I did a Google image search for “winter warmers” and this was on the first page. I would LOVE to have a big fire like that right now. *shivers*

Anyway, there is a UK winter warmers swap starting shortly on the UK Swap blog. Signups close on 30th November, so there’s still time to join. I’m looking forward to taking part as the last swap I did was Sockapalooza 4, which is about 18 months ago now! I love all the cloak and dagger stuff with secret emails and cryptic messages. I am a very good stalker, which should probably worry me..!

I got a card in the post at the end of last week from those lovely people at Innocent:

In it there is a handwritten note saying that they loved my stripey hats. Now, considering they received over half a million little hats, that means someone had to make a note of every parcel of the thousands that came in, who it came from and a distinguishing feature of that parcel’s contents. Next year I will be sending them twice as many hats as I did this year; I think it’s the least I can do.

I also wanted to thank everyone who commented here, on Ravelry or sent an email after the Winter issue of The Inside Loop went live. Not only for the comments about my socks , but about the whole issue. It’s amazing and gratifying to see how many visitors the site has received over the past few days, and to see people casting on (and in one case, finishing) projects from this issue.

So I’ve been on a post-publishing high for the past few days, added to which Mr B and I went to see Bill Bailey on Saturday night and I love him even more now. It’s time to come back to Earth and point out that December starts next week and there is still festive knitting to be done! I have one present blocking as I type, and one more only a few pattern repeats away from being finished. If it wasn’t for the fact that I don’t even have the yarn for one present yet, I’d feel almost organised…