Ch-ch-changes

As some of you may have noticed, there's been a few changes made to the blog.  I've been wanting to clean up and simplify this space for a while now but the final push to do so came when last week I spent half the day trying to fix a blog post due to formatting issues (which I have mentioned in several posts leading up to this one).  I knew it then that it was time to give the blog a li'l makeover.  So I changed the template to something simple, cleaned up my sidebar, and got rid of the funky fonts.  I had major hopes that all my housekeeping would be the key to fixing my formatting issues.  It kinda worked.  I really liked the changes that I had made but I still spent a few hours trying to write and fix a post that just ended up not happening.  Ugh.  It's definitely time to switch my game plan here.

I've been thinking long and hard about this, had arguments with myself, weighed the pros and cons, and finally came down to the decision to re-brand and to buy my own domain.  Yup.  That last one was a huge decision for me to make, but one that I've been thinking of doing for the past few months. I finally just bit the bullet and did it.  So this will be the final post on this blog.  Don't worry, I don't plan on ever deleting this blog, and all previous posts will still be up for your viewing pleasure.  I'll still be keeping an eye on this blog, you know, to make sure the comments are being spammed and that the photos and links are still working.  I know that some people have posts and videos that link to this blog and I don't ever want people to not be able to find my work, nor do I want people to have to go and re-link everything.  But from now on you can find me at:

www.misocraftyknits.com

Starting tomorrow I'll be posting at the new blog!  So don't forget to update your feeds, readers, bloglines, and/or blog lists with the new website address.  If you subscribe by email, head on over to the new site and sign back up on the new blog.  Oh!  And while you're there, don't forget to follow me!  Once on the new site you will notice that the old blog and the new blog look eerily the same.  I guess you can say that I used this blog's last days as a guinea pig, and I wanted the transition from old to new to be easy...on me.  I know, I know...how selfish am I?  To make it even easier I had also transfered over all posts, just to make it easier to find stuff.  I don't know about you, but I'm not a fan of having a million browsers/tabs open just cause I'm searching for one little thing.

Ok, well...I guess that's it for me!  Ok little blog.  We had some moments together...the good, the bad, the ugly, and now it's time for me to say "smell you later!".

As for you blogging friends, see you on the new website!

♥ Melissa

Down Time

Well hello there!  Fancy meeting you here!  It's been quiet around here lately, hasn't it?  Yeah...and trust me, it wasn't by choice.  I've tried to make a post, twice, but it just wasn't in the stars for me.  The first attempt I had written a longish post and had all my photos inserted and everything.  It was awesome.  But sometime during the writing process Blogger or something must have signed me out because when I clicked the 'publish' button I was taken to a page that told me that I needed to sign in before I could perform such activities.  I had lost the entire post.  I was so not impressed.  Defeated but determined to post, I wrote another post but a much shorter version of the original.  This time I made sure I was signed in, I had saved a million times, all was good in the hood.  Until I went to publish the stupid post.


I'm actually surprised that I still have hair left on my head.  Yes, the post looked good in the draft stage but when I checked it out in the preview...that was another story.  I know I've mentioned it before, but I've been having major formatting issues lately.  My posts have been appearing in three different fonts with text of varying sizes, major spaces between paragraphs and photos, and photos themselves are showing up either super big or really small but always un-centered.  All attempts to fix these problems in the "normal" way were fruitless and I would have to go in and html the crap out of the post, and trust me when I say it was pure hell.  I don't know html at all, but can tell that within one sentence there were at least 6 different commands...for text and size, sometimes for position.  Now imagine an entire post having each and every sentence like that.  Oh yeah...I was sitting there for hours trying fix the one post!  I got fed up and decided to nix it altogether.


I noticed that I started having these issues ever since I tried to make a post via mobile.  Then it got worst when I messed around with the fonts in my blog layout.  Sadly, all my issues are due to settings within the computers that I've made posts from.  Yeah...apparently my phone has settings but that is all within the app.  So even if I do figure out the settings on my computer, the phone settings are out of my control.  Even deleting the app doesn't help.  Trust me, I tried.  I'm not saying don't download the Blogger app, cause it does work.  I had it on my old phone and have blogged from it before and it had worked just fine.  I guess the combo of the camera apps mixed with Blogger mixed with whatever else I had done was something that Blogger didn't like.  At all.  And now I must pay for it.  With each post.  Le sigh.


Ok.  Enough of my blogging issues!!  I promise!  Onto some knitting content.  I've been knitting like a fiend but not getting anything finished.  Why?  Well, I was in denial for the longest time and finally admitted to it last week.  I had a bout of Starteritis.  It wasn't pretty.  Let's just say that I have used every single cable I own for my interchangeable needle set, all my sock needles in my favourite size (2.25mm/US 1), plus a few fixed needles from other sets...all occupied with projects.  I am not proud.  This is why lately I've been feeling like a chicken with my head chopped off when it comes to my knitting.  I seriously had wanted to cast on every.single.project I plan to knit this year, and then some.  My house looks like a yarn shop had exploded, you can't look anywhere without spotting a skein or cake of yarn sitting there, attached to some needles that have had only a few rows knitted up.  Although a while ago I finished my Orchid Audrey cardigan, so I do have one project off the needles.  It still needs the ends woven in and a good blocking.  I'm hoping sometime next week I can head over to Button & Needlework Boutique and find some buttons for it.  I had taken my cardi to knit night on Friday for some opinions as to what kind of buttons I should get.  The lovely ladies all had wonderful ideas, so now I know what I'm looking for.  Just hope B&N has it!


Since I was having blogging issues I was kinda turned off of the computer for a bit, but it's amazing just how much knitting you can get done when you're not busy staring at photos of yarn, surfing Ravelry, checking your email every five minutes, and having your time sucked in by Crackbook Facebook.  I hadn't even bothered to upload photos from my camera either (I'm still trying to take photos of the stash)!  And I'm usually always on top of that!  Brett will be leaving for the mainland tomorrow and will be gone for a handful of days, so I'm not sure just how much knitting will get done in the next few days.  I think the Starteritis has tapered off for a bit cause yesterday I was actually able to knit and concentrate on just one project!  If I keep it up, I just might be able to get it finished by mid-week!  Yay!  Something to show you guys!


Speaking of which, maybe I should get off the computer and get back to the needles...


Enjoy the rest of the weekend!




PS: Cause I'm sure someone will email me and ask, the yarn in the photo above is Madelinetosh Vintage in Steam Age.  I heart this colourway so much!  I think I have a sweaters worth in this base but am still trolling for patterns that will mesh well with the colours.  Any suggestions?

Snow Day

I wish I could say we had an awesome time in the snow yesterday. Actually, I wish I could say we had an awesome day in general. But sadly, we didn't. Not at all. If anything, it was probably one of the worst days that we've had in a long while. I had woken up to the scene of a beautiful winter wonderland with snow still sprinkling to the ground. I had immediately envisioned frolicking in the snow, building snowmen, having snowball fights, making snow angels, giggling, laughing, and basically staying outside until our cheeks are red, our hands are so cold you can't feel them any more, and our feet are blocks of ice. I had envisioned coming inside for mugs of hot chocolate, snuggling under blankets on the couch, playing a few video games in an attempt to warm up. Maybe do a little baking. Maybe do a little knitting. Yes, I had envisioned a wonderfully perfect winter day.

Um...yeah. Envisioned is the key word here. What really happened?

Tantrums. All.day.long. Over putting socks on. Over putting snow pants on. Over putting the new snow boots on. Over wanting to wear sneakers, not the boots. I want the brown sweater with the orange stripe, not the orange sweater with the brown stripe! I don't want to eat apple slices, I want a bowl of cereal!

And that was just with the Munchkin. I won't go into the gory details of it all but let's just say that a few adult tempers flared and I guess you could say that everyone in the family had at least one tantrum throughout the day. But the majority of the tantrums were by those who are 3 feet tall (FYI: I'm 5 feet tall). Some people had grand plans of doing absolutely nothing, since they too were having a snow day. This also involved doing minimal help in the child care department. Others just simply wanted at least a ten minute break.

Suffice to say that it was just a bad day for everyone all around. Yes, we did end up going outside. Yes, the Munchkin had fun. Yes, hot chocolate was had. No, baking did not happen. Neither did the knitting. No video games were involved either. The house was beyond cold all day long, even though the heaters were on full blast. We all went to bed extremely early.

Sigh.

I hope you had a much better snow day than we did.

Shiny Things

Here's a tip on how to keep the motivation for knitting going: get your hands on some darn pretty stitch markers! Like these gorgeous ones from Liisuuka. Obviously I gravitated towards the pink ones! I couldn't decide between the hot pink or the cotton candy pink markers, so I did what any insane knitter would do. I got both sets. Then I spotted the beautiful turquoise set (sorry, my photo does not do the colour any justice...I just can't seem to get my camera to like blues) and bonus, they were on sale! You just know I added those bad boys to my shopping cart!! I had to quickly checkout before I went too crazy and added the whole shop to my cart.

I very impatiently waited for my new stitch markers to arrive. I'm one of those people who buys something online and then expects it to arrive at my doorstep the very next day. Admit it, you're like that too. Sadly, when my package arrived in Victoria my postal worker didn't put it in my mailbox. I'm all frowny face about that. Instead my lovely stitch markers went directly to the post office. Luckily for me I've developed quite the relationship with all the ladies at my local post office, and so when one of them had spotted me at the grocery store across the street from said PO she kindly informed me that I had a package waiting for me. She and the rest of the crew were wondering when I was going to pick it up since they hadn't seen me in a few days. I'm not sure if that's a good thing, or a bad one.

Here's a geeky factoid about me: I absolutely love foreign stamps and packaging. If it weren't for the fact that I already have a few hobbies that take up a lot of my time and space (and my obsessive attention), I would totally have a stamp collection. The hoarder pack-rat sentimentalist in me didn't have the heart to recycle the envelope that my stitch markers came in so it currently sits on my dresser, propped up against a picture frame, serving as a gentle reminder that maybe one day I'll be able to return to Finland. Geeky factoid #2: I have a major soft spot for all things Finnish. Seriously. The pulla, the riisipiirakka, the architecture, the designs, the language (my favourite saying - "haluaisin poikaystävä". Not that I was looking, I just liked how it sounded), the paying the washing machine to do my laundry via mobile phone, paying for my orange Fanta at the vending machine via mobile phone, doing anything via mobile phone. Really, if it's Finnish, I'll probably love it. Ok, maybe not so much salmiakki. That's a Finnish thing I don't really care for.

Since I was Liisa's first customer I also scored a sweet little present: a handmade crochet reflector! She even made it in pink for me! How incredibly awesome is that?? Kiitos paljon Liisa!! ♥

I know a lot of you are thinking "WTF is a reflector? Do I need one? Is this a new knitting tool?". Ok, I'll admit that I'm kinda cheating here. The only reason why I even know what a reflector is and what it is for is because of my time in Finland. In my first week in Helsinki, my fellow Canadian and good friend Kat, and I had ventured out of Pasila (we were still quite jetlagged) and had stopped by an S-Market for some groceries. While at the checkout we were scoping out the section of impulse buys and had spotted a box of random gadgets that looked like they belonged on a bike. Not knowing what they were for but knew it was too cute to pass up, we each bought a little doohickey solely because it was Finnish. I'm sure our cashier judged us thoroughly by our purchases: a package of coffee, a box of tea, apples, toilet paper, a household cleaner of sorts, a scrub brush, various packages of noodles, a can of what we thought was tomato sauce (it wasn't), several Geisha bars (ok, that was just me. I think I gained at least 5 pounds just from constantly shoving Geisha bars into my face. We won't talk about the flatmate that worked at a cafe that let her take home day old pastries...let's just say we had an endless supply of pulla, cinnamon buns, and danishes...my mouth is watering at the memories), and that random thingy. We took our cool looking thing to school the next day and asked our "Finnish Mommy", Mauri, what it was. He laughed at us (he was always laughing at us...but in a good way, I think) and told us that it was a reflector for our bag. Since Finland gets dark really early in the winters it was best to practice safety in making sure we could be seen at night.

The reflectors that we had bought were Moomin themed. Mine in particular was a character called Little My, a mischevious little thing that lives with the Moomins. My Polish flatmate used to tell me that I reminded her of Little My all the time. I wasn't sure if this was a good thing or not, but she would always tell me it's because I was always "so tiny" and hyper, and would always have a smile on my face that made me look like I was up to no good.

My Moomin reflector is still on my backpack, my new reflector is on my knitting bag, and I have cast on a new project just so that I could use one of my new lovely stitch marker set. But I'm thinking I should cast on another project just so that I can break open another set...this could be the Starteritis talking.

Helter-Skelter Tuesday

Where has the time gone? I can't believe the weekend has already come and gone! I feel like I haven't posted in ages. Guess what I was doing this entire time? Knitting. Who would've thunk it? A knitting blogger, actually knitting? Anyhoo, I woke up this morning feeling a bit discombobulated. Most likely from being so scatter-brained all weekend and not being able to concentrate on one thing. At all. So I give you yet another post about random thoughts. That, and I'm having a hard time keeping my attention on the task at hand.

- for the past few weeks I've been waking up at un-godly hours. Like at 4 or 5am and not being able to fall back to sleep. As a result I've been falling asleep at like 8 or 9pm at night. It's messing up my crafting time...oh yeah, and my solo time with Brett.

- I kinda like being up so early in the morning. It's very peaceful. I feel like I have the house all to myself and I can enjoy my first (and sometimes my second and third!) cup of coffee without any interruptions, I can knit for an hour and not worry about doing the dishes or the several loads of laundry. And most importantly, it's nice to have the "me time" that I desperately need.

- I find that 9am is when I've been feeling the most energetic, which is saying a lot considering that I still feel like I'm in slo-mo 99.9% of the time. 9am is when the lethargy lets up just a smidge that I can actually do something without fighting the heavy eyelids.

- so what have I been doing at 9am pretty much every morning this past week? I dance. To Dance Central. And BEP Experience. I kid you not. I think I've even lost a few pounds. I've been working up such a sweat that there's been a few times where I had to peel down to nothing but a tank top and shorts. But I'm going to put it out there that whatever you do, DO NOT put on high heels out of curiosity and try to do a dance routine in them. Just don't. Let's just say that I have a whole new respect for Fergie for not only singing and dancing at the same time, but for doing it in such restricting outfits and killer heels.

- my feet still hurt.

- I lost my battle with Starteritis.

- I've been fighting the Starteritis since the beginning of the month, but should've known that it was going to happen one way or another. A hint that it was going to hit: when I had started a pair of socks, a scarf, and a sweater in one day. Another hint: you have have cast on three new sweater projects in a week.

- one of the sweaters that I had cast on was going along swimmingly. Then I hit a bump. I turned to Ravelry to find some answers, only to find out that mathematically the pattern in my size just doesn't work. Knitters who have made my size improvised the entire time. The designer even commented that she was going to work on the pattern over the weekend. So I put the project down and started another (so clearly, the designer is at fault for why I started another sweater!). Then I discovered this morning that my size was omitted from the pattern. Crap.

- I'm way too far into the pattern to frog the whole project.

- I don't think I'm experienced enough to fudge it to make the pattern work.

- I think I'm going to try anyways. But am going to have to wait to give it a go for another early morning, when I have complete and total uninterrupted time to concentrate.

- as if starting three new sweaters wasn't enough knitting for my plate to handle, I picked up a long forgotten WIP that was part of a KAL a few of the girls in my knitting group and I have started. I'm now entranced with this project and have now abandoned the freshly cast on projects.

- I may or may not have joined the newest round of the Vesper Sock Yarn Club by Knitterly Things that will commence February. I am not at fault here. I have a major weakness for self-striping yarns. Technically this does not count towards my "no-buy" months, as this is a club. Um...can you say loop hole!

- speaking of self-striping yarns, I received a few skeins at knit night on Friday from my friend Em of Everything Old. These yarns also do not count in my "no buy" policy because we were in talks of doing these skeins since November.

- I told you I could find loop holes in anything. Even within my own rules.

- I recieved some more yarn in the post last week that's part of a yarn club. It's staring at me, begging to be turned into something. Now. I'm finding it extremely hard to resist its allure and want to wind up a skein of it...just feel the yarn glide through my fingers...and maybe knit up a swatch...but I will NOT cast on a new project.

- this grey and gloomy weather is really putting a damper on my photography time. The natural light in my place currently sucks and so I will have to dig into the "archives" and see what I can find. I'll apologize now if you keep seeing the same photos over and over. Anyone have any tips on how to get decent photos indoor? So far the natural light bulbs are doing nothing for me. Le sigh.

- I'm also having some major issues with Blogger in the formatting and font. It's kinda turning me off of blogging. My Google-ing has not turned up anything valuable in terms of how to fix these issues and am wondering if I'm going to have to live with having blog posts that are written in several different fonts and sizes, without having to manually go into each post to fix it.

- I think I'm going to dance to Poker Face to let off some steam.

Fresh Off The Needles: Neither Here Nor There Hat

Yes! The first FO for 2012! I'm sure you were expecting Brett's cardigan to be the first but I really needed a break from that thing. Maybe it's the time of year, y'know new beginnings, fresh starts, and all that jazz, but I couldn't even wait a full day into the new year without itching to cast on a brand spanking new project. So what does a knitter do when that feeling arises? Wind up some yarn of course! I knew that I wanted a quickie project that could be whipped up within a day (or two) just to get that Starteritis edge off my back and so that I could continue on with the regularly scheduled program once done. I already knew what pattern I wanted to make, as it was one that has been on my mind ever since I saw it. A hint that I knew I was going to eventually knit up the pattern: I already had the yarn picked out in my head and was mentally winding it into a yummy yarn cake while I was still sitting at the computer desk staring at the pattern.

When I first laid eyes on Veera Välimäki's newest collection, Follow The Lines, I just knew that I would most likely be knitting that entire collection. So I'll forewarn you now that this will be the first of the four from this collection! Veera Välimäki is one of my favourite knitwear designers, and I know that along with Jane Richmond's, I can pretty much guarantee that I will like whatever they design. They both have clean and simple aesthetics that I love, and when paired with the right yarn, whatever pattern you knit of theirs will become an instant classic in your wardrobe. I love their no-fuss pattern directions too and most importantly, their consistency in everything.

Anyhoo, back to the hat. So this here is the Here and There Hat. I used SweetGeorgia Yarns Superwash Worsted in the Riptide colourway and leftover Tough Love Sock (held double) in Slate that I had used for my Northwind Hat. I was actually saving the Superwash Worsted to knit another Northwind Hat, but after seeing the Here and There Hat, I knew it had to be that instead. I absolutely LOVE Riptide in the most unholiest of ways. So much so that I just have to have it in every SweetGeorgia base. Remember how I mentioned in my Stashdown 2012 post that yarn can make you go crazy? How you can see an absolutely gorgeous yarn that you just had to make it yours, just to go home and find out that you already had three skeins of that yarn in your stash? Yeah well, Riptide is one of them. The sad part of it? I didn't return those extra skeins. The yarn hoarder in me kept them. I'm not proud.

I've never knit with SGY Superwash Worsted before and I'll say it now, for the record, this will definitely not be the last time. I love the squishy-ness of it and how it gives such great stitch definition. It makes me super happy to know that I have more in the stash, I'm so tempted to cast on another project using this yarn! Is it wrong that I want more Riptide?

This project was completed last week and I've only gotten around to taking photos of it now. I couldn't pin down Brett long enough to get his help, and when I did we had our...ahem, artistic differences. So I've resorted to jimmy-rigging the camera for some self-portraits (note to self: find out where Brett hides the tripod). I give much kudos to people that can do self-portraits and can do it well. I felt like some weird internet hoochie trying to hock my wears while kneeling on the bed, trying to get my camera remote to work. Half of my photos came out with me looking extremely uneasy with the whole process!

This pattern is super quick and easy...that is, if you pay attention to the directions. I was a bad knitter and didn't swatch. I'm so glad that the hat ended up fitting me! Although I did get gauge, I could have gone down a needle size, especially on the brim. I like the brims of my hats to be a little on the snug side cause hats tend to slide off my weirdly shaped head, and I know that over time the hat can stretch a little. Having the brim slightly tighter than normal usually helps out in that department for me. Speaking of weird heads, I always thought I had a ginormous head (not freakishly big like Brett's, just bigger than average) so I thought knitting a extra inch in the length would help. Um...no. I had knit the hat, bound off, and tried it on. The hat was freakin' huge. And not in a good way. I have a feeling that I mis-read how long to knit the hat to and had knit way past the 8.25" mark. I measured and re-measured and had to rip back so that the length from the CO edge was 6.25" before re-knitting the decreases.

I've been wearing this hat non-stop ever since it came off the needles. I didn't even care that when I went to knit night last week that my entire outfit didn't make any sense. Yes, I did wear stripes and houndstooth at the same time. I'd like to say that I was trying to be fashionably avant garde but really, I was just being lazy. This hat couldn't have come at a more perfect time too. It's time to wash my Northwind hat and the drying process will most likely take a few days. This hat guarantees that my head will still stay warm during that process.

I have half a ball of yarn leftover in the Worsted and have no idea what to do with it. For a while there I was tempted to knit another hat using a different contrasting colour, but something tells me to save it for next winter when the Munchkin is a little older (and will hopefully be more appreciative of hand knits) and will need a new hat. Actually, I think I might do that. In the meantime, I have other patterns calling my name...

Hat Details:
Pattern: Here and There by Veera Välimäki
Yarns: SweetGeorgia Yarns Superwash Merino and Tough Love Sock
Colours: Riptide and Slate
Needles: Denise Interchangeables in 4.5mm and 5mm (US 7 and 8)
Ravelry Link: MisoCraftyKnits' Neither Here Nor There

WIP: Orchid Audrey

I woke up this morning at 4:30am and couldn't fall back to sleep. I tossed and turned for an hour before whipping out my iPhone and started playing Bejeweled Blitz. After five minutes of that I made a really sad attempt at trying to fall back to sleep. I gave it fifteen minutes of my time before coming to the conclusion that I wasn't going to be getting any more shut-eye. So I got up. I made coffee. I had my third cup by 7am. I'm contemplating on making another pot since Brett had drained half to bring to work with him (he had to leave for work über early). It's kinda nice being up so early. So peaceful. And quiet. I think I'm actually going to get a good hour of un-interrupted knitting time in before the Munchkin wakes up and makes his way down the stairs. This early wake up time might become habit. I said might.

So what am I working on? Remember how I mentioned in this post how there were a bunch of WIPs that I had yet to blog about? Yeah well, this is one of them. This here is my Audrey in Unst that I had started back in October, took a hiatus on in favour of quicker projects in November, and knitted on for a week before putting it down again for the month of December to knit on Brett's sweater. I'm still not done Brett's sweater but I do need a break from it. So back to Audrey in Unst. This pattern is not at all a boring knit per se (although this pattern does reiterate the fact that I'm SO not a fan of twisted ribbing), there is a lot of stockinette involved. I have no explanation as to why this project is taking me so long to knit, after all, it's a cropped cardigan with 3/4 length sleeves! Seriously, what's the hold up? The pattern is extremely well written, the yarn is absolutely lovely to work with, and I'm using my favourite needles. So weird. It's one of life's mysteries, I guess.

Aside from taking forever to knit this up, I really have nothing to say about this project thus far. The pattern is pretty darn straight forward. I've been pleasantly and wonderfully surprised whenever I got stitch counts right and on the right side row, and got the exact number of stitches needed to pick up around the armholes without worry. This rarely ever happens to me! I felt mighty clever each and every time. The only issue that has come up is purely all on me - I decided to not do the full amount of twisted ribbing at the hem, and since the sleeve hems are to match, not on the sleeves either. To compensate I had knit rows/rounds of stockinette to the length given in the pattern's specs. I thought about making the cardigan a little longer since it would make it a little more practical and in my opinion more wearable, but decided against it cause I didn't think I would have enough yarn to do so. Well...let me tell you how so wrong I am.

The yarn I'm using is SweetGeorgia Yarns (surprise, surprise!) Merino Silk Fine. I had purchased three skeins directly from Felicia a few years ago with the intent on knitting this pattern (see? That's how long this pattern had sat in my queue!). The yarn is pure luxury and has been a pleasure to knit with and the colour...oh my, the colour! Such a gorgeous, perfect shade of pink. My pink! I could have a whole closet full of nothing but this exact shade of pink. Really. I have nothing but pure love for this colour. Anyhoo, this is a hand-dyed yarn and I thought getting a fourth skein so late in the game would be out of the question since it most likely wouldn't match my skeins exactly and knowing my luck the difference would be quite noticeable. So the idea was nixed. And I'm glad too! Cause then I would have that one solo skein stuck in my stash. I've already finished the body and one sleeve with plenty of the second skein left. As I type this I am close to finishing the second sleeve without even needing to touch the third skein. After this sleeve all I have left to knit are the button bands and the collar. Yup. I'll have plenty of yarn left over. Which means I could have totally added way more length to this cardigan. Le sigh. Oh well, coulda, shoulda, woulda...right? I guess in the future I'll be knitting some pretty lux hexipuffs for my Beekeepers Quilt!

PS: Is it just me or is Blogger really messing up on the formatting front of posts?? Lately my posts have all been publishing with random fonts here and there and I would have to go in and html the crap out of it. Then there's the double spacing action. What's the deal? My Google-fu powers are weak and can't seem to find out what's behind this. I've switched from the old to new back to the old interface, and I've even switched from Firefox to Safari to Chrome to see if that helps. Nope. Le sigh. I just might have to look into other blogging websites if this keeps up.

Hello, Lover!

In between rounds of Fruit Ninja, Play-Doh fun, and having mini dance parties (ok, this last one is just me...and Dance Central), I broke out one of my Christmas presents and messed up the kitchen a bit. Nothing major. Just a lot of chocolate chip cookies. I wanted to get a feel for my new kitchen toy and since chocolate chip cookies are always in demand in this household (mainly by Brett, the Munchkin doesn't know any better...yet) I figured it wouldn't hurt to try to whip up a batch...or two...or three. Cause y'know, I gotta see how well this mixer can handle cookie dough.

I'm hoping that maybe next weekend I can really have a go at it and see what this bad boy can do. Brett had to work all weekend and was stuck doing work related things when he wasn't actually working, and since the Munchkin has yet to reach that stage where he can be occupied for longer than 5 minutes (if that) at a time, I really didn't want to try anything adventurous in case my attention was needed elsewhere...like when said three year old just needs me to watch him make his Mario stuffed doll toy (Brett was very adamant that boys don't play with dolls...they play with "toys" or "figurines") do death defying stunts off the window sill in the living room. Yeah, not really a good time to say, have condensed milk boiling away on the stove and you're waiting for the right temperature before it's considered burned. Or to have a bowl full of egg whites whipping away until it's at "stiff peaks".

Brett's still worried that I don't love my new mixer. Or even like it. I know, he's crazy. He thinks the fact that it's a black Classic stand mixer and not the Komen pink Artisan stand mixer that I've been lusting after forever, is the reason why I would shoo it away. Um...why would anyone who likes to bake, in their right mind, turn down a stand mixer? Any kind of Kitchen Aid stand mixer at that?? Yes, it's not my beloved pink. True, it won't matched the rest of my kitchen stuff. Yes, it's not the Artisan. But the thing is, I've always wanted a stand mixer to call my very own since high school. There have been several times where I myself have almost purchased the black Artisan because it was on sale at a very, very, VERY good price. But had to practice restraint due to the fact that I spent my budget on yarn. So as you can see, black was my next choice anyways.

I still remember my Mom's mixer, she's had it since the 70s and it's this weird browny green mustard colour and after how many decades it's still going strong. She used to churn out six loaves of banana bread at a time. I used to come home from school to the amazing smell of baking banana bread and find at least twelve loaves cooling away on our kitchen table. Don't worry, they weren't all for us. All my aunts, uncles, and cousins used to circle our house like hungry vultures whenever they caught wind that my mom was making unusually large banana purchases. Sadly, my mom no longer bakes banana bread. This fact makes me cry.

So I'm making it my mission this year to perfect my mom's banana bread recipe (if I can get it out of her head, that is...after over 20 years of baking at least six loaves every couple of months I'm sure the recipe has been tweaked and embedded in your brain). Another mission: to perfect the Madeleine cookie. I read somewhere that you should have a dish that you are known for. That you should pick a recipe and own it. Whilst I have yet to perfect lasagne (although, I'm rethinking that dish and wondering if I should pick something else...since technically the recipe given to me came from my friend Tyler, who seriously kills it), I think I could master the Madeleine. As if my plate wasn't full enough (ha ha ha...) I'm thinking of also getting down a marshmallow recipe down pat too. Over the holidays when the Rice Krispy treats were flying around here, a few mini marshmallows may have gone rogue. The Munchkin has developed a liking to them (yet doesn't like the regular sized marshmallows...so weird). I'm not really thrilled with him eating such soft pillows of corn by-products and stuff that I can't pronounce, and figured that if he's going to eat such things then I should make him a somewhat better-for-him version of it. Like using kosher gelatin. It would just make me feel a whole lot better about it all.

Completely off topic but topical to this blog, I've also been busy knitting away. I even had my first FO of the year come fresh off the needles last week! I have a few other projects pretty close to be done too. I'm so excited! I even wound up a few skeins of yarn when I woke up this morning. I think a new yarn winder and possibly a swift is in my near future. I've had my yarn winder for a few years now and it has served me very well, but now I think it's on its last leg of life. The poor thing can no longer handle anything heavier than a DK weight yarn (if I'm lucky), and has been winding up pretty messy cakes. You can just hear the contraption struggling to wind. As for my swift, it was my first major knitterly purchase (other than my interchangeable needles set) and it too has done its job for me fairly well. Unfortunately it can't handle the weight of yarn any more and needs the key to be jimmied with some tissue to make it stick. I think I can rig it so that it can last a few more months or at least bug Brett to make me one. I'm thinking the winder is on top of the priority list between the two and I'm hoping that with all this money that I'm "saving" from being on a yarn diet will be able to aid me in the purchase of a new winder. Anyone have any recommendations for a winder that can handle heavy use? I'd give my left nut for this one.

Anyhoo, I'm hoping to get some photos taken this week to show you some of my current WIPs and my lonely FO. The dreary grey weather that we've been having lately has put quite the damper on my photo taking opportunities. Today is suppose to be a nice day, but we'll see if I'll be able to get away long enough to snap a few pics. In the meantime, I have some yarn calling my name.

Chicken Dinner

What a weird name for a post title when all I'm doing is announcing the winner of my Stashdown yarn giveaway. But all I could think of was "winner, winner, chicken dinner"...sometimes I wish I could just turn off my inner dialogue.

First off, I just want to give a huge THANK YOU to everyone who entered the giveaway!! I wish I could give yarn to everyone who left a comment! But then I realized just how much that would cost in postal charges (it would seriously be up the wazoo) and in the end I would probably be dishing out more money to Canada Post than what all the yarn prices combined would be. And trust me, I think I've given Canada Post enough of my hard earned dollahs these past months!

Anyhoo, I digress. Some of your comments made me laugh right out loud, and I'm really glad that some of you have been inspired to "stash down" too and want to use a few ideas. I say go for it! I also love the different project ideas that came up. I think my most favourite answer by far came from Liisa, who claimed that she needed the yarn so that she could "make all the non-english speaking girls at work cry". I was taking a sip of tea when I read that and snorted, causing hot liquid to swish back and get stuck up in my nasal cavity. Ah, good times.

So, because a three year old toddler made it quite apparent that my undivided attention was completely vital to his very existence that I had to watch him do some sort of weird dance that involved random twirls and leg kicks to the sound of the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse theme song lest he shriveled up and turn into a wisp of smoke, I made Brett run the random number generator to pick a winner. The man makes me question his thought process sometimes.

To this moment I still don't know how he managed to get an answer that involved a decimal. I'm at a loss for words at this.

Ok, enough stalling! The winner is...

Comment #16:

Laura (culabrat)!!!

Since I got free yarn in the post the other day with another freebie skein soon to be on its way to me, not to mention that I've been feeling/seeing/hearing the incredible RAKs (random acts of kindness) lately on Ravelry and through other knitters in general, I decided to draw one more name! Hells yeah! So...

Comment #20

Kelly. K!!!

You get the other skein of yummy SweetGeorgia Tough Love Sock! How you like them apples?? (You don't have to answer that).

Ok ladies, expect to hear from me sometime this weekend about where I should send these yarny yummies to. In the meantime I've got to do the Hotdog Dance with the aforementioned three year old before he loses it on me.

Happy weekend my yarn loving friends!! ♥

Two Against One

The Universe and the Yarn Gods are both scheming against me. They both want me to fail. The day that I posted about my Stashdown 2012 goals and plans, I got mail. Good mail. Well, what would normally be considered good mail on a day where I wasn't planning on reducing my stash. The mail? Check out the above photo.

Oh yes, that's a skein of yarn in a mug. A free skein of yarn. I can't even return it for a refund cause I didn't even buy it. The yarn is a gift. The icing on the cake: see this scratch ticket?

That's right. I won a free skein of Squoosh yarn, in any base, any colour of my choice. I won't lie, deep down I'm doing cartwheels of joy cause who can turn down free yarn?? Yummy free yarn at that? Only a freakin' crazy knitter who likes to knit with nothing but Red Heart yarn, that's who. If there is a person out there like that than I would like to meet them, solely so that I could slap them across the face with a skein of cashmere. Oh wait, that's not a punishment! That would be heaven. Ok, I'd slap them with a wet skein of Red Heart. Oh yeah. I could possibly be put in jail for that.

Both of these items came from the same company, in the same box. I think I'm being set up for failure here. You want a close up of what the yarn is?

That there, my friends, is a beautiful skein of Malabrigo Worsted. What am I going to do with it, I don't know. I have to be truthful here and say I'm not the world's biggest fan of Malabrigo Worsted. As sinfully buttery soft as it is, the single ply of this yarn pills and felts way too easily for my liking. I once had knit a project with this yarn back in my early knitting days and halfway into my scarf I saw that it was looking a little weird. It was starting to felt in the spots that were being handled a little more. Yeah, I wasn't impressed to say the least. Who knows, maybe I should give it another go? I've been eyeing up Veera Välimäki's newest collection, Follow the Lines, which uses nothing but Malabrigo yarns in all four patterns. But you know what that means. I'm going to have to purchase another skein of this stuff if I want to knit any of the patterns.

And this is how the vicious cycle begins...

How many more months until 2013? Oi...

Stashdown 2012

I'm sure a lot of you are well aware that I've had yarn on the brain for quite a long time now. I'm sure a lot of you are sick and tired of me talking about my stash and how I am feeling a tad bit smothered by the sheer amount of yarn that I have in my possession. I'm sure a lot of you are wondering why the hell am I complaining about having this "problem". Some of you don't even consider this is a problem. Well I think it is. Not only is my stash getting out of control, but so are my spending habits.

I've been organizing and re-organizing, and then organizing the stash some more in fruitless attempts at Tetris-izing it all to somehow make it fit within the confines of the closets they've been designated to. And yet, there are still piles of yarn at the foot of the bed, behind the couch, and under the computer desk. Bags of yarn have been stuffed into all the crevices on my side of the closet and caution must be given to anyone who dares to open the closet in the Munchkin's room, as yarn has been known to spring out in an almost comical way. Basically, my stash is starting to become a physical burden.

Then there's the psychological side. Oh yeah, yarn likes to play mind games with a knitter. Having so much yarn at your fingertips could make a knitter go crazy. You're constantly thinking about all the pretty yarn that you want to cast on. Like, yesterday. Nevermind that you already have 6 projects on the go. Why not cast on just one more project? The (evil) yarn is calling and before you know it, the wool fumes have gotten to you and you find yourself casting on for yet another project. Crap.

There are moments when your stash makes you have temporary amnesia. You are planning for a project and all of a sudden you can't think of a single.yarn.in.the.stash.that.will.work. So you go and buy some more yarn. You get it, knit it up, bask in the awesomeness, and then you see it in the corner of your eye - some yarn in your stash that is exactly like the yarn you just used. Or even worse, you see a gorgeous shade of yarn in a base that you know you'll just love. So you purchase some. Then when you go to dump it into the black hole that is your stash add it lovingly to the rest of your yarn collection, you realize that you already have 6 skeins of yarn that look exactly like the yarn you just bought. Want to turn it into a nightmare? That yarn you just bought IS the yarn that's already in your stash. Oh yeah. It's happened baby, and it wasn't pretty. Not pretty at all. You want to wake up screaming all sweaty? How about this: you.don't.return.the.yarn. You convince yourself that since you love the colour and base so much that you bought it twice, that you'll most definitely will be able to knit two (large) projects with it. I'm losing my freakin' shit here.

But then there are times where you don't even think about the stash. You have so many pretties that all of a sudden you get consumed with the thought that you need even more of the lovelies, which then turns into the crazed idea that you need to own ALL the yarn. Sharing?? What the hell is that??

Deep breath. See?? See?? What did I tell you? Yarn makes a knitter do crazy things. What's that? No, no...I'm not rocking back and forth, whispering all the names of yarn companies and their yarn-y line-up in alphabetical order. No, no. I'm just um...LOOK!! SQUIRREL!!!

Woah. Aaaanyways...

So what's a knitter to do when they find themselves in such a predicament? Well, in order for me to curb my yarn shopping and accumulating, I'm partaking in Stashdown 2012 (imagine a deep, Hulk Hogan-like voice saying stashdown, with the end echoing a bit...and maybe throw in the sound of something really heavy crashing down at the same time). What is Stashdown, you ask? Well let me tell you, my dear friend. It's dedicating a certain amount of time (in this case, the entire year) to whittling your yarn stash (or any other stash you may have...I'm thinking of also doing a fabric version) down to either a pre-set amount or percentage, or to as low of an amount as you can humanly do so. There are tons of groups on Ravelry that are hosting a Stashdown of sorts and I was thinking of joining as many as I possibly could in hopes that being in so many groups would help me in my quest to well, get the stash down. Then I realized that having too many groups to check in with throughout the year would just turn me off and I will most likely fail in the most epic way known to man in the end. I foresee it not being a pretty sight. So I opted to join only one group's stashdown in hopes of avoiding such an epic downfall. Stashdown hint: You know you need to do a stashdown when you start padding the stash in preparation for the stashdown. Seriously, WTF? Who does that? Me. And I'm sure there are a whole lot of other knitters out there that have done the same.

The group that I joined decided to not have any complex rules, just simple guidelines with the main goal to reduce your stash down to "slightly hoariffic levels". You set up your own goals and you be the judge as to whether or not if you're failing. Easy peasy, right? Well maybe all down on paper! As the cliche saying goes: easier said, than done. I don't really have a set amount of yarn that I want to get rid of per se, my main goal is to have more yardage leave the stash than enter by the end of the year. Think it'll be hard? For me, I think so (I know some crazy people ahemMaeahem, that can totally do this challenge. I'ma thinking that I'll need to channel their willpower throughout the year to help me out). In general my rule is to knit more, buy less! But to break it down even further, here are some goals I'm going to work towards:

- the months of January and February are strict No-Buy months.

- instead of trolling for more yarn, these months will be dedicated to nothing but knitting (although, I just discovered that I have one bag left in the shop so I'm going to have to use a few knitting days to replenish my inventory)

- I'm allowing myself to keep my yarn clubs and spending the money to renew subscriptions - but no new clubs, unless I have moved out a lot of yarn from the stash

- I can only buy yarn if, and only if I need it to complete a project

- with the last goal said, I know myself well enough that I can't go cold-sheep and tell myself I can't buy any yarn whatsoever. This will only cause me to fail miserably. Therefore I'm giving myself a monthly budget of $50 for yarn. I can roll over this amount to the next month and ultimately "collect" enough to spend on a sweater quantity, but I CANNOT borrow from the next month's budget. Again, I know myself too well to know that this will end up in horrible failure. You might think that $50 is a lot for a monthly yarn budget, but really, you can't get a sweater's worth of yarn for that much (unless there's an epic sale going on or someone is destashing their yarn to the point where they are practically giving the yarn away for free), can you? Because my next goal...

- absolutely NO Knit Picks yarn purchases!!! The only Knit Picks purchases I am allowed to make are for more cables, tips, and as a complete, total, and utter dead last resort for yarn when knitting something for Brett or the Munchkin. But seriously, what does Knit Picks have on Patons Classic Wool, Cascade 220, or even Berroco Vintage or Weekend?? Absolutely nothing. Well, other than the fact that it can be much, much cheaper. Yet I need to remind myself that: I still have copious amounts of City Tweed in a lot of sweater quantities, I do not need more; I have a lot of their sock yarns, and I'm not even a fan of how thin their sock yarns are...the colours is what sucks me in; and even though Knit Picks yarn is friendlier to my wallet and I feel I can buy way more than if I were to buy a more expensive yarn, I always feel horrible when I get my order because the quality really doesn't compare to some of my snobbier yarns. Knit Picks yarns can be totally hit or miss. So far, there's been more misses than hits. I need to remind myself that it is definitely worth it to shell out a bit more money on a higher quality yarn - it's all about quality, not quantity. Knitting is so tactile that when you spend hours, days, weeks, and sometimes months knitting with the yarn you would want something that you love to touch, hold, and ultimately wear. Like my friend Andi and I agree on, in the end it's better to have spent a few more dollars on a quality yarn that will look good, wear well, and hopefully will last longer.

- cut down on single yarn purchases!! Unless I am needing a skein for a project. I have so many solo skeins in the stash with more coming from the yarn clubs, that I have plenty for socks and shawls so there really is no need for me to be buying any more. This will help out my $50 monthly yarn budget and will help me to save up for a purchase of a really nice yarn for a sweater. It's a win-win situation.

- minis swaps are ok. Cause that means I'll be swapping an entire skein of something from stash for a bunch of mini skeins in a variety of yarns in return. This could possibly help curb my urges to purchase one skein of sock yarns with the idea of using it towards my Beekeepers' Quilt.

- actually, swapping is ok. I haven't been swapping much anyways since postal costs can really add up but swapping isn't adding to the stash...just switching it up.

- if I really must buy a sweater's worth of yarn and will die if I don't have the yarn in my stash, then I must get rid of an equal amount of yarn from the stash either by destashing, donating, or...a giveaway!

Reasonable and realistic goals, no? We're only four days into the new year, so I can't say for sure. Ask me again at the end of the month. I think the keys to my success will be to avoid going to my LYS "just to see what's new", avoiding all online yarn shops and all yarn shop updates (I'm looking at you Wollmeise!), and stop looking at destashes. I'll also forewarn you all right now too that if it's a bit quite around here this month, it's because I'm busy either knitting or sewing...and maybe dancing (that damn Xbox is luring my attention away from my crafty endeavours!), so please, no hate mail as to why I haven't been around lately. Ok?

To help me kick off Stashdown 2012 I'm going to do an impromptu quickie yarn giveaway! My yarn hoarding will be your gain! The yarns I chose for this giveaway is one that I love dearly. Alas, whilst going through the stash I realized that I had several skeins of a certain colourway and the other I have already knit a project with. I also chose this yarn because I know several of you have either commented on this here blog, on my Ravelry project page, or had sent me a PM via Ravelry regarding the fact that you have not yet knit with this yarn but would like to.

So without further ado, the giveaway and the deets....

*** This giveaway is now closed...Thank you so much to everyone who entered! ***

The Prize: one lucky reader will win one of the above skeins! Those lovely skeins are, you guessed it, SweetGeorgia Yarns Tough Love Sock in colourways Boysenberry (left) and Nightshade (right).

How to Enter: leave a comment letting me know which colour you like the best AND what you would knit/crochet/weave with it.

The Rules: all comments must include either a valid email address or your Ravelry ID. Comments not containing either of these will be disqualified. Giveaway is open until Friday January 6, 2012 midnight PST (I told you it was going to be a quickie!). I'll contact the winner sometime the following day.

Good luck!

2012

Happy New Year to all my wonderful blog friends!

This is coming to you a day late. Oh well, better late than never, right? I had every intention of posting yesterday but then the day turned into one epic family day. How could I blog when my family and I are having such moments?? Exactly! We had a lovely day playing video games (even the Munchkin played...it's actually quite funny to watch a three year old trying to river raft and having the Kinect only capture his head half of the time), watching Gnomeo and Juliet (such a cute movie!), playing with all of the Munchkin's new toys, cuddling on the couch, and even taking down the rest of the holiday decorations turned into a fun event! I even managed to sneak away for half an hour to organize the stash a little (more on that later this week). Needless to say that the three of us were pooped by the end of the day and ended up going to bed before 9pm! I guess the Munchkin didn't want the great family day to end because I woke up this morning to discover that he had crawled into our bed and was asleep between Brett and I. So cute!

Anyhoo, now that the winter holidays are officially over, we'll be making the attempt at getting life back into a routine. So today is going to be spent running errands and getting the house back into tiptop shape, ready for what 2012 has in store for us. Since I haven't had much a chance to do any knitting the past few days I'm planning on squeezing in some knit time in the car while out and about today. I'm also hoping to get some baking done and trying out one of my (very generous) Christmas presents...a shiny new Kitchen Aid stand mixer!! I'm so excited!!

I'm even more excited that I feel a lot more energetic today than I have all December long. I know I should take it easy and not over exert myself, but there's just so much that I want to do! What's everyone's plans for 2012? Are you as excited as I am?

Happy 2012 everyone!!

PS: Note to self - I think blogging via iPhone isn't smart. It really screws up the formatting of the post. And it drives me insane that the font doesn't match the rest of the blog. Grrr....I hate html sometimes!

The Crafts of 2011

Or should I say 'the knits of 2011' since I really didn't do much else other than knit this year. Yes, I did a ton of sewing but it was all project bags for my shop. So they really don't count. I think I should make it a goal for next year to do more sewing that doesn't involve project bags. Yeah?

Anyhoo, when I first wrote down the list of projects and then made the collage I was kinda taken aback about having only 30 projects for the entire year. I mean, really? I had knit my ass off all year long and out of the 30 projects I only have 26 knitted items to show for the year?? But then I smacked myself. Knocked some sense into me. First off, I'm knitting. As all you knitters out there know (and you non-knitters should take note) that knitting is one of the most labour intensive crafts out there. Yes, you can fudge things left and right but really, unlike sewing, you are the one making the fabric. Knitting a sleeve could take hours of work, but in sewing those very same hours could get you an entire garment already...and then some! So really, I shouldn't be all hard on myself for only having 26 knitted FOs under my belt. Last year I only had 14 knitted items! I've almost doubled that amount in a year! I should be darn proud of myself!

I also need to remind myself that these 30 items are completed projects. Cause trust me, I have UFOs (unfinished objects) left and right all over the place! Throughout the year I had started a bunch of projects and either still have them on the needles or frogged them before they had a chance to even resemble anything. There's soooo many projects that I haven't even blogged about! Talk about secrets! Hmm...still on the needles...well, remember Phinney? I had started that pullover at the very beginning of the year. It was suppose to be my first project of 12 in 2011. Technically she's off the needles. All pieces have been knit, the only thing holding me back from completing her is the sewing up and then picking up the stitches for the collar. That's it. Really. What else is still OTN? A capelet, a pair of stripey knee-high socks (it was for a sock KAL with Hayley), 4 pairs of socks (a test knit, a stripey Skew similar to this pair, a variegated Skew like my first pair...can't you tell that I love Skews? Oooohhhh...maybe I should just frog the stripey knee-highs and turn them into knee-high Skews??? The wheels are turning...oh! I also have an ill-fitting-should-just-be-frogged-now pair of crap socks on the go too. Something tells me I should have a day where I do nothing but frog unloved projects that I didn't have the heart to deal with at the time).

Ok, where was I? Oh yeah, projects still OTN...let's see...well there Brett's cardigan (which is a shoulder, collar, and buttonbands away from being done), the Dahlia cardigan (I was obsessed about it back in September and October, started knitting it as part of a KAL with some ladies in my knitting group, and never blogged about the actual knitting of it), an Audrey in Unst cardigan (again, not blogged...like, at all), and remember this bad boy of a yarn cake?

The blue one next to the normal sized cake? Yeah, that's currently being turned into a shawl slash wrap. Again, I haven't blogged about this project but I'm not even close to being even halfway finished and looks like a blob of blue. Doesn't make for pretty blog photos, that's for sure.

Then there's the projects that just need some finishings...like the jacket for the Munchkin (it just needs the icord closures) that I haven't had the heart to finish since he won't even wear the Thorpe I had knit for him, and another hat for the Munchkin (which again, I don't have the heart to finish...see previous item's reason for not finishing). My Hooray Cardigan should really be added to the FO list but it's still awaiting for some grosgrain ribbon to be sewn onto the button bands...and oh, some buttons too. We won't even talk about the projects I had knit in 2010 that just needs some simple sewing done to them that I thought I would do at the beginning of this year.

I've been trying to give myself pep talks about clearing out the proverbial knitting basket and clearing the knitting WIP clutter. I think it's starting to work cause I'm slowly getting antsy about turning those WIPs into FOs and reclaiming all my needle tips and cables back. Who knows, maybe I'll finally have a full set of interchangeable needles again? Wouldn't that be something?

I have a lot of plans and ideas for 2012. So much so that January is already looking to be a tightly scheduled month. I think I better go get a new day planner and start penciling in my plans and hope that my schedule is do-able. I hope someone somewhere will discover a way to add a few more hours to the day in 2012. Or am I the only person who's stupid crazy enough to put themselves on an intense crafting agenda?

A Mission Accomplished!

S-U-C-C-E-S-S, that's the way we spell Success!

Yes, I'm channeling my inner cheerleader cause boo-yeah! I've accomplished the 12 in 2011 goal! Ohhhhh yyyyyyeah! Actually, I had accomplished this mission back in September but didn't realize it 'til now when I was going through all my lists and was trying to figure out the things I've completed this year. How awesome is that? It's always such a boost to find out that a goal you've been working towards all year finally comes to fruition. Even more so when you don't realize it until after the fact. Man, I feel good!

And to prove that I'm not lying I've made a list and linked them all to the finishing blog post. Without further ado, the projects:

1. Shalom

2. Ishbel

3. Queen Jaywalker

4. Sweet Monkey Socks

5. Plain Hummingbirds Socks

6. Blue Maile

7. Pebbles Maile

8. Sunshine Sunnyside

9. 220 yds. of Retro Heaven

10. Tahitian Tea Leaves

11. Georgia

12. Emelie

There's also a few "beyond 12 in 2011" in which I used really old stash yarn with patterns that were free, like:

The Munchkin's Thorpe

Stockholm

Both projects were knit using yarn that I had before I even considered myself a knitter! Yowzas! I'll admit it's an awesome feeling to get those out of the stash, even though I didn't even know that they existed. I'm thinking I need to do a complete and total overhaul of ALL my crafting supplies and do a thorough inventory. It also wouldn't hurt to toss the stash every now and then to remind myself of what I have.

I'm actually quite surprised at myself for keeping up with the whole 12 in 2011 goal. I honestly thought I would give up halfway through the year. I was definitely tempted to knit up every single new pattern the second they came out and was itching to cast on with newly purchased yarns the moment I got home or when they arrived, but I persevered and stuck with the plan. I mean, I had queued these patterns ages ago and for a reason (such as I really like them, or why else would I have queued them?), and have been wanting to knit them up for-evah. I would always feel guilty about casting on newer patterns that were at the bottom of the queue, so it does feel quite awesome to finally knit those 'top of the list' patterns! I'm also quite pleased that I did my 12 projects with three months to spare, even though I feel like I kinda cheated by knitting three baby sweaters. Oh well. I could have spent the entire year knitting nothing but dish cloths, wrist warmers, and bookmarks and then go around claiming that I'm on my two millionth project of the year. That's not what 12 in 2011 is about, but sadly some people started to view it as a competition. I'm just happy that I had knit every project from stash (most of the yarns were from when I was just starting to have a stash and when I was starting to shop at my LYS rather than Walmart), and that all of the patterns were either at the top of the knit-list, free, or were bought and then quickly forgotten and ditched when an even newer pattern come onto the scene. I had a game plan and I stuck with it. Changing only a few projects...like Shalom. The original pattern in mind was something that I had started knitting and ended up frogging before the yoke was finished - when I realized that the design was just all shades of wrong for me. The three baby sweaters were all suppose to be different, but who can predict that everyone was going to have their baby at around the same time? Not to mention that one of the patterns I had bought yarn for (gasp!) and therefore didn't count.

Since 12 in 2011 was such a success for me, I think I'll do a similar goal for 2012. This time around I plan on mixing up the patterns I queued ages ago with newer patterns...cause who knows how much longer my will power will last! I'm also thinking of going bigger...as in a sweater a month big. Oh yeah. I plan on going there. I guess that means I'll have to go through my Ravelry queue and really weed it out, add tags, and all that jazz and figure out what is do-able. While I'm at it, I should also go through my stash page and update everything. Ahhh...can't you tell that the new year is almost upon us? Is anyone else planning their 2012 knitting schedule? I can't wait to get started!!