My studio space is a mess these days – and I wouldn’t have it any other way.  My Christmas knitting projects need to live in the house discreetly and what better place to hide yarn than in with a lot of other yarn?  It is kind of like the Witness Protection Program.  I give a project a fake name, dump it in amongst a lot of other yarn skeins and needles and such, take care not to draw attention to it – and it becomes invisible.

Christmas projects are generally pretty safe in the knitting bags I carry around with me, too.  No one imagines there would be anything desirable or useful in my knitting bags (apparently, it has never occurred to anyone in the family that I keep pens and scissors in there…don’t tell!).  So, no one except the babies (babies are smart) dig around in my knitting bags and a nearly-complete sweater with the recipient’s initials monogrammed across the front could live in there for weeks safe from detection.

It is during the actual knitting that there is a slight chance of discovery.  In the early stages knitting just looks like knitting – and the family is so used to seeing me knitting on various projects that they are fairly blind to it.  If someone, feeling conversational, asks what I am knitting, I can usually satisfy the slightly curious with “Oh, I’m swatching some design ideas.”   Once the piece is larger, I might have to get clever:

“A caftan for International Knitters’ Day”

“A cat cozy design for our next Pet Owners Workshop”

“Hats for the Homeless” (though in this case, I would feel guilty unless I began actually knitting hats for the Homeless immediately! so, that would only be a panic answer)

I have become adept at sliding a knitting project into a bag quickly and smoothly when someone walks into the room – and it always gives me a little thrill, I confess.

But when it comes down to it, I can rely on the fact that our family likes surprises.  No one really wants to know what I am giving him or her — though they like to know that I am knitting for them. 

If, however, I let one of them in on what I am knitting for another of them, I am in for trouble.  They like to torture me.  So, if I was unsure about the size of a blue tam I was knitting for Sonja [note to family: this is a fictitious example, everything but the names has been changed] and I were to break down and ask Sasha to try it on, she would say something like:

“So, am I getting a tam for Christmas too?  Hmm?  Maybe a green one?  Or maybe this is really my present?  And you want me to try it on, but are being sneaky about it?  I bet this is my present!  Oboyoboy!  I’m getting a blue tam for Christmas!  I’m going to go tell Sonja!”

I find it is best not to talk too much about my Christmas knitting. Keep it on the down-low, as it were.  Down low, up high, in the bag…you get the idea.