‘Getting ahead of the Christmas gift situation’

This is gonna be a quickie, ‘cause I’ve got to get back to my hats. See, I had this brainstorm this past weekend. (Yes, I mean the weekend before the weekend that has Christmas at the end of it.)

I was working away on my umpteenth sweater while watching Friends when I needed something from my knitting closet. While fishing out whatever the heck it was, I was almost smothered by bags of leftover yarn from all the sweaters I’ve knitted already.

One of the sweaters I’ve knitted already. Yes, there is yarn left over. Yes, there is some going into a hat

I looked at all those partial hanks and semi-depleted balls and thought, “Hats!” (Actually, I think I said this aloud: “Hats!)

It was a real Eureka Moment for a person who has friends with chilly heads. Friends who, like my follically-challenged husband, are hard to buy gifts for because they already get themselves anything and everything they want or need. But hey, they can always use a hat.

Someone who can definitely use a nice warm hat. Maybe two

So I turned our guest room into a hat factory. Gathered all the odds and ends of worsted and sport and heather, grouped them into interesting little piles of colors and textures, downloaded a bunch of hat patterns from Ravelry — and got to it!

What I used to knit with leftovers: vests! But, gee, his head looks cold

I had never knit a hat before. Which, in a wacky way, made it all the more fun. The first one got off to a rocky start, because it’s not so easy determining whether the circumference is going to work. But once I frogged it a couple of times, it went swimmingly. In case you’re interested, the term “frogging,” which means to undo your knitting and roll it back up into a ball and start over comes from “rip it rip it”, which some knitting wag thought sounded like a frog: “ribbit ribbit”. I guess.

The first hat, all done and getting blocked. After I ripped it out a couple of times. Grrrrrr

Incidentally, I’ve been test/playing with The Child’s whiz bang new product, Dot, which another tester said is “like an operating system for your life.” Dot, which you can read about here, is not available to the public yet, but I’ve been putting her through her paces with all kinds of tasks. This morning she entertained me with an article about playing “Yarn Chicken,” which is when you’re in a race with your yarn. Will you win, and have enough to finish? Or will you run out somewhere toward the end? To which quandary I have the perfect answer: Stripes.

Running out of yarn? Throw in a couple of stripes!

Well, I warned you. I have one more hat to knit before Thursday. So I’ve gotta get at it. Good thing Friends ran for so many years!

I’ll leave you with this holiday photo from my favorite yarn source, Catskill Merino. Most of my hats (and their parental sweaters) started out on the backs of these lovely merino sheep.

There’s gotta be a manger in there somewhere

May your Christmas be merry and bright. And your head be toasty and warm — topped with a nice new hat.

New York City. December 2023