Now this is appreciation!

Excuse the dodgy phone camera picture, it was the best we could do...

This is my little friend Holly, yes "Holly's Jacket" Holly. Hasn't she grown? Anyway, I have been doing a little knitting for Miss Holly and I whipped her up a seamless kimono somewhat because I was dying to knit something in Panda Starshine (a very "little girl" yarn) and also because I wanted to do some test knitting of my resized pattern. Wouldn't you know that the kimono took 2 balls plus a femptometer of yarn and thus I had a fair amount of the Starshine left over.

Whilst I think the yarn is cute as can be, see..

It really is not something I am ever likely to use again. Hell I am 36 and I have three boys for goodness sake! That being the case I decided that my best course of action was a matching hat. Now wouldn't you know it. I had lots of leftovers but not a hat sized quantity. As we all know, when this happens the answer is (and always will be) stripes!

Off to the stash I go, grab some Cleckheaton Machinewash that I had left over from Rohan's Lightning A-Queen hat and I am off and racing again. The end result (as seen at the start of this long and protracted story), a rather cute red and white striped hat with a pom-pom on top. Is there anything cuter than a pom-pom on top of a little girls' hat?

Well, to cut a long story short, Holly is in love with her new hat. How in love you might ask? I got a call from Holly's Dad the night that I presented my gifts. It would seem that Miss Holly had had to answer a call of nature prior to her bath. Thinking it would be easiest (and least messy) Dad decided to strip her down for her trip to the loo. This was going smoothly until the removal of the hat. According to Dad, that hat was not coming off for anyone and any attempt to remove it ended in rafts of tears. Holly ended up sitting astride the throne wearing nothing but the hat that Auntie Jack made her.

Now that my friends is appreciation!