Black & Lace

I'll tell you what's hard to take a picture of - anything that is black and lacy and hand knit. Unfortunately this Christmas I knit two presents that were both black AND lacy, so bear with me. 

The first was the Foliage Lace Mitts that I made for my friend Kathryn (rav). I hit up Joann's for yarn and found that Vanna's Glamour was a good substitute. This yarn is FANCY, people. It's glittery! If you click on the picture you can see it close up and you can tell which part is lace and which part is glitter.

check out my hand modeling!

The pattern is lovely and simple (and free!), with an easy lace pattern and it only used one ball of the Glamour. I had a little issue - mainly knitting two right hand mitts, but that was completely my fault. That's what I get for furiously knitting without paying attention.

Then I knit my Mom a Talia sweater vest (rav). I absolutely loved knitting this sweater. I used the recommended Lamb's Pride Worsted in black, and it was awesome and a bit fluffy. 

I knit this in a whirlwind right before Christmas, but - remarkably - didn't have any problems. The bottom and center panels are lace and pretty easy to memorize, and other than that there is some simple shaping. I only used 2 skeins of Lamb's Pride as well, so I have a whole skein left over. After I finished it, I tried it on and it was very flattering... I kinda wanted to keep it. But I didn't, as evidence by the photographic evidence above!