WIP: Sock Hat

I have yet another project on the needles! This past week brought some sample work so my regular projects are on hold until I get it done. I cast on a hat for knit night last week so I would have something simple to knit. 

This yarn was a gift from a friend and has languished in my stash for several years. 

The yarn is Sleep Season Goods Sock Yarn in the color Sassafras and is 100% wool. Initially, this yarn was destined for socks but the lack of nylon and the light variegation changed my mind. Hat it is! This is a great project for knitting on the go and I'm happy to use some older stash!

WIP: Kites

Creative energy is flowing pretty strongly at Chez Birnel right now. I'm making sewing plans for the year, working on exciting new things, and knitting along on one of my favorite types of projects - colorwork. 

I cast on for this project on New Year's Eve as a way to start as I mean to go on. What that really means is I want to work on things I really love and enjoy doing rather than forcing myself to finish projects I'm half in love with or because I "need" to use the yarn, pattern, etc. 

This is a free pattern named Kites by Teleri and it uses three colors of fingering weight yarn. I'm using two shades of Rauma Finullgarn (navy and gray) and one shade of Brooklyn Tweed Loft in Hayloft. This pattern isn't fooling around; it's easy to follow and the motif is straightforward but you're still working with three colors of yarn. The tangle factor is a bit of an issue but that could be circumvented by breaking either the blue or yellow color instead of carrying them up. But hey, I wanted fewer ends to weave in so I'm going the tangle city route. The first fingerless mitt flew off my needles but the second one is slow going since I'm not on vacation anymore. 

WIP: Serif

Every January 1st I drag all of my stash out of hiding and sort through it and organize it. It takes half the day to do a proper job and put it all away, nice and tidy. Throughout the sorting process I'll cull a few yarns to destash and a few yarns to knit right away, but most of it goes back into my cedar chest or large space bags. This year, I was particularly taken with inventorying my sweater quantities of yarn and I set aside some Quince & Co Lark and Chickadee that I purchased last October.

I'm knitting Serif from Elizabeth Doherty's book, Top Down, in colors Honey and Storm. My gauge swatch was spot on for row gauge, which is super duper important for top down knitting, but off on stitch gauge. However, I really liked the fabric I got on US #8 (4.5 mm) needles and didn't want to sacrifice my perfect row gauge for a better stitch gauge. Turns out I just needed to knit one size up to get the correct width measurements while following the length measurements for the size I originally intended to knit - 42-ish for length and 45-ish for width. 

It just so happened that I was ill last weekend so I spent a lot of time laying in bed while knitting and watching movies so I got a ton of this sweater knit. A lot as in most of the body. As of last night I joined the contrast color for the skirt and am knitting merrily along in garter stitch. My goal for today is to get through the garter stitch portion of the body so I can get to the sleeves. I'm usually not too keen on Sleeve Island but I'm eager to try Elizabeth's method of top down sleeve construction again (I knit a sample for her book) and to get a real feel for the fit of the sweater. I'm almost always a bit "meh" about sweaters until they get at least one sleeve because it really changes the way they fit the body; drawing the armhole closer to where they actually sit during wearing and allowing any stockinette to unroll and lay properly.

I've also looked through my wardrobe to see if this sweater fits criteria for filling a hole in my wardrobe and it certainly does! I have two dresses that should look fantastic with this cardigan not to mention a pair of slim cut navy pants that will look super cute with this sweater and a patterned top. Not too shabby for meeting my handmade wardrobe goal for this year!

2016 Goals

Here we are, almost an entire week into the new year, and I haven't posted about goals or projects or anything. A good guess is that punctuality isn't on my resolution list - I'm usually right on time to everything, all the time, even when the everything sucks (like a doctor visit or paying bills). But I've been thinking. A lot. What do I really want to achieve this year?

1. Continue knitting local. 

I really like where this took my stash last year. Purchases were fewer, but of better quality, and my stash is about 90% OH PRETTY right now.

2. Have a half-handmade wardrobe.

A bit of a doozy, yeah? I'd say my wardrobe is about 30% handmade right now and I'd like to up that percentage this year. I'll need to work on tailoring pants to suit me and get more comfortable sewing with knit fabrics but I think this goal is achievable given the amount of sewing I did last year. 

3. Self-publish more patterns. 

I have three or four patterns just about ready to go to a tech editor. The process is kind of long between what's in my head, the knitting, and the publishing on Ravelry and I tend to lose momentum somewhere in the last step. It's also pretty scary to put designs up for public scrutiny. Not that I'm a delicate flower but I would like people to like what I design if I'm mostly designing what I like, you know? 

So that's it. Three goals that are craft and hobby related. I have a few other goals for myself - reduce caffeine intake (down to one cup a day as of right now!), bring my lunch to work instead of buying it, and save money. I'm trying to introduce things slowly and build good habits instead of going full tilt all at once. How about you? Any goals for the new year?