Thursday, December 30, 2021

Hats Hats Hats and More Hats (cont'd)


One last post for the 2021 year, almost at the wire.  Might as well let it be for the mutsjes/little hats that round out the year!

Speaking of which, the 2021 mutsjes donated to Innocent smoothies for charity (helping seniors in need) were due by the end of November.  These next two batches were the last I donated for the 2021 year:

You can tell these little hats were from socks I made for me, myself and I,
now that I'm remembering to show the matching photo.

These were made from self-striping yarn in our communal stash.
I LOVE how they remind me of babies.

All in all, I ended up with 151 mutsjes donated to charity from 2021,
and because I didn't start until July, that's almost one mutsje per day.  YAY!

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

Now begins the 2022 year in December, with my goal to make 300 mutsjes by the end of next November:

Self-striping yarn from the communal stash.
I tried light, medium and dark brims to mix it up a bit.

More self-striping yarn from the communal stash, which I love.

In this case, I found the green and gold solid-colored yarn, again from the communal stash.
You can't tell but they both have a gold, sparkly thread running through it.

Using the same green and gold yarn as in the previous collage,
I tried to make my own patterns, using white and red yarn to spruce it up.
It felt a bit more festive for this time of the year.

Now I'm back to my own Scheepjes yarn that does weird self-striping patterns.
It's my least favorite yarn but I want to use it up.

Last but not least, here's a loner from a scrap of communal yarn I found intriguing.
I'm glad it yielded only one because those colored flecks made knitting it hard.
Still, it makes for a perfect year-end splash, don't you think!

Speaking of which,
HAPPY NEW YEAR!

 

Thursday, December 16, 2021

A Christmas Market Alternative


For the second year in a row, because of COVID, visiting Christmas markets here in the Netherlands or Germany has been out of the question.  Even if some are open now in Germany, they're not full-blown with all the usual stalls.

Talk about a bummer!  

So, you can imagine our excitement upon discovering that nearby garden centers in Rijswijk (Kolbach) and Dongen (AVRI) give a Christmas "fix" that is almost as good.  Little did we know!

What follows is a combined visual of both garden centers visited in one day, 29 km apart, with Kolbach just 15 km from home.  With lunch in between at one of them, it was totally doable.

First of all, remember that these are garden centers...
where you can still buy garden supplies, plants etc.  DUH.


But THEN you enter a Christmas wonderland!
And like at Christmas markets, you have a gazillion things to see...and/or buy.

The decorating creativity was as good as anything I've ever seen in America or Europe.






I told daughter Amy that I could picture one of these
next to her Christmas tree or fireplace.  Just call me a glutton for them.

But THIS is what grabbed our attention the most:  the model villages.
Both garden centers had several of them that took up most of our photographic time.

This is just one of them.





I think we all have Childlike Wonder at such sights, don't you!

♥ ♥ ♥ ♥ ♥

And now, for all of you who celebrate the day...

Merry Christmas!  

And to my Jewish friends,
Happy Hanukkah!


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