I am hereby proclaiming...

...this Christmas to be a "No Knitted Gifts Christmas!"

Aaahh. Feels so good to say that. Every year I try to make everybody in my family The Perfect Knitted Gift That Doesn't Take a Long Time to Knit or Isn't Too Expensive. That usually ends up being a felted bag, a scarf, a pair of socks. I had every intention of going through the process again this year, until the other day when I was making one of my famous lists and decided that I'm just not going to have enough time. It amazes me still, to think that I'm actually admitting that I'm not Superwoman and don't have the time to make gifts this year. They're probably not as appreciated as I'd like to think they are, anyway.

So with that being said, this is The Plan:

1. Finish my Union Square Market Pullover in the next 2 weeks.
2. Knit Hayden's Harry Potter sweater before the movie comes out in November.
3. Knit my Greek Pullover (for which I bought the yarn last Monday - very pretty red Rowan Kid Classic. I own nothing red, so this will be great.).
4. Knit a sweater for Hayden out of a really unusual shade of blue Rowan Handknit DK Cotton. This will become his holiday sweater. I try to knit a new sweater for him around Christmastime, but I don't want it to have a Christmas theme or be red or green because I want him to be able to wear it more often than December. Last year's holiday sweater was a grey cabled sweater ("Jack") out of the Rowan Junior pattern book. I think this year it's going to be "Action" out of Rowan Pipsqueaks.
5. Knit a sweater for my husband that will be more useful than the sweater I knit for him last Christmas. He kept saying last year, "You'll never be able to knit a sweater for me. It'd take too long, and the yarn would cost too much." So to prove him wrong (like I like to do), I knit a simple v-neck sweater for him that is teal with a grey chest stripe. Fits him PERFECTLY. The only problem is that in an attempt to get chunky yarn so that it'd go by quickly, I used Lamb's Pride Bulky, which is way too hot to wear in Nashville very often. He wore it a total of 3 times. This year I'm not surprising him, and I let him choose between 3 different patterns. Wouldn't you know it - he chose the most complicated one! It's a Rebecca pattern with cables and ribbing. I'm going to use Rowan All Seasons Cotton (geez, do I sound like a Rowan whore, or what???), which I love. Haven't bought it yet, though.

There may be a couple of random projects thrown in here and there, like a halter top for my friend or a baby hat for Hayden's speech therapist who's due in December or January, but those won't take long, so that's why I didn't include them in The Plan.

So that's it. There are only 5 things, but a) every single one is a sweater, and b) Christmas is less than 3 months away (YIKES!!!), so 5 things is a lot. If anyone sees or hears me try to add something to it, PLEASE STOP ME. I'd like to keep my sanity this winter.