WIP Wednesday and Dickens

The sweater for Finn that I began a few weeks ago is finally coming along a bit. The back is complete and I've moved on to the front. I love the way the striping pattern is working up, but I've wondered more than once why I decided to tackle stripes as my first sweater!

I've also been working on these little cuties. :)

I'm happy to say that most of my Christmas knitting is complete. One small thing left which shouldn't take more than a few hours. I'd like to get Finn's sweater finished for his birthday (which is on Christmas day), but I'm not going to stress about it. I generally try to have all my handcrafting and other present buying done by Thanksgiving so that I can spend the month of December celebrating without stress and living in the moment with my kids. I dare say they'd rather have the memories of things we do together than me out shopping every spare moment during the month of December.

The book that we've begun reading together this month is the classic A Christmas Carol. I found this lovely illustrated version at a favorite bookshop years ago and bought it knowing that when the time came, I wanted these beautiful illustrations to introduce the kids to Dicken's famous work. Unfortunately, Mickey Mouse beat me to it for at least some of the kids.

The ghosts are a little creepy in their watercolor luminescence, but the older kids seemed ready this year. They are thoroughly enjoying reading this together despite the often magniloquent language.

One of my favorite illustrations: the dance in Scrooge's past.