Knitting + Gifting = KNIFTING!!!

It's the most wonderful time of the year--the time when I can offload my knitted goods or, KNIFTS!, as I like to think of them, onto unsuspecting (and, sadly, sometimes uninterested) parties. Knitted goods for all occasions! Of course mittens, hats, sweaters and scarves but also tea cosies (which always require explanation and explain I do--going into great detail about not only the wool chosen and the color [for example: red indicates warmth and cosiness--perfect for the tea COSY! Get it?] but also the stitch types, design style and so on--and can you believe that not everyone finds this facinating? Imagine that!), kitty and doggy blankets, ornaments and stockings! And whatever isn't knitted is FELTED. [Felting + Gifting = Felgifing? or perhaps Gifting + Felting = Giffeltig? Hmmm...isn't that a Swedish fish dinner? I'm pretty sure that is what my swedish-american grandmother served for christmas dinners many years ago. ] Felting, that crazy fad that's sweeping the nation and causing otherwise sane people to intentionally boil and abuse their sweaters for the sake of making a clutch or a tote bag. A friend of mine once said, while eyeing a felted purse in a yarn catalog with suspicion, "Why would I want a fuzzy purse?" But why NOT, I thought?! Obviously she missed the point entirely--it isn't about wanting the purse, it's about wanting to create a fuzzy thing--any fuzzy thing! It's that magical experience--powerful yet mysterious--of transforming yarn that is lovely, soft and has wonderful loft into something tiny and matted. And those felted things look great...for a few days until all the cat and dog hair in the world covers their lovely fuzziness and the straps and buttonholes stretch hopelessly out of shape, and then that wonderful felty thing looks like a big hairball. Which is what it is, afterall.