A New Year of Knitting

I'm not making any New Years resolutions about anything other than related to knitting. Not that no other parts of my life and myself couldn't use some improvement, etc, but one baby step at a time, you know? If I don't resolve to lose weight, I'll do better at losing it. And I'll drive slower, plan ahead, exercise more, stop procrastinating, and a myriad of other things as well.

But knitting is different somehow. I used to sew a lot. An awful lot. I made all my kids' pajamas, underwear (I made great kids' boxer briefs), loads of their shirts, pants, and jackets/hoodies once upon a time. But then I learned to knit. In November 2006 I finally figured it out. Not a day has gone by since then that I haven't knit something. And sewing has slowly taken a backseat to the knitting. The "extra" money goes to the yarn store and KnitPicks rather than to the fabric store and Sewzannes. The "spare time" is spent playing with sticks and string. I actually bought pajamas for the kids when the weather started turning cooler this fall. Knitting is different from sewing to me. It's fun, creative, productive, entertaining, useful, challenging in ways that sewing isn't to me right now. I still love to sew, but when it comes down to it right now, it's easier to knit - it's portable! I knit at the soccer fields during the boys' practices, at stop lights when I'm driving (yarn&needles hit the passenger seat before my foot hits the gas, every time, I swear), at family gatherings - most of the time with my sister Sarah, I even knit at Midnight Mass on Cmas Eve this year, although I think my Mom was a bit appalled by that (it was only before the priest came in, during the choir's warmup). I knit in line at Kohl's on Christmas Eve - and I might have been the only one in that line who was still smiling after they'd checked out. In short, I knit anywhere and everywhere, and I don't ever leave the house without some knitting project tucked into my bag - you just never know, right?

So my Knitting Resolutions for 2008 are -

- Knit things other than dishcloths. Yeah, they're fast and cheap and small and portable, but my wool stash is missing me.

- Make a bag with stripes, probably felted.

- Finish Dillon's hooded sweater. Started it in July, as of right now it just needs sleeves and blocking. Get it done before the poor kid outgrows it already!

- Knit something for myself - a sweater/cardigan, probably in a chocolatey brown color.

- SOCKS. Just do it already.

- Don't stop knitting dishcloths altogether - my cotton yarn stash is ridiculously large, and needs to be reduced by some means, to make room for all the sweater's-worth of yarn I'm going to need, and the copious amounts of sock yarn I'll no doubt become addicted to after completing the previous resolution.

- Get Dillon knitting. With needles. Start with finger-knitting, he'll like it. Get rid of those damned knitting looms!

- Knit myself a shawl. Nothing fancy or lacy, but I'm itching to make myself a triangular shawl. Maybe DK weight w/size 10s or so - wish I could figure out how to make a F&F in that non-squared shape.

Ok, off to work more on my HelmetLiner for the Troops (well, for one of the troops, that is), and knit through the ball dropping while watching a movie.

Happy New Year!