Lost in Yarn

Right before my trip to Europe, stressed from moving out and moving in, I allowed myself a little bit of shopping therapy. The packages came just days before leaving:

Eight balls of Rowan Big Wool in ice blue, and my new love, ten balls of Rowan Felted Tweed in watery. I'm so completely, head over heels crazy about this color, I almost took a ball on the trip for fear of separation anxiety.
Have you ever wanted something really bad and when you got it, you realized you weren't crazy about it anymore? That's how I feel about the Big Wool. I had been gawking at this for over a year, and when I saw this, there seemed good reason to give in and purchase. But I think I'm over it now. But maybe I'm not. Why is it that one day, all I want is soft, barely there color, and then next I crave dark rich jewel tones? The jewel tone phase is now, and I will hold on to Big Wool, hoping the desire will be rekindled before spring. It's not just that I crave different colors, I want different projects as well. Last night I frogged my almost finished 'Lila' sweater. I just wasn't 'feelin' it' anymore. So here I sit surrounded by beautiful yarns and I have absolutely no idea what I want to do with them. Maybe I need to do a little more shopping, for pattern books instead.
As for the rest of the stash, here is the sock yarn I bought in Munich at Wollkorb ( I went to the one by Sendlinger Tor, though I much prefer the one close to LM university) :

All these are for bf. He loves the self-patterning yarn, the crazier the better. I had to keep that in mind while selecting the colors. On the bottom are his socks for Christmas, the only gift knitting this year chez craftoholic. I have now finished those socks and wrapped them up, so there will be pictures after Christmas.
I got a pair of socks as well, knitted for me by my cousin in Germany, who knits nothing but socks:

She makes me a pair every year. It's fabulous to get a knitted gift, even if the colors are a little bright. I love them nonetheless. I'll be back after the holidays, hopefully with some ideas for a new project. Have a very Happy Holiday everyone!
And thank you to all those who commented on my gothic knee highs who didn't have emails listed!

Gothic Knee Highs

These have been finished for over a week, waiting to be photographed which proved very difficult given availability of light and photographer, but here they are. The dark red almost black color of this yarn made me think of Sadie Frost in Frankenstein, the dark ages, Gothic architecture. After studying drawings of the cathedrals of Reims and Strasbourg, I came up with a simple yo, k2tog/ssk pattern design of gothic windows. I used three skeins of Koigu and had just an inch of yarn left over after weaving in the ends. They would look great with a black taffeta skirt.

My knitting hasn't been very exciting lately, I'm working on a pair of socks for bf, a Christmas present, which means nothing else gets in the way until they're done. I'm past the ribbing on the second sock, so just a couple of days should do it.

There and back again

I've been back just a little over a week and already it seems my vacation was just a dream. I do this every year and yet I still experience culture shock both ways. This time held surprises such as my grandma offering me leftover chocolate from Halloween. Halloween? Since when do Germans celebrate Halloween??? Apparently they have been doing so for a few years now, as well as shopping at Staples, Toy's-R-Us and Eddie Bauer, and paging through Land's End catalogs. I dread to imagine what else will be there by the time I visit again. Munich is still the beautiful glorious city I left, busy yet always ready to sit down and have a beer or coffee and cake. For five days I accompanied my mom to a conference in Warsaw, Poland, where I spent a lot of time in the many beautiful city parks, wandering along the river Wisla, warming up in lovely cafe's with hot chocolate and apple pie. Poland was very exciting, it is so rapidly changing into a western society. Amidst the grey and heavy whales of communist architecture, steel and glass highrises announce the indelible establishment of capitalism. Krakow, a two hour train ride south of Warsaw, is beautiful and busy even on a chilly winter day, but then you slip into a little coffeeshop where time turns back and you expect Kafka to stop in on his way to Prague. South of the castle, Kasimierz is Krakow's old Jewish neighborhood, a place with little alleys and dark houses and street vendors selling old books.
Back in Munich, the opening of Christkindl's Markt (Christmas Market) a day before I left meant sipping Gluehwein and hot blueberry wine, eating roasted chestnuts and enjoying the sparkly lights and sounds dissapearing in freshly fallen snow. It was lovely. A few of my pictures can be seen here
Now what about the knitting? I almost finished my knee highs, both are just waiting for the ribbing on top and are hopefully ready to be photographed this weekend. My yarn purchases were extremely modest, three skeins of sock yarn, all picked for bf's eclectic taste, was it. But a tv station had a feature on a woman who is knitting a very long scarf incorporating the flags of all soccer teams participating in the WM. She's not knitting this all herself, but knitters from all over Germany are helping and sending her the pieces to sew together. I've never been a soccer fan, but in Germany it's better to feign interest than admit that out loud ;-)
Also coming, pictures of goodies I received from Janette's on ebay right before I left. It's hard these days to photograph things when even the daylight isn't light enough.

In Poland it's a muffinka, in Germany grandma calls it a 'mooffin'.