Last week was mail-out week for the latest Ravelry Australian Knitters Group swap. I sent my recipient’s gift off last Tuesday, registered mail, but there’s been no indication it has arrived yet. I even took the form to the post office yesterday, but they couldn’t tell me if it had arrived as the phone at the other end was engaged.

But they did have a parcel for me. Inside was this:

And inside that were these:

(I whipped out a bottle of bubbly so I could try out the cosy straight away.)

I requested a champagne bottle cosy or wrist warmers and my very generous swap pal, missfee, made both. The cosy is appropriately glam and is now sitting on the mantle so I can admire it. The pulse warmers are a work of art, knit out of fine baby alpaca and covered in tiny, tiny beads. I wore them yesterday afternoon and most of the evening, only taking them off to avoid getting hand cream on them.

Here’s a close up of them:

And of the beautiful stitch markers. Last night I went through my little collection of markers and culled some to make room for these. The ones that I removed were a bit tired and worn and it’s lovely to have fresh, sparkly new ones in there. (Who’d have thought you could wear out stitch markers?)

The yarn is Cascade Fixation – a yarn I wanted to try for summer socks. I did a search on Ravely to see what other people have made out of it, but nothing I saw could tempt me away from wanting to knit socks. The most popular sock pattern was Broadripple, but I think I’ll be a bit over chevrons by the time I’ve finished my Crosswalkers. Another pair of Charades appeals, though.

The bottle cooler is going to come in very handy, as I never remember to put a bottle of wine in the fridge until five minutes before it’s time to serve it! And the beau and I are doing our bit to decimate the world’s chocolate frog population.

So on the receiving side of the swap it’s been wonderful, but I am a bit worried about the sending side. The post office said they’d call me when they knew where the parcel had got to. They didn’t call yesterday. I hope they call with good news today.