Look! I Knitted.

Late yesterday afternoon I settled onto the couch, took up Anklet #5 and got to within one row of finishing it, took it to Friday Night Knitting, finished it, and weaved in a couple tails.  Finis!  Then I cast on the Hermaness Worsted hat that was Fringe Hatalong No. 3 in 2015.  I printed off the patterns and gathered up stash yarn to make a kit for hats Nos. 3 & 4 in early 2016 and put them aside for when I needed a project.  This one made it into my knitting basket on Wednesday morning but I didn't get around to casting on until last night.



Casting on was more of a challenge than I anticipated since every third stitch was to be made with the Twisted German Cast-on which was described in the pattern but luckily YouTube came to my rescue.  Of course, I have a perfectly good book with it outlined in great detail but that book was unhandily in the yarn storage bin in the living room.  Thank god for YouTube.  I've got about two-thirds of the ribbing and I'll get to the fun part, the simple lace pattern, later today.


Between knitting on the couch and knitting in the back room of Goodwill, our friend, TD, the electrician and his wife, BD, showed up to fix the light switch in the ceiling fan (she visited while he fixed) for a whopping $3.50.  I pressed a few more bucks into his hand before they left because he keeps trying not to charge for labor.  Friends, whatcha gonna do?



We woke up to a tiny bit of new snow today, barely enough to cover the bare spots.  Every once in a while a few flakes drift past the window but I'll lay money that it'll start snowing with vigor 'round about time for people to go out to ring in the New Year.  


Another benefit of adding more grown-up grandchildren is the quality of the fridge art increases dramatically.  Not that I don't love the colorful scribbles of the littles, I do with all my heart, but look at what GC drew for me last weekend.  I love it.  He put his favorite quote along the bottom, "I will not let you go into the Dark alone."  Then he signed and dated it to me on the back.  I smile every time I walk by it, and I walk past the fridge a lot.  Stop too often too but I love seeing his drawing there.

December 31--Don B. Stevenson, Mrs. Blakely's Class.  My third grade class was like a pint-size United Nations.  There were kids of every color and from every continent.  English was the first language of only six of the twenty-one students and it was the best class I ever had.  We celebrated the customs of each country represented.  Our parties were legendary.  Word of the foods the mothers brought lured the principal and office staff to make excuses to visit the classroom.  I asked for the recipes, typed them into a booklet, and each student got one.  I heard that Eddie Langer did a roaring business when he photocopied his and sold the copies to parents from other classes for fifty cents.  "Just to cover printing costs," I heard him say when someone objected.  That kid will go far.

Not bad.  Tonight I have art to write from.  Yippee!  Everyone be safe if you're going out to celebrate tonight.  We're staying home but we'll cook up something special to ring in the New Year.  Happy 2017!
--Barbara