New Year News from Playing With Yarn

   Our Christmas came and with it the 5th biggest snow fall storm in Duluth's history going back to 1850. Away from the Lake the totals ranged from 24 to 26 inches of snow. Along the Lake we didn't get the huge amounts of snow but we also got rain - then ice. Christmas still came of course, but we didn't get to celebrate it with family. Instead it will be New Year's Day for opening gifts, eating and jigsaw puzzle doing.

I don't know how many knitters are finishing up knitting Christmas gifts but I am. Daughter Elisabet may have her scarf by New Years' Day. But daughters Marion and Penny will have to wait until theirs are knit and blocked. I am doing some beaded, lace scarves in Zepher Laceweight from Fiddlesticks - a wool/silk blend. I am using #10 seed beads and a Clover Soft Touch #14 0.050 mm crochet hook to place the stitch through the bead. They are not difficult patterns and they are not all that time consuming to knit but they kept getting pushed to the back burner of knitting projects and got left to the last to do.

   I had some Christmas socks to knit on commission, something that I try not to do much of as I just don't have all that much time from shop models and family gifts. Then I had some last minute grandchildren requests for slippers. Lucky for them the Monday Night Group had decided to knit the Knit Wits Elf booties as a group and I could whip out a couple of pair of those. Natalie had requested another pair of 'TV Slippers'. She has outgrown the last pair that were actually her older sister's and had been passed down to her and will now go to Little Bo in Texas. The yarn that I had used really held up and is no longer available - I do have some left but not in the white that she wanted - so I found a substitute yarn. I put ears, more and eyes on them so they look like mice or what ever animal the child wants to think that they are and that's what Natalie had requested. In my youth, in the 50's, we called them

TV slippers, other people may have called them something else. But they are easy and fun to knit. So I quickly knit up a pair for Natalie.

Then because Natalie loves baby dolls, I decided, at the

last minute, to knit and crochet doll clothes for a 5" itty bitty Baby for her. We carry the dolls and pattern books here. I had such a good time creating the doll's wardrobe. The doll and all of her clothes fit into a shoe box size locking plastic container from Target. It was so fun that only the need to get it into Christmas wrapping paper stopped me from doing more clothes.
In the shower one morning I thought what a good project it would be for people to get one of dolls and knit and

/or crochet clothes for the doll during the coming year and then turn them over to Flock* or other such groups to be given to little girls for Christmas. They would be especially nice for children in shelters as they don't take up much room and can be contained in a shoe box. We have dolls in the 5" size and the 7" size - $4.99 & $6.99 respectively. The 5" dolls take fingering weight yarn and the 7" use sport weight.
*Flock is a local area organization started and run by Julie Kubala. Knit and crochet items are collected by numerous local businesses, including Playing With Yarn.Then Julie collects and distributes them to area organizations that see that they get to people who need them. She also collects yarns, needles and hooks and gets them to people willing to make items. Flock is a labor of love started by Julie when another organization quit and she saw the need left vacant. http://flock2008.wordpress.com