A whole bunch of not much

Are you serious? It's almost December already?

I vowed to post several blog entries in November. Epic failuree, obviously, but if I post this today, that'll give me a grand total of two entries for the month.

I made some hedgehogs. I needed a little gift to give two children, friends of friends' kids, on Christmas Eve, so I decided it would be knitted hedgehogs. I found the pattern here.  They were quick and easy, which suited me just fine. As you can see, I got a little carried away and actually made five of the little rascals. The extra three will go to other children .

Behind the hedgehogs are some knitted and felted gift card holders. I found that pattern here. I use a similar small purse to keep all my credit cards/discount cards in, in my handbag. It's much easier to pull out all the cards at once and shuffle through them to find the one I need, rather than to store them in my wallet and take ages to try to locate the sought-after card. Perhaps the recipients of these gift card holders will use them all year for the same purpose.

My so-called Christmas cacti all bloomed very early this year, like in early November. I enjoyed them but wished they'd held off a few weeks so they could have added some color to the Christmas season.

A friend asked me to knit a lamb for her great-grand daughter. Here's the result. I used my favorite pattern for knitted lambs.

In October/November I swept the dust off my sewing machine and whipped up some small zippered bags, or wristlets, to sell for my sorority. They're a breeze to make and should come in handy for a multitude of purposes. A friend, an upholsterer, gives me her old fabric sample books, so that's the fabric I used for these. Also in the photo are two Wonder Wallets, also a sales item for my sorority. These little wallets have sold like hot cakes. I wish I'd kept a record of how many I've made in the past four-five years. I bet I've made at least 150. Just when I say I will absolutely NOT make any more, someone requests one or two and I, being weak, oblige them. But I really, really hope I won't be making any more.

Almost two weeks ago I came up with the brilliant idea of knitting an afghan.What drove me to this, I don't know. Anyway, I'm working on it daily and the darned thing is barely growing at all. I measured it this morning, and it's now 20 inches long, which means I'm only one-third of the way there. Mercy. I hope I have the stamina to stick with it and finish it. I rather like the design, to be honest. I do enjoy knitting cables.

This is what we've received for snow so far. Rather disgusting, really. I mean, this is MAINE, for crying out loud, and this is what we've had for snow in November. I hope December starts looking like winter around here.

Our great niece Violet came for a two-night sleepover at Thanksgiving. She attempted to draw a portrait of Molly while here. Things were going well until Molly suddenly had had enough, got up, and walked off, leaving the budding artist with a pencil and paper but no model.

 I had a hankering for lemon meringue pie for Thanksgiving, and a hankering to make a meringue others only dream about. I searched Allrecipes.com, and there was my answer: Never, Ever Fail Meringue. The secret is the cornstarch, I suspect.

If I had any self-respect, I wouldn't let you see the mess my kitchen was in a couple of weeks ago. I've since tidied it up, honest. I wanted to show this to you because that large box beside the fridge? Yeah, that one. It arrived from Amazon one day. I thought, "Wow, they sent my entire order in this one box!

Wrong. The box contained one order only: six Stella Artois beer glasses. Six glasses in a box large enough to accommodate, easily, one average human.

Now you see why I haven't been posting in November. I've had little or nothing to write about!