On the needles, Fri. Dec. 12th

I finally feel like I can sit back and take a few deep breaths!  It was a lot of fun having our kids home last weekend, and especially, enjoying giving, and getting our Christmas gifts.  They were all on their way home again by Tuesday afternoon, and then "life" kicked in again - doing the routine things that had been put on hold while the kids were home.  Now, that part of my week is mostly behind me, and I'm able to pick up my knitting again.  I'm still working on finishing "Pears the Elephant" - I've got all 4 parts of the ears "on the go" at the same time, so that I make sure all the shaping gets done at the same time - the two back parts are the gray, and the fronts will be striped, white, fuchsia and blackberry.

I decided that having only 1 knitting project on the needles at one time is boring, so I started the first of what will be several pairs of socks for our (as yet unborn) grandson.  This little sock is working up really quickly - I did all the ribbing in about 3 hours (between getting up a few times to tend to other little things), and I've just done about 4 rows of turning the heel.  The pattern calls for leftover sock yarn, which I never seem to have, so I bought a ball of Kroy in typical boy colours (Singin' the Blues), and I'll knit socks until the ball is finished.  That way, if one sock gets lost (which inevitably happens), there will be a replacement available!  I'll try to make the socks match, as much as possible.  By the time this sock is finished, I'll have a better idea of the striping pattern.