December 1 - Self-Imposed Holiday Knitting Deadline

I didn't quite meet my self-imposed December 1st Holiday Knitting Deadline but I did get darn close to it! The problem is that Nick's family is so huge that despite knitting relatively consistently since mid-September, I still have gifts to knit for two 3-year-olds and a 4-year-old. Also for his brother and brother-in-law, if I have the time (which I should). Also, for him.

I *did* manage to complete gifts for his mother (the long, white "Falling Leaves" scarf), his father (the greyish "Antler Scarf"), his oldest sister (the blue "Summerflies Shawl"), his older sister (the orange "Cable-O" fingerless gloves), his younger sister (the light blue "Fetching" fingerless gloves), his twin nieces (the matching "Baby's First Cables" in purple and pink [in slightly different sizes since they're fraternal twins and one is definitely larger than the other]), his baby nephew (the blue and turquoise "Sailor Rib Beanie"), and his oldest nephew (the larger blue "Sailor Rib Beanie").

Above, are some close-ups of the hats...

 ...and below, of the fingerless gloves.

I've been looking through patterns on Ravelry for ideas on what to make the remaining niece and nephews. I'm pretty sure I'm going to make this for his 3-year old niece, in the same shade of purpose as the larger "Baby's First Cable" hat but with some darker green for the leaves.

I'm thinking about making this for his 3 and 4 year old nephews. Maybe one for him, too.

I'll probably make adult versions of whichever hats I end up knitting for his remaining nephews for his brother and brother-in-law.

If I have the time and enthusiasm, I would really like to make some journals, too. Apparently both Nick's mom and younger sister loved the journal I made and sent along to him a few weeks ago in my Halloween care package. Since I had originally planned to give one away to Nick's oldest sister (see below), I would only feel comfortable doing that if I could do the same for his younger sister, as well. I don't want to play favorites.

Each journal takes about four hours to make, though, so I want to make sure I finish all the holiday knitting first, before I go about making additional gifts. If I do make one for his little sister (she likes spirals!), then I will give this one to his mom:

...unless I decide to knit her this hat to match her scarf. We'll see.

I would love to knit things for my own family, too, but they're not really into knitted clothing. It's a shame, but there's nothing I can do about it.

I'm hoping to finish all the knitting by mid-December so I can wrap everything up and ship it out to New Jersey with plenty of time for it to get there by Christmas. That should happen since my friend Nance is coming to stay with me for about a week, starting on December 6th. She's an amazing knitter and I'm sure we'll spend most of our days knitting and chatting away!

Welcome December.