Lookee here!

My Fetchings are completely finished and this is all the yarn I have left. I started with about 1/2 - 1/3 of a ball of Debbie Bliss Cotton Angora in white...

...and one full ball of the Debbie Bliss Cotton Angora in blue. I added two cables on the wrist for length, changed colours as I did the last cable and worked 17 rows in the white, adding the waste yarn on the 14th row and cabling while changing colours on the 18th row. I cabled one more time then worked 4 rows of the ribbing and cast off normally. For the thumbs, I picked stitches and worked two rows of white, changed to blue and worked 3 rows then cast off normally. The thumb colours meet up with the colour change on the hand and I am happy. The only thing I would do differently next time is to continue on with the purl row up the outside of the thumb so there isn't that break in the patterning. It isn't noticeable on the part where the thumb and palm meet so I would only change that one row.

The mailman brought me a nice package yesterday and in it were the final gifts from my Secret Pal Cate.

There were quite a few really nice gifts including some for Girly. The sheep was appropriated right after this picture. I have never tried Knitpicks (Wool of the Andes - carrot) before and I am really looking forward to working with it. The purple is Classic Elite's Monteza 50%Llama and 50%Wool. It feels beautiful. There were also a CD of Christmas music, some cute kleenex which went into Girly's knitting bag and some beautiful napkins as well as some treats. Crystallized ginger in dark chocolate. Really good! Some fruit jerky. Imagine a dried fruit treat that kids love, has a mere 9g of sugar per slice and no preservatives! Diabetic/Hypoglycemic/Careful Mommy heaven.

There were lots of stickers for Girly and a very cute greeting card (handmade?). The best gift of all though is the book. I didn't knit much more than the thumb on my second Fetching because I was so busy reading this book. "Knitting for Peace" by Betty Christiansen. If you don't have this book, go get it. It has an overview of all the charitable knitting groups (written in 2006), how they got started, how they expanded and took off and how they are doing today. It has stories of some of the people they have helped and how they are doing now. I couldn't put it down. This is the perfect book for me since charity knitting is something I am into and want to continue to do. There is contact information and mailing addresses for all the charities listed in the book so if I want to knit something for them, I won't need to try to find them first.

There was a fresh baked sugar cookie scented chapstick (mmm) and a very cool orange scented pencil with a shaft made entirely from recycled newspaper. How cool is that. The slogan on it is "Saving trees one pencil at a time." Want one for yourself? Check out Smencils to see them all.

Thank you Cate, everything is perfect and you have been a great pal. I feel very blessed to have been on the receiving end of your generosity and creativity.