Pro-tips of the Week

1. Observe the orientation of the hole in the sippy-top of your thermal mug before attempting to drink. This will save you pouring coffee down your shirt.   (This alas follows the incident some years ago when I poured a regular glassful of something down my shirt and my younger sister asked me in a sweet, kindly tone, "Robin, do we need a cup with a sippy-top?"  For the record, the answer was 'yes'....)

2. Check the size of the needles you grabbed out of your bag before casting on. Vaguely remembering what you threw in a few days ago is no substitute for actually noticing that you're casting on using sixes instead of eights.

3. When the hat comes out sized for a 30" diameter head, do not assume that it will magically become smaller just because you knit another couple of inches. Frog it now.

4. Going to bed early instead of doing dishes may be result in being better rested, but it will do nothing to clean the dishes.

5. If your boss didn't give you the details of the job he wants you to follow up on before he left on vacation it's probably because it's already late.

6. Driving southbound on the northbound lane of the highway is a bad idea*.

7. When in doubt**, knit a hat***.

*This was not me. Yes, I did call 911 when I saw the other guy doing it. Along with a zillion other people.
**What can I say, there's been a lot of doubt this week.
***Unless you're a cat, in which case you should lounge on the sun porch.  Assuming you're not already busy subduing the yarn.

Experimental

So, I kind of suspected these might be done next, if only because over the weekend, I had taken them out of time-out, unraveled the decreases on the one that was too short, and then adjusted the yarn quantities so that the dark blue would run out in the same spot on both mittens.   But I didn't put it past them to find some new way to annoy me.

Nevertheless, here they are- kid Salt-and-Pepper mittens, inspired by the pattern in Robin Hansen's Fox and Geese and Fences:

These were an experiment.  You may recall that I got a large box of sport weight yarn a few months back.   Well, these mittens are made from some of that.  They're sized for a two-year old.  On the theory that at least they wouldn't take long if they were really annoying.  Guess what?  Yeah, they took a while, and they're really annoying.  Colorwork mittens are not going to be my plan for using up the sport weight yarn.   Hats are fine, they just need more stitches around.  Mittens are rather more fiddly, since they need proportions adjusted in the row count as well as the stitch count.    Mind you, I'm not saying I won't try it again, particularly if I find a pattern written for this weight of yarn.    But it's not going to be my go-to project for this particular box of yarn. 

Biscuit liked them, however,  and helped me finish them by subduing the yarn.

I think it's scared, don't you? 

Happiness Is a Stripy Pair of Socks

Even when things get a little crazy, you can always wear happy socks, right?

And less happy but no less finished, a plain hat for the gift bin. 

Next up...well, I have no idea what the next FO will be since I appear to be attacking them in a completely haphazard fashion.   We can all all be surprised, right?