minute and a bit - check it – it needs to be runny, but be careful not to burn it. (I did that!) Rachel suggests using a pot with water in the bottom (boiling) and putting a bowl over the pot. Melt the chocolate in the bowl. (She saw that on Martha Stewart.)

Put some parchment paper or waxed paper on a cookie sheet. Put some blobs of chocolate on the paper - this will be the bottom of your chocolate mint balls. This is how we get chocolate on the bottom. Form your sugary mixture into balls and place on top of the blobs. Then you need to coat the blobs with the melted chocolate, making sure no white is showing. Place the cookie sheet in the freezer. It’s a good idea to keep them in the freezer until maybe an hour before  you eat them.

Also, once they are frozen, I would package them up in a cookie tin with waxed paper liner - being careful to not have them touching. Use waxed paper between layers. A great gift.

Later this week - or maybe even today, I will be making truffles! More on that later!

 

 

Crochet me Magazine is up! Oh my! Sprite! I love Sprite! Zen and the Art of Stash Diving is a great idea. One pattern, done in many different yarns. So many different looks are achieved using different yarn. I love that. I prefer the mohairyish stuff myself. Every baby needs Abominable Baby Slippers. I love the Abominable Snowman in the Rudolph classic :)

Well, off to work on some gifties…

 

Things are slowly returning to normal around here. Hopefully we can start our decorating, baking and shopping soon.

My goal is to make one biggish item per Christmas so that everyone gets something special from me. So far, the lucky recipients have been:

bro: granny square afghan done in Toronto Maple Leaf blue and white

sis: Kittens in a row afghan done in shades of blue and white

stepmom: knitted afghan quilt - blocks sewn together to look like a traditional pieced quilt

stepmom: crocheted checkers game (ok, I know, she got two last year, but..... they are awesome!)

sisII: table runner (actually for her wedding, but since she hasn't received the finished product yet - it still counts!)

I still try to make smallish items too and have a whole load of ideas for this  year. Ahem. Ideas. All WIP's. Some UFO's. My own biggish item this year is more than 3/4 finished. Yay!!! Wish me luck! I can't wait to post the photos!

By the way, I am in looooove with Brown Sheep's Lamb's Pride worsted bulky! Just starting a smallish gift using black and charcoal with no pattern. Just giving it a go. MMmm. It's so...soft. The man at Village Yarns even wound the hanks into centre-pull balls for me. (because I don't have a yarn swift - sniff sniff). I bought balls of Noro Silk Garden because it's divine. Oh I bought the piece-de-resistance as well, but I haven't decided if it's a keeper or a gift yet. (Originally intended as a gift, it is begging to be kept!) Bad yarn!

Besides the knitting, I'm planning to make homemade edible goodies too. Now, all I ask for is a little more time!

Winter Knitty is online. It is crammed with more patterns than we know what to do with, Knitters! Lots of new projects to start once the last Christmas gift is opened. If you come from a big family like we do, you likely knit right up until Christmas morning, wrap it and put it under the tree when no one is looking so they won't know you were working on it all night! Oh no, I wouldn't know anyone like that.... not me... nope....

If you love me and you know it, knit me Kate...If you love me and you know it, and you really want to show it, if you love me and you know it, knit me Bobblicious....

Santa, laughter… what more could you want?

Village Pillage: “The Village Pillage is Toronto's largest annual garage sale spanning hundreds of private garage sales all held in the Bloor West Village on the same day.”

How come I just found this now?? Remind me about this in the spring, will ya?

The Knitting Fiend is an awesome knit blog with pattern generators for socks, hats, mittens, dog sweater, cardigans and more. She has stitch patterns and patterns for “odd things to knit”. She has knitting calculators for estimating yardage, how to space buttonholes or to increase and decrease evenly. You can even learn how to do bust darts! You’ll also find knitting tutorials for hand and machine knitting including the three needle bind-off, inset pockets and double knitting. A wonderful resource for adventurous knitters who are ready to take the next step and really start designing their own garments or altering patterns for a better fit. This is one link you need to keep in your favourites.

Last night coming home from work, the strangest/nicest thing happened to me. I was stopping at Queen’s Pasta to pick up some ravioli for my sister and I for dinner. Yay! I was just about to open the door….

Man: Wait! Wait! I have to ask you something! Please wait!

Me: Yes? Can I help you with something?

Man: I’ve seen you walking in the neighbourhood and um… I had to stop you…. You’re so beautiful and I just wanted to tell you that and  to ask you a question. You are very beautiful…..

Me: Huh? Uh… thank you. Um, you said you wanted to ask me something?

Man: Yes. Say you’ll come and have coffee with me. Just to talk.

Me: Oh, I’m sorry I can’t do that.

Man: Please? I’ve finally worked up the courage to talk to you and ask you, you have to have coffee with me. Please have coffee with me. Not today, another time.

Me: No, no, I can’t have coffee with you because I’m married.

Man: Married? That’s ok. I’ve been married 4 times! He can come too!

Well there you go. It’s nice to have a stranger stop you to tell you  you’re beautiful (especially when you’re sweating because you’re wearing too many  layers, you’re tired and feel a little sick…). lol