It's beginning to look alot like Christmas

Everywhere you look.

And this is days after the storm. You can't really see in the picture but there's a 7 foot drift in front of the cars. It's like Christmas weather before Christmas.

It's been an amazing December for ski resort season pass holders in VT. It's really too bad I have had this pesky grad school application hanging over my head so that I have not been able to enjoy it. But despite not being able to do much skiing (or snow plowing, in my case) Being surrounded by snow just put me in the Christmas spirit. As does managing to have all but avoided shopping at the box top stores. This past weekend, we had a most gorgeous blizzard. Any excuse to avoid Christmas shopping with crowds of angry, pushy people is quite lovely, and so much more so with some knitting and coffee and a nice view of the storm. I was not as excited on Monday morning, when I was plowed in, but the 2 1/2 foot snow drifts I had to dig my car out of are still enjoyable in December.

Gift Number 1:
Though this coffee cozy looks decent from this angle, it's got a HUGE seam on the other side. I'm considering cutting the seam, sewing without a seam and felting it together. The yarn is some random rough wool scraps I was given years ago, so I think it would felt well, and that would get rid of the unseemly seam (hehe) that I couldn't even bear to take a picture of.

Gift Number 2:

I really love the way the snowflakes came out. I ended up going with silver paint instead of plain old white, and I think it makes up for the imperfections of my micro-painting skills :)

My Hand Dyed Yarn Swap Package

My hand dyed yarn package came in the other day and look how pretty! It also came with swedish fish, but those didn't last long enough to make it into the picture. Hattie dyed it for me and called the colorway grapevine. It's fingering weight superwash, so I can knit the prettiest socks ever.

You can't really tell from the pictures, but the colors are green and deep purple with some browns and sky blues thrown in there. It's gorgeous. The picture below shows the different colors, albeit darker and less vivid than they actually appear, the light is not so amazing in the computer room...

I don't think she possibly could have realized how perfect the yarn matches this year. My wedding was purple and green, with purple bridesmaid dresses and the hall decorated in green. And we've frequented more vineyards this year between the trip to San Francisco this spring and taking visitors to local VT vineyards this summer than I have in all my former years combined :)

Coffee Swap Package

I actually received this package a few weeks ago, but between losing my camera battery charger and a massive final paper for class, I just haven't had the time to post about it.

Joy sent me yummy biscotti cookies (half gone already), a cute ceramic travel mug, and a skein of lamb's pride worsted and directions for making felted roses. She also sent a 2008 postcard calendar, two different kinds of coffee: Starbucks Sumatra which is nice and strong and an Artisan Coffee Roasters Jamaican Butter Rum, which tasted as good as it sounds! The card is even adorable; it's paper cut to look like a boutique window. Thanks Joy!

Sneezing Panda

No knitting picures today, but here's my favorite youtube video. I watch it when I'm having a bad day, nothing cheers me up better....except perhaps, chocolate :)

All boring words

I received my coffeeswap package last friday and have been trying depserately to find my digital camera battery so I can take pictures, but, alas, it seems to have gone the way of my sunglasses...and all my missing socks :) So maybe I'll be brave and try husband's camera in the next few days...after I finish the 20 page paper that's due this thursday. I cast on for a scarf Christams present for Matt, and in between writing and researching the paper and reading Book Five of Robert Jordan's Wheel of Time series...which Matt was not supposed to let me start until this paper and my physical therapy grad school application were both done. I've managed to make some progress in all directions, except Christmas knitting :)