Year End Sales

I managed to finish my Christmas shopping for the kids, mostly Write Your Books from Barnes and Noble and digital photo album key chains for the teens. We are giving Dad pajama bottoms, house shoes and a fleece jacket this year. I bought a Red Cardigan from JC Penneys for Mom to give to me (I am her personal shopper). Lots of handknits for everyone, and gift cards for the work group. I am so happy we are not having dinner this year. My Cousin is having it at her house in Elk Grove. Yay.

Wow I scored a lot of stichmarkers, fiber and project bags during Black Friday and Cyber Monday, from various Etsy and ArtFire shops. Great discounts and free shipping offers were all over Ravelry. I joined 3 fiber clubs, two are Nov-Dec-Jan. The third starts in Jan and is for the whole year. I am undecided about the Socks That Rock Club 2011. If we get bonuses this year I will probably do the STR Club again in 2011.

The Berutti hat is done, I cast on a Short Row hat last night. I only have 18 more rows to go to finish the short row hat. I cast on the Shaken But Not Stirred scarf in Thraven, it is so pretty, I kinda want to keep it. I modified it for a guy, so there are no lacey olives on the border. The yarn is perfect. I am casting on self-striping socks as fast as I can. I want to wear the Rudolph socks on Christmas. We'll see.

I have not spun in over a week. The Quetzal Bird still needs to be plyed. I am thinking about spinning all of the 1 oz bumps and samples I received. My first one I want to try spinning without any prepping at all. I am not sure how to store my singles, I am considering winding them into cakes or balls for storage. Then once everything under 4 ozs is spun, I can decided what to ply together. I bought some solid fibers and I still have almost a pound of undyed fiber that I can spin and ply to get more yardage and different combinations.

I am not posting pictures of anything right now, because it is such a time suck. Taking pictures, editing them, labeling them, uploading them, then posting them just takes up too much time. This past week I have been spending that time knitting and I have finished 3 projects. That convinces me that less time on the computer equals more productivity. However, I have not been happy with the sparseness of my blog posts so I will try to spend more time here.

I need to find a new book. I have not been able to get into the Jasper Fforde book I started. Any recommendations??