Bad Blogger, Bad!

It's not that I haven't been knitting. I really have, even on the scuba trip. It's just that I'm still knitting the same thing. It's true. That pretty grey thing I have in my hands on the boat? That's just one piece (left front) of the sweater I'm making for my dad (who is aparently the size of the entire state of Washington, judging by this sweater) for Christmas.
He's gotten hats and scarves for Christmas before (including the year I started knitting, in which he got some cleverly expanding hats that could just about fit the Lincoln memorial), but this year I decided he needed a sweater. The truth is, I just got cocky. A sweater, I scoffed. How long can that take? I made a sweater for someone my size in just five days. I didn't really take into account that my dad is a foot taller and more than a hundred pounds heavier than someone my size. It's three weeks later, and I've been knitting, and knitting, and knitting. I'm nearing the end of the first sleeve. I could have knit at least two small sweaters in this time, but I'm still only at about the halfway point on this monster. And did I mention I picked a pattern that requires a lot of finishing? So even once I'm done with the bulk of the knitting, I have to block it, assemble it, pick up stitches at the neck and make the collar, crochet the edging all around, and then sew in the zipper. Then it might be done. It's good thing I started this in October.
There's also a slight problem, in that I didn't really check my row gauge very clearly. And while this worked out just fine on the body, when I got to the right number of stitches for the sleeve, the length was too long by about 3". The pattern didn't call for a cuffed sleeve, but it has one now.
Since I'm reasonably sure my dad only reads my blog when my mom tells him there's something funny, I may post some WIP pictures at some point. Really, a lot of knitting has been done around here, it just doesn't look like it.
Mom don't read this. [The other thing that I'm working on is a fantastic lace scarf for my mom for Christmas. (Clearly, I love my parents dearly. And if they can't tell that by the amount of knitting I'm doing, I'll murder them in their sleep.) I can't wait to blog about it once it's done and the holidays are over. The scarf is suprisingly fun, and a huge relief from the vast expanses of stockinette stitch in the sweater sleeves. The trouble is, it's still a lace scarf, that is to say, lace weight yarn (gorgeous 100% merino, btw) on size 2 needles. It's like knitting with thread on toothpicks. I don't know how some people (Elizabeth, Jessica) turn out lace like it's garter stitch, I only know I am not one of them.]
All this ranting and raving brings me to my final rant/rave, which is this. I have a massive amount of knitting left before the holidays. I'm going home for Thanksgiving, so I'll have a nice amount of leisure time with the family during which I can knit. However, I cannot knit the two things I desperately need to be knitting! This means I have to come up with some kind of buffer project that is interesting enough to keep me entertained, but not interesting enough so as to distract me from the real knitting that needs to get done once I'm back in the fortresss of solitude. Hats, anyone?