Is Christmas over already?

Christmas and Boxing Day seem to have passed in a flash, indicating they were both good days. Christmas Day was just Dave, myself and the cats - who begged to be allowed to help eat Christmas Dinner, which was a complete surprise as neither of them are the kind of cats who beg at meal times. We did the church thing, ate far too much, opened pressies and spent a good amount of time on the phone to various relatives.

Present wise, I had a good haul of knitting and crochet related books, including the Encyclopedia of Tunisian Crochet by Angela "ARNIE" Grabowski. Weirdly, I searched for this book on Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.com, but it doesn't seem to be listed. So instead, I've linked to the Google entry and the author has set up a website called ChezCrochet.com which looks worth a look and is largely focused on Tunisian Crochet.

Dave also bought me some tunisian hooks, which look like a cross between a knitting needle and a crochet hook, so naturally Christmas Day evening saw me sat on the sofa trying to make sense of it all.

And here is my first ever Tunisian crochet swatch...

This is Tunisian Knit Stitch (Tks) AKA Stocking Stitch, Stockinette Stitch, Ribbing Stitch and Foundation Stitch. I worked it in a DK yarn on a 5mm hook and as you can see it is very prone to curling.

According to the author, Tunisian crochet has a very high tendency to curl and the only way to counter it is to go up several hook sizes, something I've taken on board although I'm still playing with my trusty 5mm hook at the moment.

Yesterday, Richard and Nat came over for the afternoon and evening to play lots of silly board games. We played Kill Doctor Lucky, Monty Fluxx and Munchkin Booty, all of which were great fun. We also ate a lot of nibbles, drank much tea (made properly from loose leaf proper tea in a tea pot) and I made chicken stew. There was also cake. It was a good day.

There were also more Christmas presents, including this hat which I made for Richard, who put it on as soon as he unwrapped it and kept it on all day!

This is Ribbed Cap from One Skein Wonders. I cast on 120 stitches and knitted it for 10.5 inches before starting the decreases, so it wouldn't be too small. It turned out great.

My other Christmas knits went down relatively well, I think. The feedback I've had so far has been warm and they sound appreciated, which is about all I can ask for really.