Knitting New Year's Resolutions!

Happy New Year!  It's SereKnitty here! :)

I don't know about you, but I always make resolutions.  They're usually positive changes I want to incorporate into my life, like giving myself a weekly facial (which I am somewhat consistent with), doing yoga three times a week (which has become habit) or this year's resolution to pay my rent on time each month.  (My landlord is very patient with forgetful me! ) As a knitter, I always make knitting resolutions.  Last year I wanted to knit 12 pairs of socks in 2012 and I know I did it if you count all the baby socks I knit.  But what I didn't do was knit up all the sock yarn in my stash like I wanted and knit lots of socks for ME.  So that is one goal this year. There are so many sock patterns in my queue that I have yarn for and have been waiting years to knit and I want to work on those this year. Another is to finish some UFO's that have been on the needles for WAY TO LONG.  To that end, I intend to reinstate Finish Fridays, where I spend an hour or two working on one of my UFO's to try to get them off the needle. Expect lots of blogs about this.

I also want to get AND KEEP my stash below 30,000 yards.  It might not seem like much to most knitters (Lolo's is WAY bigger than that), but it's way more yarn than I need to have on hand at any one time and it's about as much as my yarn bin will hold. I can't really get the lid shut at the moment!  I know it's unusual, but I actually don't like having lots of yarn on hand. It makes me feel pressured to knit it all up!  I would prefer to buy (or dye!) yarn as I need it and only have a small stash of odds and ends on hand.  It's weird, but it's how I am and that's ok!  :)

Then, I want to knit a hexapuff a day for the entire year.  364 hexapuffs!  I have 6 as of this morning so I'm ahead of the game already.  My Beekeepers Quilt has been slowly building, but I really want to make progress on it this year. I'll post pictures soon!

I also want to FINALLY card and spin the alpaca fleece that's been sitting in my closet for a year and a half.  If I slowly work on it throughout the year, certainly I can get it done!  I haven't had much time for spinning lately, so this will be a good excuse to get back to my wheel.  

I think those are reasonable goals and I think I can do well this year focusing on them and not getting distracted by new patterns and yarns.  Of course, I'll continue with my baby knitting. My little bunny Sera is 6 months old already and my Blueberry is over 3 months. They grow so fast! Which of course means they need new knitwear and toys!

But those are just my personal crafting resolutions.  We also have some KnitCore goals for 2013.  Look for a post about those soon!  And what are your Knitting Resolutions for this year? 

I DID IT!!!

I finished the shawl!!!!

Isn't it beautiful? Don't you love it? The pattern is now available. It's called Dancing Birds of Paradise and you can find it here.

In other news, I knit 2570 yards in July! Pretty amazing, huh? Well, not all of it was knitting, I did give some yarn away, but still, in coldsheeping, destashing counts. So far I've used up 11,562 yards, bringing my stash down to 27,370 yards. I think I can make my goal of hitting 15,000 yards before Rhinebeck in October!!

All in all, good news. We are both knitting/dyeing/crafting furiously to prepare for the craft table on the 27th, so clear your schedule to come visit us at the Lancaster Farmer's Market between 7 and 1. We'll have hand dyed and hand spun yarns along with knitted and hand made gift items. There will be something for everybody and hopefully it'll be lots of fun!

Catching up

Wow, it's been a while! We've been so busy this spring/summer. But here's what's going on with me:

My Coldsheeping totals for June are:

Total Yardage in my stash: 28150.08
Total yards used in 2011: 8992.08
Total yards used in June: 780.06

Not too shabby, but a slow month compared to what I've been doing. But, that's ok, because I have some larger projects on my needles that will be done next month, and I'm always churning out a few small projects.

Plus, I'm really trying to work on finishing up some UFO (unfinished objects) so I've instituted FINISH FRIDAYS (I didn't coin the term) where I work on a UFO for an hour on Friday to try to get it done and off the needles. I can do more than an hour, of course, but squeezing in an hour when I have deadlines looming can be tough. So, this past Friday I picked up my Jaywalkers, or Sreklawyaj, as I like to call them, as I'm knitting them toe up. :)

Here is the picture before I started. The rubber ducky marks my starting point.

I popped in a DVD, knit away and when I was done, it looked like this:

Not too shabby for one episode of "Wonderfalls". Tune back in next week when I'll try to get even further!

Besides working on UFOs and some larger projects I haven't finished yet, I did manage to finish a few things in June. First, a pair of ankle socks (because I am addicted to ankle socks!)

A second Whisper Cardigan that I knit out of a worsted weight, hand dyed cotton boucle that I am calling my ROAR! Cardigan (for obvious reasons)

And this adorable toy. It starts as a squirrel:

And flips into a hedgehog!

I know I shouldn't have favourites, but isn't that hedgehog CUTE?

Oh, and I also spun up a small skein of some llama fibre I got at Rhinebeck last year. I'm going to dye it and then knit it into something for myself:

It's the first fingering weight I've been able to spin so I'm quite proud of it!

And that's what I've been up to recently. What have you been knitting?