I altered this one a bit from sweaters to scarves bc, while I wanted to have lance make the gift, apparently knitting a whole-ass sweater takes a good month and since I wanted him to make one for everyone,,, that's six months,,, which would mean that he would have had to start in what, june? anyways, sorry for changing it, I hope that scarves (and hats too!) work too <3

"Hey, Lance," Shiro greeted as Lance walked into the dining room of the Castle of Lions. "Where have you been?"

Lance sighed, lugging a lumpy canvas bag over his shoulder, letting it drop to the floor as he slouched in his seat. "Knitting," he replied tiredly. He gestured to the bag which was full of yarn and the beginning of a started piece.

"Knitting?" Hunk confirmed from across the table, sliding Lance a plate of food goo.

The tired Paladin took it thankfully, shoving some of the green goop into his mouth as he talked. "I'm knitting everyone scarves and hats for Christmas because I don't have any money to go out and buy you any real gifts at the space mall, but knitting is really hard. My Abuela taught me how to knit a long time ago, but that was just simple quilt patches. With scarves, there are all these patterns and I'm trying to work in pictures and words and-," he cut himself off, sighing. "It's just hard."

Shiro smiled empathetically, patting Lance on the shoulder. "I thought knitting was supposed to be relaxing, Lance."

Lance's tired eyes looked to Shiro. "Really?" he asked pathetically, "Because I don't feel very relaxed. I feel frustrated and my hands hurt."

Shiro chuckled. "You can take breaks, you know."

Lance groaned, sitting back in his chair, and rubbed the heels of his palms against his eyes, taking a deep breath and letting it out with a whoosh. "I can't!" he cried out. "I'll lose my motivation and never bring myself to finish them!"

Hunk rolled his eyes, laughing along with Shiro. "Don't worry so much, bud. You can take a break if you need it. If it helps, I'll remind you to pick up the needles again after you've rested and taken a break."

Just then, Keith walked into the dining room, a thick blanket pulled around his shoulders like a cape. He stomped over to Shiro, his bedhead surprisingly adorable.

"Is the heat working?" he grumbled, his morning voice gravelly and rough like sandpaper.

Shiro shrugged, "Probably. Why?"

Keith sniffed, yawning, then answered, "It's freezing in my room."

Lance's attention perked up and he stood up a little straighter. Clearing his throat, he attempted to be discreet as he asked, "Would a scarf help?"

Keith's dark eyes met Lance's. His under-eye circles were the color of a bruise. Keith shrugged. "Probably."

With renewed energy, Lance shoved his chair back from the table, his cheeks blushing a few shades darker, and basically sprinted out of the dining room to his own quarters.

Bewildered, Keith raised an eyebrow, turning to look at Shiro again. "What's up with him?"

Shiro laughed lightly, shaking his head. "Nothing."

Christmas Eve approached quickly, and, to the Paladin's dismay, Lance was spending an alarming amount of time in his room, knitting. For at least 6 hours per day, the Blue Paladin would sit in his room, on his bed, with his headphones on, knitting furiously as he worked to finish 6 hats and 6 scarves.

Allura almost dragged Lance out by force, telling Shiro that it was unhealthy, but Shiro seemed to think that the task was good for Lance.

"It's giving him a chance to think about things without a distraction. He's meditating, I guess. I think it's good for him, maybe even therapeutic. It's only going to be for another week or so, and then he'll probably sleep it off for a day and be back to his normal self before New Years. Plus, it's knitting. It's not like he's off doing drugs."

"You sound like my dad," Hunk had then shouted from across the room, making everyone laugh.

Shiro sighed, laughing a little too. "I just think that it's good for him to have a commitment to something that's not concerning the fate of the entire universe."

On Christmas day, while the Paladins were still very far from Earth, they'd recreated a pretty accurate Christmas in the Castle of Lions, which made them feel a bit less homesick. Underneath the tree (that wasn't necessarily a pine tree and was an awful shade of Cheeto-dust orange, but it worked fine and wasn't poisonous) was a small stack of presents.

Lance made sure to hand out his presents last, both excited and exhausted, but proud of his work nevertheless. Each Paladin and Altean received a warm hat and scarf with cute little patterns on them that Lance had connected to their personalities.

Coran got teal with orange mustache embroidery, Allura got pink with little white mice running on the hems, Hunk got yellow with tiny, slightly unrecognizable cupcakes, Pidge got green with a black triangle pattern that was supposed to be Rover, and Shiro got purple with the words 'Space Dad' written around the hems.

Everyone was grinning as they pulled on their hats and wound their scarves around their necks, pointing out how cute the designs were or exclaiming at how soft the yarn was.

Keith sat on the couch quietly, hiding his disappointment. Of course, Lance hadn't made a set for him. I mean, come on. They were rivals. Why would they give each other Christmas presents? Keith slowly began to slip the face scrub that Hunk had helped him make for Lance back into his pocket, mood souring considerably.

But then, Lance jumped up, alarmed, and looked at Keith in surprise. "Keith! I'm so sorry! Your set is in my room. I just finished it yesterday, so it's still in my knitting bag. Do you wanna come with me to get it?"

Keith felt his heart lift, eyes widening hopefully. Yes, there was still a chance that this could be some mean prank meant to get back at him for using all the hot water the other day or eating the last dessert at dinner last night, but Keith doubted that Lance would stoop so low on Christmas.

As the two of them made their way down the long, seemingly-endless hallway that led down to Lance's quarters, it felt awkward and odd. Being alone together wasn't something that they were used to, but neither of them had the heart to come up with some petty argument just to break the silence.

Rounding the final corner, Keith was glad to see Lance's door. Half of the battle was over. Now, he just needed to accept the gift graciously, give Lance the face scrub, and then run like a fucking maniac back up the hallway and into the safety of the living room.

Lance unlocked his door and it slid open in front of him. Keith leaned against the wall next to the door, examining his shoes, but Lance wasn't having any of that bullshit. He wanted to give Keith his present seriously and without being awkward or distracted or anything.

"You can come in, you know," he said quickly, looking at Keith pointedly. Eyebrows raised, Keith reluctantly followed Lance into his room. The place was a mess- clothes everywhere, knitting needles and balls of yarn strewn around like Lance had hurled them in rage, a few blankets that had fallen off the bed.

The space was so much a reflection of the blue paladin, Keith could practically feel Lance's aura in the air- smell his coconut oil face moisturizer, his cocoa butter lotion, his surprisingly large collection of other cosmetics.

Lance dug around in his canvas bag for a second, then produced two items, both made from soft, red yarn.  He held them out to Keith proudly, his grin hopeful.

Keith took the hat first. Along the hem, Lance had knitted the word 'MULLET' and with little stars on either side of it. A puffy white pompom bobbled on top. Ignoring the obvious insult to his hair, Keith smiled, pulling the hat over his head. Next, the scarf. It had the same white lettering as the hat did, but, to Keith's surprise, the word on the hems of the scarf was 'CUTIE'.

As he slowly slid the scarf around his neck, Keith looked up at Lance. The brunette was looking at him shyly, a rosy tint to his cheeks.

"Do you like it?" He asked tentatively, wiping his sweaty palms on his sweatpants.

Keith smiled genuinely, reaching up to kiss Lance on the cheek.

"Yeah. I do."

Aaaaaaaaah it's 1:34 am so I'm a little late, but I hope you enjoyed this!