we're off

Last night we managed to put away some of the tools and return some of our kitchen items to their places, which cleared the way for a little Christmas decorating. We didn't get a tree this year; I am still smarting from an offhand comment last year referring to our tree and involving the words "Charlie Brown."

(For those of you who aren't familiar with buying Christmas trees in a city, you should understand that trees must be imported from New England, which means that they tend to be rather expensive. We can't just go cut one down. Around here they go for around $10 a foot, and since we don't have children and aren't here for Christmas itself, buying a 5' tree for $50 is a real extravagance.)
Anyway, Christopher picked up a wreath on Monday, and last night we put up some lights, wrapped presents, listened to sappy Christmas music and ate popcorn. I'm feeling a little more in the spirit, though I am unsure how we ended up with just one measly present for Christopher's stepfather (actually, I do know how that happened-- he only requested one thing, and we have no idea what else he would like. Socks? A paperweight?)When Christopher gets up, we'll open the presents we got for each other (he's getting new t-shirts from me, not so exciting unfortunately) and then we'll pack and head off to Philadelphia for a few days of family time. I still have some gift knitting to do, a pair of mouse/cat mittens for our nephew, who is 4. (the pattern is for a mouse but I thought I'd do a cat instead.) The body of the mittens are done, but they still need to be made into an animal. I knit on an ear to see what it looked like, but I think I need to go bigger.

I am also considering whipping up a French press cozy for Christopher, since I'm feeling so bad about giving him mostly t-shirts this year. The main question is, how can I make the cozy when I'll be with him non-stop from now until Christmas morning??