If you've ever done socks out of the self striping yarn, you know how enticing it is to just keep going to see what the next stripe is going to look like. On that vein, I've found that the Clapotis shawl I've been working on has just sucked me in like a black hole. Since I'm working with recycled sari silk yarn, the colors are unpredictable, and getting to that row where you can just let one stitch come undone and ladder down is just so much fun!! So in the matter of a week I've gone from this: To this: When I'm not working on the Clapotis, I'm thinking of Christmas. This year I'm visiting family, including one of my nieces who's married to a physicist. For most folks the idea of trying to figure out what to give a physicist for Christmas is a daunting task. However, I come from a family of engineers and love watching physics at work, so I have an idea of how the guy's mind ticks. Usually they're pretty out there. If you're vanilla, they're raspberry banana. Or in extreme cases, pork chop. So I'm thinking of something that I could make that is out there without being ugly or have that particular look that poorly designed handcrafts have. So I'm looking at knitting a Klein bottle . Knitters already play with mathematical constructs with Moebius scarves. A Klein bottle runs along that vein. He lives in the Bay area so I don't know if a hat is in the works but he does glass art so I'm sure he's familiar with Klein bottles. I love this stuff!