I thought I had nothing, BUT...

I worked feverishly on the shawl over the weekend, but you know, shawl knitting looks pretty much the same one day as another. Its looking wonderful and I am onto the second ball of yarn of the two from the mangled skein but I could hardly post pictures of it again.

However, Last week, my niece, ST, sent me an email. She's knitting! She began a little last winter with scarves and this year, just look.

She's playing with cables. She made these cup cozies with odds and ends, but used a very simple project to play at learning something new.

I love these cup cozies. I have bit and pieces of yarns all over the place, and I could stand to make me some for in the car. Those long drives between here and Saskatoon mean at least a couple stops for coffee, and the usual practise in the Needles house is to forget the steel coffee cups at home.

ST also sent me a picture modeling the hat she made.

She says, "I haven't managed to work up the courage yet to work on anything but 2 needles, so the hat wasn't done on the round, but I think I'll try for the next one. I'm also going to tackle socks at some point this winter! The hat was made with Bernat Satin Sport in Wine, it was really cheap at Michael's one weekend and I thought I'd try it. It was very nice to work with and turned out quite fine."

Dear ST, there is a part of me that wants to shout no, no, don't go to socks. They lead you down a garden path to all kinds of fun, challenges at your leisure and as close to instant gratification yarn work gives you. Its addictive, wearing them makes you feel sinfully decadent.

The other part of me, says yes, run, don't walk, fly even if you can (inside joke), but get to socks as soon as you can. They lead you down the garden path to all kinds of fun, challenges, and almost instant gratification and these things are very very good. They might look hard, but are infinitely simple, and only someone who has done it knows the little thrill you get when you turn your first heel.

I feel as if I am saying 'walk to the light' and in a way it is, I guess. ST, your perceptions of everything you knew may very well change if you go to socks. You are entering a whole other dimension, and net thing, you start thinking you can do anything in knitting. The good thing is, you can. Welcome to knitting.

If I have any readers who hail from Ottawa, I'll try to aim her your way to a knit night. I'm verklempt.

I am so verklempt, I forgot to say this is not the young niece I spoke of before, this is another knitter niece. I now have two knitter nieces. I feel so very pleased with the grand scheme of things. I've never fully led their mothers down the path to strings, but I do my duty with their daughters. (except that neither of these lovely ladies learned from me)