Are you there knitters? It's me, Kaylin.

If you're reading this, I'd like to congratulate you on surviving another holiday season. If you're like me, you barely snuck in the last few knitted gifts in the eleventh hour. And even if you didn't, if the holiday season totally snuck up on you, guess what? You didn't spontaneously combust because your projects weren't finished. Your brother can wait a month for his knitted hat and your whiney child/uncle/cousin/in-law can wait until next year.  It's not even cold enough in the midwest right now for most knitwear.

The problem with rushing to finish so much knitting is that I got burnt out. After the last beret was finished blocking, I had no desire to cast on for anything new, not even the stole I had planned on knitting myself over break (I have this vision of me fighting away a chill in a classy stole. I'm sure the reality of stole wearing is much less glamorous since if it is cold enough to wear a stole, I'd likely be wearing a jacket already. It's a dream, okay?! And clearly I just really like using the word stole!).

Most of my holiday knitting consisted of, no surprise here, hats. I also knitted up a few super simple headbands, modeled by my sister below.

She's a doll, no? Except when she tries to take knitted things that were not meant for her. Though this headband was given to her specifically. Stay away from my hats, Jackie! 

The absolute best thing I made all break had to be this little guy:

He now lives with my friend Cassie, who won him at our White Elephant gift exchange. Besides the obvious adorable factor, I was really proud of myself for whipping one up on the first try without a pattern. This may not have been a daunting task for many knitters, but I'm more of a pattern adaptor than designer. The ability to shrink the little bugger in the dryer to get a better bottle fit helped a lot.

So, clearly, my break knitting peaked on December 18th. Not that I haven't enjoyed some time off. Mostly I spent the time I would have been knitting flipping through knitting magazines, books, and websites. I have a lot of pattern inspiration and, thanks to the holiday season, a small yarn budget to work with. But first, to work on that stole. Which will likely be made using this pattern from Brooklyn Tweed. They call it a wrap. Pffft. We know the truth, friends. We know. I will look "casually sophisticated!" I will! And I will keep it with me until I find optimum temperature conditions in which the stole provides the perfect amount of warmth. I've got sixty or so years. It'll happen.