More Making

 In looking through my photos from last year I realised I did a lot more innovative cooking (for me that means following new recipes, more or less), read slightly less than in 2020 (which I count as a good thing), and knitted three sweaters for grandchildren. I've shown you one of them, an apple green cardigan for Isla. 

I also made a coral red hoodie for Isla and a blue jumper (pullover sweater) for Struan. These were both challenging makes. The hoodie because I'd not made a hood before and attaching it was interesting; the blue jumper because of a strange 'knit in the stitch below' thing that I never figured out how to correct properly if I made a mistake. This meant taking out several rows instead of just one and re-knitting. Also, the wrap around collar was very short on instructions. Bill seemed to understand them better than I did, perhaps being more familiar with a wrap-around collar. I finished Isla's hoodie right before Christmas, but I was stitching together Struan's jumper in the car, driving up to Edinburgh Christmas Eve! I had to make Bill pull over halfway to have him explain (again) how the collar was to be stitched on. I really don't want to do that last minute stuff again. 

Another thing I made around Christmas time was some little Christmas trees. They were quite fun, if time consuming. Marilyn, from the Linskill Craft Group, shows us all how to make these. She had done a whole bunch and made bunting from them! I just made enough to decorate a few gifts with them. I will try to make more for next year.

I've started knitting another cardigan for Isla from a pattern written as a chart, sort of like a counted cross-stitch chart, only different. I've ended up writing it out row by row, which is very tedious. I'm wondering if everyone does this or if I'm just making work for myself. I can't see following this pattern across a whole row and keeping my sanity.