Presenting the Presents of 2015

I started making presents for real in October this year, because of of the wedding and all, but considering I started quite late I think I did alright.

I have made:

Three sets of mug rugs, four cat heads (two in black and two in white) and one seasonal one (gifted for a birthday in December). Patterns on Revelry here for the cats and egg, flower, pumpkin, the snowflake one I made by myself.

I have made four finished and one half finished ( still hoping to finish the last half soon) wrist warmer and two and a half pairs of socks (one was started by my mother).

The dark grey and red one was made in alpaca after this pattern and was given to my neighbour and friend with a scarf and a lip balm.

The dark grey and lilac one is also in alpaca and the pattern was from Simply Crochet Magazine 11 and the designer is Jennifer Reid, and although I like the pattern and have used it many times it is very time consuming, but luckily for me, I started it in January so I only had to finish one. For my friend Evi.

The other tree is loosely based mostly on this pattern, but a bit from my head too. I gave the grey one to M, the blue ones for my travelling cousin and the blue and grey one will be for my carpenter cousin.

The tree socks are a pattern my friend *Kio gave me that was passed down in her family so I used that on all socks. (the blue pair was started by my mother so I only finished one half of one sock).

I have made four scarfs.

The scarfs are made using this pattern, the red ones were also made in alpaca that I bought on sale, one for our neighbour and one for M's aunt. I think they were well received. The pink/grey and purple  pink ones are made in mohair, the purple pink I bought when my mother's local yarn store went out of business and the pink is from the 80's from my mother's stash, I had to buy the grey because the pink one turned out a bit too small. So another batch of inexpensive but pretty gifts that were fun to make (at least when I didn't have to unravel any mohair stitches that is).

I try to make my gifts because then I can give to almost 30 people and add a small something that fits instead of not giving anything because we live on a limited budget.

My aunt got three washing cloths and a soap. 

Almost everyone got around three trees each this Christmas so I think I made almost fifty in total. I also made this owl in a pattern by Drops. That I haven't given away yet since we didn't see them yet this year, she also gets a Christmas towel, but she likes owls so I hope she likes this little dude. All are made from scrap yarn.

I made two sitting pads for two teenage boys that have a dog, so I think they walk a little, at least now if they do take a walk they can also take a break;) They got a little money on the side. Most of the yarn is scrap, but when you the star is getting bigger you need more yarn for each round so in the end I had to buy more yarn, luckily I was using rather inexpensive Nille wool yarn.

I made four lap blankets, this one for two people, my aunt and her wife, this blanket is made mostly in regular sc and dc, but some x stitches and v stitches thrown in. I made this of scrap wool except the border that I bought. There is even some yarn from our wedding in there.

The bottom blanket was made last year but given to my mother at her 60th birthday, but it was the only picture of all lap blankets I had.

I made three of the lap blankets in the same star pattern I used for the sitting pads, one for my uncle and two for two little boys that we celebrated Christmas with (they also got some money) the pattern is also from here. Mostly made from scrap yarn, but the last rounds used about one skein each so I had to buy a little. So all in all, not too expensive since I use Nille wool yarn again.

Lastly I made 9 hats, three crochet cat hats, pattern from here, for my friend and cousins, and one crochet hat in grey and blue, pattern from here, mine looks a lot different because my gauge was way off. All the males in our family that we celebrated Christmas with got a hat each. My uncle got the crochet one and the rest got knitted ones, M also got a hat.  The other knitted hats are from various Norwegian knitting books but all the knitted hats are made from Nille wool yarn. The black cat is made from reflective yarn that I also got on sale when the yarn store next to my mother went out of business. 

One hat though is a 2014 gift but a 2015 finish, the one for my cousin with a beard, the beard is from here too and the hat is a Tristan from Drops again. 

I am getting better at following patterns and these small finishes help with feeling a sense of accomplishment which is important.

Lastly I made this little dude for my mother, I started this last year, but managed to finish it in time for the holidays. I hope I will be able to do more cross stitching next year. Also I hope to knit more and make cloths for myself as well as presents;)

I hope everyone has had a lovely year and that they liked the presents I gave them.

I do try to give something that fits the person but sometimes I just have to make a pattern because I have a hang up on it and have to find someone to give it to after;) Like with the scarfs.

Today we are celebrating New Year and I have a sinking feeling the last present of 2015, the wrist warmer, won't be finished in time especially since I have been doing presents for next year instead. Oooops. 

Oh well, Happy New Year, I hope next year I will finish all presents within the actual year itself, it might be too much of a stress to hope I will finish all presents in time for Christmas;)