Variation on a theme

One of the recurring themes in my knitting life is that I am late with gifts, especially birthday gifts for my sisters. Luckily for me, they love knitted things, even when I finish them months late and take still more months to mail them. This time, though, I did something different, for variety's sake, I suppose.

My middle sister's birthday is in May. I had one of her gifts done in January. January! And somehow, I didn't get it in the mail until the end of June. June! I'm just going to say that I was waiting to accumulate a whole box of things to send to my family, and leave it at that. No need to mention any of my other tardiness...

Anyway, I crocheted my sister a scarf.

Boteh Scarf, in Trekking Hand Art, colorway Jamaika.

This was my first foray into crochet (besides edgings) since about the time I was 6. The crazy shaping might make you think the pattern is complicated, but the instructions are clear and easily memorized, and the crochet itself is not very challenging (I think the whole thing uses three stitches). All in all, I had a lot of fun making it, and I hope my sister will have a lot of fun wearing it. You know, after summer is over.

Acquisitions

I don't know how this happens so often: I sit down at the computer to blog, start by doing something else, and suddenly, it's three hours later at the end of the evening, I haven't blogged and I should really be going to bed. Normally, I give up on the blogging in favor of sleep, not not tonight! I still need to prepare for Monday, though, so this will be a quickie.

I've had some interesting acquisitions lately, chief among them a new camera. I've been playing a lot with the new camera, and used it to take some pictures of my most recent yarn acquisitions.

Limari by Araucania, a fantastically soft, marvelously blotchy super bulky wool/alpaca/silk blend that I bought as souvenir yarn in London.

Zauberball by Schoppel-Wolle, a remarkably fun-looking sock yarn and another souvenir from my London trip.

A load of Blue Moon Fiber Arts' Socks that Rock in light and medium weights and intended for four different projects.

Still so far behind...

My blogging is still months behind my actual knitting. This is a direct result of two things: 1) I don't like to blog about gifts (as finished objects) until the recipient has actually gotten it (and I'm really slow in getting things to my family), and 2) when things get crazy busy, I quit blogging but I don't quit knitting.

Anyway, my dad's birthday was back in February. His birthday present was a scarf that I didn't finish until March and didn't get in the mail until last week. I realize scarves are not useful in the summer, even in Alaska, but summer's short and it'll be cold again in a few months, so I don't feel too badly about it.


It's a Noro two-row stripe scarf in 1x1 ribbing. Simple, and I picked sedate colorways on purpose, because while my dad has occasionally been known to where almost anything (you should see the cycling and skiing clothes), he's new to scarves and I didn't want to overwhelm him with both a new accessory and outrageous colors.


In any case, I hope he finds it to be a useful winter accessory to wear with his leather jacket in a stylish fashion the rest of the family will approve of.