Aurora Borealis in Green

I am in Christmas ornament mode. At this time of year I get the strong urge to create something for the soon to come Christmas tree. I love Christmas trees. For most of my life I wasn't allowed to celebrate Christmas, or even admit to thinking the trees are pretty, because I grew up in a religious cult that was very anti-Christmas. In 1997 Sweet Hubby and I found the courage to leave it. Now I can have all the Christmas trees I want. I get very creative each year. Sometimes I choose a color theme (like purple, or blue), or maybe a subject theme. There was the year I knitted yards and yards of furry sparkly 'garland' with Novelty yarns. This year I'm going for good ol' Multicolor.

Here's the Aurora Borealis ornament cover I've been working on, all done. Believe me, the picture does not do justice to the sparkling beauty of it. (Click on the pic to enlarge.)





The pattern for this little gem can be found in Karen DeSousa's book Accent On: Celestial Series. I made some substitutions. First of all, instead of the Czech fire polished crystals, I used Chinese faceted round crystals. I substituted large sized bi-cones for the tear drops, and instead of using 12mm bugles, I used size 3's, and I substituted the long 30mm bugles with two size-3 bugles with a seed bead between them. I wanted to make this cover completely with beads that can be bought at Bead It so the boss could put it on display and not have to answer the "Where did she get that?" questions. I'm quite pleased with it.

I have finally made it past the 2 unruly rows in the swim suit cover. I've split for the placket and am on my way to the armhole shaping. The directions say to knit both sides at once, but I never do that because invariably I get messed up and make a mess. So I do one side at a time and take copious notes so they'll match.

Today I am going to do something totally crazy. I have made arrangements to meet a fellow knitting blogger in person. Marguerite, from Michigan, author of the Stitches of Violet blog, is coming to my area to visit family, so we're going to meet for lunch today. I admit I'm a little nervous, mostly cos as a rule I'm a very shy person. But I'm also very excited. We've been reading each others blogs for several months now and it will be fun to put a face to her.

Have a great day.