Our tree-topper is this blingy star I bought on clearance at Target and have hated ever since. It always sits askew on the topmost branch, causing me vague dissatisfaction. I've thought for years about knitting a felted angel to replace it, and this year I finally sprang into action.
I've always hated our tree-topper and I keep thinking I should knit up a little felted angel. Elwood was on board with this plan until I said I'd need to buy a skein of yarn.
— Jamie (@mostgladly) December 17, 2018
"How can you not have enough yarn?" he wanted to know. "There's so much yarn in our house!"
For Elwood's sake I decided not to felt the angel, so I could use up a stashed skein of cream-colored superwash. I used Elizabeth Zimmermann's angel pattern from Knitter's Almanac and cast on 56 stitches on the 17th of December.
If you are a Catholic person thinking about angels on the 17th of December, especially a Catholic person who is fond of the O Antiphons, you might find inspiration striking you as you work on a project with seven ribbed panels.
I decided to knit ERO CRAS into the panels of the new angel tree-topper's robe, and so I am googling knitted alphabets while drinking a pumpkin smoothie.
— Jamie (@mostgladly) December 18, 2018
This is pretty much me acting like a caricature of myself.
"That is very on-brand," observed my 19yo, when I told him what I was doing.
I am finishing up my annual read-through of the Bible, which is structured so that I'm spending December reading Revelation and the prophets. This reading schedule does not bring warm cozy angels to mind. The angels in these books are not saying "fear not!" because the world is scary and they've come to make things better. They're saying "fear not!" because they ARE the scary. (I mean, yeah, they've come to make things better. But I myself would need a little fear-not-ing if I encountered an angel with eyes like flaming torches.)
I decided that if I was going apocalyptic I might as well go whole hog, and give my angel eyes like flaming torches. My 16yo suggested a little butane. Elwood thought solid fuel would be a better choice. I decided to go for a subtle array of purl stitches to represent flames, which seemed less likely to send our Christmas tree up in smoke. Sadly, my angel's face now looks more like a mutant owl than like a herald of the almighty God. "You gotta go big, Mom," counseled my 16yo. He is optimistic that we could have actual flaming eyes without an actual flaming tree, but he says that if I am unwilling to go the butane route I should at least break out the red and gold yarn.
I hesitate to dip a toe into embroidery territory, given that Christmas Eve is Monday and this angel still needs arms and wings.
"You'll have to give it six wings, of course," said the 19yo. "I don't think I have time for that," I told Elwood, "although if it's covering its face with one set I wouldn't have to worry about how accurately I had rendered the flaming-torch eyes."
"Maybe," said Elwood, "angels grow a new pair of wings every year. One for this year, one for next year, one for the year after that."
"Like antlers!" I said, and we burst out laughing.
So. I do not love this quirky angel, but OH MY GOODNESS do I enjoy my quirky family.
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