More Knitting, Winter, Baby it's Cold Outside

Why write novels when you can knit? Knitting is the new black, or so I hear. Actually it was the new black a few years ago, it's probably the new beige. Maybe it's the new new black. Anyway, I knitted another thing which involved purling, shaping...fancy. Of course I can't take a photo without Ms I'm So Totally Three inserting herself into the frame. This is a nappy cover. If you haven't used one it can be hard to imagine how wool works as a nappy cover, but it just does. Something to do with the lanolin, wool neutralises urine. It wicks away mositure so baby bottoms can breathe (and we all know how much bottoms like to breathe). Anyway, I am a fan of the wool cover. Unfortunately this one is just a little bit small, not high enough in the waist - I will have to find another little bottom for it.
Winter has hit with a vengeance (leading to cosy evenings inside knitting of course) and we have been using our coonara more and more, and whenever Martin lights it smoke fills the house (disclaimer: this is not in any way a comment on Martin's caveman fire lighting abilities, I am sure it's a defect of the wood). Fred carries the wood in, it's also her job to bring in pinecones (which she collected with her Nana and Papa at Blackburn Lake) to use as kindling. The fire has taken hold of her imagination, she dreams about it. We go out with her and she'll say out of the blue, with just the right concerned tone, 'Do you smell smoke?' She's going to give some nice elderly knitter a heart attack one day.
To foster this interest (well someone has to raise the next generation of pyromaniacs or all those nice firefighters will be out of a job) we took her to a (early) Winter Solstice party on Saturday, with a (small and well-contained) bonfire. The hosts and most of the guests were German and the kids did a lantern parade, carrying paper lanterns strung on sticks, lit up by flickering candles and singing German songs. Fred sang, loudly, with gusto, her own lantern carrying song. Una watched the fire all night and was quiet and self contained. The kids wrapped potatoes in foil to roast in the fire (they cooked perfectly despite the small brazier), and we ate warming bean soup in the winter darkness.