knitted :: Awbrey #4, originally uploaded by earthchick.

Thank you all so much for your kind and enthusiastic comments on my blogiversary post, as well as for your sweet words about my DIY silhouettes (you should all make them, they are so fun and easy!). Nova pointed out in her comment that while knit blogs may be on the decline, other types of craft blogs – most notably quilt blogs – seem to be having an explosion. I think she’s right, and I must say that I do read certain quilting blogs with the same kind of hunger I used to read knitting blogs. In the past I’ve documented my sewing adventures here on my blog, but I haven’t really done that with my quilt block sewing over the last year. Maybe I should. Maybe I will.

At any rate, I have some knitting to show you. This was my first FO of this year – and, honestly, the only one so far! I am trying to finish up a test knit for babycocktails’ fantastic new pattern, Mulled Cider . I seriously love it so much that I want to weep every day that it’s not done yet. I am currently knitting my way through Sleeve Island, and it seems to be going slower than it is because I am doing two at a time. Y’all, I can’t wait to finish this jacket and show it to you because it is most certainly going to be one of my favorite things I’ve ever knit.

In the meantime, there is just this. One more cowl from the little pattern I published last month. I made this as a (belated) Christmas gift for our awesome babysitter (she has been babysitting the boys since I took those pictures I showed you in my blogiversary post!). She is a new knitter, so it was extra-fun to give her something handknitted.

pattern: Awbrey
yarn: Malabrigo Chunky, “Blue Surf,” roughly 83 yards
needles: 10.5 dpns
dates: January 3, on the drive home from our Christmas travels

I had thought I might make one of these for myself, but I am pretty much done with this pattern for awhile.

Okay, so I know why you’re really here. Who won the giveaway? Right? So, there were 50 comments, but that included one pingback (my own, heh), two comments from one person, and a few comments from people who didn’t want to be entered into the giveaway. So after I culled those, there were 42 entries. I entered that number into the Random Number Generator and got this number back out: 4. And that number belonged to Schrodinger , maker of these awesome knitting bags . Yay Cathy!! It’s pretty cool that Cathy won, as she is one of the first people I ever came to “know” in the online knitting community. She and I used to both hang out at Knittinghelp.com, and hers was one of the first blogs I ever started reading. I also had the happy opportunity to meet her and her beautiful family at Rhinebeck this year, which was pretty cool after knowing her online for five years. Cathy, I’ll email you with your gift card code.

Thanks, all, for celebrating with me!