Unfinished

All around blogland, it seems, people are slowing down, settling in and readying their homes for the festive season. Everywhere I look I see beautifully decorated trees and homemade hearths and ornament-annointed mantels. I look around my own home and see empty bookshelves, piles of uncategorised 'stuff' and boxes stacked nearly to the ceiling. Ah, moving house - the most heart-warming of Christmas time pursuits.

I've been knitting a little here and a little there this past couple of weeks. I set out on our big beach holiday with enough yarn to knit at least six cardigans and jumpers. Optimistic? Hmm. Half an hour into the journey, I realised I'd left my knitting needles at home, and with the three in the back seat already whining "Are we there yet?" (only four hours to go...), there was  no way we were turning back. Of course, I had no need for the needles. The knitting I accomplished, mostly over glasses of wine after our communal dinners each evening, was scarce. Optimistic? Yes.

But now it's back to packing and sorting and packing and sorting. And throwing and chucking. I have lost count of the bags of stuff that have gone to the charity bins, and despite that and endless full garbage bins, I still have several boxes labelled 'crap' and 'junk'. I'm guessing I won't be unpacking those ones in a hurry.

The packing and sorting did unearth a large plastic box, long forgotten, filled to the brim with unfinished knitting projects. Holy smokes, what was I thinking buying that yarn? Those patterns? Some of these things have been in the works since I took up knitting again back in the early noughts. Is that 100% acrylic? Hot pink and lime green stripes? Yikes.

Amongst it all is a finished jumper (sweater) in lovely Debbie Bliss cotton that someone could be wearing now but for the wonky collar. And a quite nice Jo Sharp jumper in orange that would fit one of my girls, except the sleeves turned out quite long and thin. I could be all brash and make these my new year's knitting resolutions...or just quietly put the lid back on and add it to the tower of boxes in the garage. And tiptoe away. Shhh...

Perhaps I could stick a star on top of it all and call it the Christmas tree.

Back to the packing and sorting.

Joining in with the Yarn Along over at Small Things.