I hope you all had a lovely New Year’s Eve, spend with exactly the people you wanted to be with and exactly at the place you wanted to be at, whether it be at a big party or snuggled up at home. For me it was more of the latter, as I like to spend NYE at home, comforting my pets from all the hullabaloo outside if need be.
I wanted to do a little round-up of all my knitting this year and I already knew beforehand it would be less than I was hoping for. The sudden loss of my dear cat at the beginning of 2015 threw me off knitting for months, it being an activity so closely associated with a purring cat on my lap. Even though Dimmie will always be dearly missed, the hurt lost its edge and I rekindled my love for knitting throughout the year. 2015 was also the year in which Iva found her way into my life, and even though she’s just been living with us for 3 months now, I wouldn’t want to miss her for anything in the world.
- Upper left: Golden Leaves
- Upper middle: Striation
- Bottom left: Pebble Beach shawlette
- Right: Tiller
I finished 15 projects in 2015 (a little fitting, isn’t it?). I didn’t have any clear resolutions, other than that I wanted to knit more sweaters/cardigans. Although not an impressive amount, I did finish 1 sweater and 1 cardigan, so check I think?
- Top left: Henslowe shawl
- Top right: Blossom cap
- Bottom left: Rye mitts
- Bottom right: Sperry
I only finished 4 pairs of socks, which I hope will be significantly more in 2016. Sock knitting always was ‘my thing’. I can get lost with other projects, but socks hardly ever fail me. So I want to reclaim my ‘addicted to sock knitting’ title in the coming year.
- Top left: Pebble Beach shawl
- Bottom left: vanilla stripey socks
- Right: Grady shawl
Although I did work on a couple of colourwork projects throughout the year, none of them made it to a finished status. So one clear goal for 2016 will be to at least finish one of them. I do love stranded knitting, but I also do find it more tricky to pick up WIPs that involve stranded knitting for some reason.
- Top left: Lorem Ipsum
- Bottom left: Hyperballad cowl
- Right: Vinnland
By far it is not all doom and gloom. I do wish I could’ve done more, but let’s be real, if I had finished 30 projects I probably still would’ve said that. Us knitters are probably always plagued by the thought that it is unlikely we will ever finish knitting everything we want in our lifetime, just like I’ll never be able to keep on top of all the books I want to read. Most importantly, knitting once again kept me sane. In a hectic second year of my PhD, knitting was my meditation. It brought me tremendous joy, from picking out patterns and matching yarns, to wearing my finished projects. I also knit two gifts that I know made people dear to me happy. So what more could I possibly be asking for? Here’s to more of that feeling in 2016!