2014 Goals

So here is my post listing what I want to improve on in 2014. Besides the health-related goals that I set every year, I’m going to wok on the following craft-related goals.

1. I’m going to focus on quality instead of quantity.

That’s it. That’s my one goal. What does it mean? Well for quilting, I tend to make a lot of quilts. When I end one, I start another right away. I use whatever pattern has caught my eye most recently. As a result, I have a lot of quilts. Lap quilts mostly, but a lot of them. I don’t need to make another dozen this year. Instead, I’m going to my bucket list. I’m going to pick out one. I haven’t decided yet but I’m leaning towards either Double Wedding Ring or Seven Sisters. Those have been on my bucket the longest. I’ll probably partially hand piece and partially machine piece it. I want to hand quilt it because I like hand quilting and my family likes the end product. I also want to finish 4 UFOs. Just 4. That’s my goal. If I surpass that, then that’s fine.

For knitting, I’d like to try to improve my stitching. I make a lot of items at a small gauge – socks, shawls, scarves. My knitting looks fine in the smaller gauge. But what I’m finding out is in a larger gauge, my stitching isn’t so even. My purls are looser than my knits. That results in sloppy looking stitching and rows of unevenness. So I’m going to try to figure out a better way to knit – for me.

I started a Craftsy class a month ago on this very subject. But I only watched the class – I didn’t practice the techniques. So today, I watched the sections on knitting and purling in continental style and then practiced for 1/2 hour. (I watched it while on the treadmill. See? Hitting two goals at once.)

Pretty bad because I’m a beginner again! I will continue to practice for a little while each day. Then I think I will make a washcloth in garter. 😃 just like a beginner would. I’m going to try eastern style (my stitch orientation is western style right now). See what comes of it.

That’s it. Continue to quilt and knit and grow in my skills for both.

And be healthy. Happy New Year blog readers!

A Third Christmas

My niece was home for a holiday visit and we had a third Christmas with her family. Here is a picture of all of us at my sister’s vacation villa.

It’s been a couple years since we’ve seen Bri and her family and it was a wonderful visit. Her kids are adorable and smart as can be and I fell in love with both of them instantly. Phoenix reminds me of Gianna when she was small. Axel has the best fine motor skills and spacial skills that I’ve ever seen in a 4-year-old. You can tell he’s very bright by the questions he asks and the large vocabulary that he has.

As we wind down the year, I’m making a list of resolutions for next year. Yes, there’s always the “I’ll lose weight and get in better shape” resolutions. But what about knitting and quilting resolutions? That will have to be tomorrow’s topic as I need some time to ponder it.

Sweater Update

I am convinced that I could make a sweater then block it into any number of sizes. When I pull those pieces out of the soak, they are huge! It’s unreal what I have to do to get them back into shape.

I have both fronts and both sleeves blocking today. The back is still on the needles. I think this sweater may be completed by year end. We’ll have to see…..

Wild and Goosey

I thought I had enough variety to put a couple blocks together to see how they would look. I think this would make a cute baby quilt. But I don’t know anyone having a baby nor anyone who would want a wild and scrappy baby quilt. New mothers tend to want matchy-matchy things. But it’s going to look awesome once done. There are a lot of seams and there is a lot of thread in those blocks!

I Felt Like Sewing

Some days you just wake up and feel like sitting at the sewing machine for a while. My wonky-pieces-scrap-bin was flowing over so I decided to make some “Wild and Goosey” blocks.

These finish at 3″ so although I made progress, having 34 sewn is not a huge accomplishment. This is one of those projects where you work for years and never get a quilt top done! Kind of like Dear Jane! Oh well, unlike Dear Jane they are mindless sewing and fun to paper piece.

I’m Back

I’m back to normal and have a pretty good mental state in the days before Christmas. I’m one of those people who views holidays as stress.  But as the kids get older and there’s less pressure about presents and less running around, it’s not too stressful.  I just have to make time to sit and knit or sew to calm my nerves.

Today we are making Kringlas – Norwegian Christmas cookies.  We made some chocolate truffles yesterday. I don’t know if we will make cut out cookies or not. Depends on if we have time.  I’m going to spend some time wrapping the few presents we actually purchased.

Craft-wise, I finished my sweater.

It fits beautifully but the yarn is a little wimpy and doesn’t hold its shape. It’s reclaimed lambswool from an unraveled Goodwill sweater.  It acts kind of like cotton.  It’s warm and a really nice comfortable sweater.

I took another Goodwill trip even though I don’t need any yarn!  I thought to myself that I would only buy a sweater if it was 50% off, large or extra large, and I’m in love with the fiber.  I bought this one.

Extra Large with this big hood thing attached.  Not half off.

Fiber content is interesting. I’ve never knitted with mohair. But that combination is very “drapey” if that’s a word.  Soft as butter.  And dyeable.  The brand is Eileen Fisher. I see a lot of that brand and it’s always good fiber.  What am I going to do with it?  Who knows.  I’m unraveling it today and I’ll weigh it and estimate yardage then pack it away.

I finished my last scrap squad quilt and it should be on their blog by the end of the week. It turned out well. I was procrastinating on it because I wasn’t sure I loved the pattern. You know how that is? But I made a minor change to the pattern and ended up really liking it.  I made it in Christmas colors so it’s done in time for the season. I don’t currently have a single Christmas quilt! I’ve started a few but never finished any.

What’s on the schedule for the Christmas break? Well, I still have to move the two labs. Only my office got moved before I left for the semester. Dan and I are talking about painting the spare bedroom and getting new carpet put in. I’m all for that.  It’s a catch-all for stuff right now and I’d like to turn it into a real spare bedroom. I have a quilt to quilt for my sister (two actually) and one for our music/piano teacher. And I’d like to get another sweater knitted.  Sheesh… it’s going to be a busy break. I should get started.

Numbers

The end of November and all of December is a month of numbers for me.  This is what’s going through my head and preventing sleep.

• There are 11 days until my Scrap Squad #6 quilt is due.  I’ve had an extension already. It was supposed to be due last week! I have 2 borders and quilting left. If I add a border tonight and a second one on Thursday, I can quilt it all day on Friday and then I’ll have 7 days to actually write and put up the post.
• There is 1 one day left of regular school – today.  I have 4 assignments left to grade. I have 1 final left to make up.  I have 20 hours of finals to host.
• What? 20 hours of finals?  I am teaching a class for the first time in 6 years. I went with the schedule of the last instructor and he gave individual hands on finals for each student in the class.  I am doing the same.  45 students…. It fills all of Tuesday – Thursday plus next Monday. That’s just for one class.  I teach 4 others.
• I have 6 days before my office needs to be vacated and I need to move into my new office.
• I have 3 days after finals and before the college closes to move two labs worth of computer equipment and supplies to the new labs in the new building.
• I have 1 instructor left to interview to teach a night class for my program next spring.
• I have 1 Christmas tree up – zero (0) other decorations or outside lights.
• I have zero Christmas presents purchased. (Presents are such a stupid idea that needs to be discontinued.)
• I will not go to DJ’s Scholastic Bowl match again tonight. I missed last week’s also.  This week’s is over an hour away.
• I have 6 wreaths to pick up tonight and distribute to people who purchased them from DJ for a fund raising benefit.  Since he won’t get home until late and the wreaths where delivered late, I need to get this done asap for him.
• I got zero loads of laundry done this weekend.  I must get the bare necessities done tonight.
• We ate one meal last week that wasn’t fast food. This week will be similar.
• I cancelled Gianna’s pitching lesson tonight.  I have to attend her practice tomorrow in Dan’s absence if he is not able to attend because of work.

I could keep going on. But I’ll stop here.  See why I get so overwhelmed and crabby during December?  I don’t sleep.  Dan is “going live” with a new software module for his company today.  He’s been working day and night for two weeks straight.  Every weekend… every night. Sometimes from home… sometimes at work.  He worked until 6pm last night and then went back to work at 3am this morning.  Things are going well so maybe by next weekend that will be settled down enough that he can pitch in some more.

In My Other Life

Family and work really take a front seat for the next few weeks!

Dan’s working twice as much to implement a new project on Monday.  That means that means he works all day and then comes home and works all night from home!  I’m a single parent during this time. Luckily, the kids’ activities aren’t that jam-packed.  Just kind of jam-packed!

For example, yesterday I worked til 4pm. DJ had a Scholastic Bowl match in a neighboring town.  Gianna had a pitching lesson.  I didn’t go to DJ’s match because it had already started by the time I got off work and had to drive a half hour to get there.  Next week I should be able to go… I think.  They won all three rounds.  The JV team is undefeated.  They are good….  Dan wasn’t sure if he would be able to catch Gianna, so I went to the lesson with her.  Tonight, Gianna has her school band concert.  Wednesday… well, that’s my marathon day – 9am to 9pm.  You get the idea.

At work, we are a week before finals.  That means all my grading has to be done. I gave quite a few last minute projects, extending due dates.  So I’ve got a “to do” list of grading that’s a mile long.  I’m moving at work.  We built a new building and my two labs and my office need to be moved between the end of finals and December 23rd.  I have a week in January that can be used also.  So every day, I come in an hour early to pack up a little bit and clean and even move some non-essential stuff.

I am also a member of a computer group.  We don’t meet that much. We just plan conferences and give away money.  🙂  All the money we make from the conferences is given away as grants to local schools and libraries to update their computer hardware and software.   Here is a list of winners. 

I think that’s really cool and I’m glad to be a part of that organization!

Now you see why my knitting production has increased and my quilting has plateaued.  I’m never home!  You have to be home, at the sewing machine, to quilt. But I can pack my knitting and take it everywhere with me.  A row here and there really adds up quickly.

The Cable Has To Go

I like it – I like it a lot. But I’m not going to have enough yarn. Cables eat up a lot of yarn. The Custom Fit programs said I need 470 grams of yarn and I have 466.  PLUS a 15 gram swatch that can be unraveled if necessary.  But that’s cutting it awful close.  So I think I’ll just make this sweater a classic rib and the next one can have a cable running up the fronts.

Thinking This Through

I finished both sweater sleeves on our Chicago trip. Here is one blocking.

Now, how do I line up those vertical stripes so the fronts and back meet them correctly? I’ve been thinking of nothing but that for hours now. I think I’ve got it. I charted out the right front.

The first vertical stripe starts 6 stitches from the side. The first stitch is a selvedge stitch here and on the front. So I should be able to begin my seam side of the front the same way and it should be okay. I think….

My husband just asked me if that was my grading I was working on. 😔. No… But I need to get working on that instead of this….