Our Perfect Christmas

We had what I consider a perfect Christmas.

On Christmas Eve we traditionally have a Swedish feast at the home of a former neighbour of Skip's. Then Christmas morning (I slept in 'til 10:30!! It must have been the generous servings of glögg I had) and we opened our stockings and presents with the fireplace channel on the TV.

I made breakfast and then began our Christmas dinner preparation.

I don't make tons of different dishes - usually a bird (capon, this time)

and stuffing, steamed green beans, scalloped potatoes (from scratch), dinner rolls (not from scratch), cranberry sauce (from scratch) and lava cakes for dessert.

The tissue hats are from our traditional Christmas crackers which, in addition to the hat contain a small prize and a fortune. They are a highlight of every Christmas dinner for us and must be worn for the entire dinner.

It was a lovely day and the house continued to smell chicken-y as I boiled down the carcass for soup.

Ollie and I relaxed once everything was cleaned up.

Yesterday I took it easy, watched "The Hangover" with Skip and then the Season 3 "Downton Abbey" Christmas special which had just been aired in the UK on Christmas Day. I actually yelled at the end of the episode. (I can't tell you what I yelled because I don't want to spoil it for you). Season 3 is awesome and I look forward to watching it again every week on PBS.

I got this far on my Lehe lap blanket.

 I just have to finish the top diamond lace border then pick up stitches all the way around and knit the lace edging.I have lots of yarn left so will make the edging quite wide. 6" perhaps?

This is the view out our bedroom window today. We got our first snowfall (6") last night. Who needs a white Christmas anyway?

Skip got to try out the new snowblower - he and 4 other neighbours.

Since I didn't spin on Monday night, I thought I'd get in a couple of hours this morning while I was still in my jammies. It's a crappy iPhone photo but you get the idea.

Here is the singles thus far.

The plan is to use it with this yarn I spun previously.

Perhaps I'll do a shawl pattern. I'll use the multi-coloured yarn for the stocking stitch and the plain yarn for the lace border.

I'm open for pattern suggestions.

Maybe the Two Color Crescent Shawl, or Kleio, or Dream Stripes (although I prefer a crescent shape), or Cladonia, or Vidalia Lace Shawl, or Kashtanea Lace Shawl, or Romance?

I still have lots of the plain roving to spin.

I'm also looking for yarn to knit the Corydalis shawl, a Linda Choo pattern which I saw at the Woodstock Fleece Festival in October. I need 700m of laceweight. It incorporates lace knitting, a semi-circular shape AND it's entrelac! I'm going to have one more look in my laceweight yarn stash before I make a trip to the yarn shop.