It’s not like I don’t know that December is a crazy busy month, but it seems like every year it still catches me off guard. I think it’s because December is a month where I don’t want to say no to anything. There are holiday parties, craft shows, birthdays, and so much knitting, and I want to do it all, because it’s fun and it’s festive and it’s just nice.

Inevitably, though, that leads to a knitting crunch. We’re spending the holidays with L’s family this year, which means everything for my family needed to be done extra early so it could be mailed. Last Friday I delivered their parcel to the post office, feeling pretty good about how much of my holiday making I’d finished with two weeks to spare. Then I looked down at the gloves I’m knitting for L, and did a little math (amount of work divided by number of days in which to do it) and felt a whole lot less smug.

This time last week, the gloves consisted of one finished hand, with one finger, which I had to rip out and reknit, basically I had: no fingers, no thumb, no second glove even on the needles. I also realized that I had committed to making us stockings, and that I hadn’t even started (as in: no fabric, no pattern). I powered through on the second glove hand over the weekend (there’s nothing like a chart to motivate you through).

I took care of the stockings on Monday. I bought the fabric, I made up a pattern (yes, the toes are a little pointy, but that just adds character, right?) and I whipped them together. The fabric is upholstery weight that I got in the remnant bin at a fabric store downtown, so it was relatively inexpensive, but frayed like crazy, so these are French seamed. It seems a little fancy for something that will really only be used once a year, but I sure beat trying to line them.

Now I’m just chugging away on the fingers. I’ve got four finished, which leaves me four more, plus two thumbs, and just under a week. We have some driving to do, so I’m hoping I can get a finger or two knit in the car (the chart is nice and straightforward, and now I’ve basically knit it four times, so I’m not worried), which leaves me with just a few more, and then blocking and weaving in the ends. It’ll be tight, but I think I might just make it.