Does anyone else remember that? With Bill Cosby? I'll spare you the whole song (aren't you glad I don't have the ability to record things? Oh the songs you'd hear! Truly, you have no idea what a bullet you are dodging here!). But enough parenthetical notation! On to the pictures!
First up is the half dome I made for my cousin! It'll fit him much better than Venus is demonstrating here. 
When I mentioned that to her, she got a little huffy and turned her back on me. Armless reproductions can be so huffy. But it did give me the chance to get a shot of the back! 
And a nice zoom in on the crown finishing, which I'm really quite pleased with! 
But in the end, to get a true feel for the fit, I had to put it on me. I tapped into my modeling knowledge (gleaned from watching a few more episodes of America's Next Top Model than I should admit to) and put on my "thoughtful" face. Now to wait for Tyra's call! ;-) Actual pattern notes: I worked it as written with the exception of casting on two fewer stitches because I worked it in the round. The yarn is Debbie Bliss Cashmerino Aran, one I'd never worked with before and picked up for a pretty good price! Woohoo!
But there's still another hat! This is the hard hat liner for my uncle! It took less than a skein of Wildfoote sock yarn. I've read bad things about this yarn (coarse, splitty, things that I hadn't come across before I'd already bought two skeins), but I didn't have a problem with it at all. Maybe I'm lucky! But not with models apparently. I managed to talk Venus into this one shot before an errant comment sent her screaming out of the room. 
Thank goodness again for my years of reality show training in the industry, though! I was able to pull off the "angelic" face!
The other project I actually completed was the stole for my grandmother made by modifying the Branching Out pattern. However, I haven't blocked it yet, so I'm just going to hold off on pictures until after that. I tried Shedir, but I just couldn't get the hang of the pattern. So many other people seem to have loved it, so I'm a little bummed that it didn't work out, but Plan B is fingerless gloves of some kind. My grandfather has arthritis in his hands, so that might help ease that. Maybe. And then there's Isabella, which I'm still plowing away at. It's so pretty, but I just can't seem to keep the momentum going on it. But I'll look at all this this way: 2 of the 5 Christmas projects are completely complete and 1 just needs blocking, so that's pretty good progress in my book!
