Two months later...

So some (crazy) (overachiever) knitbloggers decided to raise the ante on NaKniSweMo this year, and create NaKniSweMoDo. Apparently it's no longer enough to knit a whole sweater in one month (which I did with one day to spare last November, thankyouverymuch), this group had to knit one per month all year, thereby raising the bar for all of us to feel like knitting slackers. That's what the Do stands for, dodecathlon or some such made up mathy word.

(Anyone else think of The Phantom Tollbooth when they hear dodecahedron? Anyone?)

I am going to roughly, roughly jump onto this bandwagon--they are specifying adult-sized garments, and that's just not feasible for me for either my knitting speed or my budget. And I have two children for whom I love to knit and it wouldn't be fair to deprive them for a whole year. And, really, a person's challenge should be their own challenge. I knit because I love it, not to fulfill arbitrary quotas. Unless I decide to, which is TOTALLY different. Fuggedaboutit.

So here is my own personal set of SweVeKiMoDo goals:

1. 12 human-sized garments
2. kid garments count
3. grown-up vests count (I’m craving a vest or two, they’re great up here in the PNW)
4. I will alternate a garment for me with a garment for daughter, son, or hubby--so, six for me, two for each of them? Hmm.
   
5. at least one will be in pieces (all my sweaters have been 1-piece top-down or bottom-up so far!)
6. at least one will be colorwork, probably fair isle.
   
7. at least one will be cabled
8. at least one will be lace
9. queue can change at any moment (ooh, shiny!)

I finished my Ingenue sweater for January, ahead of schedule, even, but for February I made the mistake of starting two garments at once, both my Lacy Top (for Vestuary):
and Mr. D's top-down raglan. (I don't have any current photos because I've been sorely neglecting it. Really. It'd be done in a day or two if I'd just buckle down--I need only to finish the sleeve ribbing and pick up for neck ribbing.) So I'm fudging that if I finish both in early March, then they count for my February and March garments. (We shall not speak of the two Gretel hats I knit in February as well. Fuggedaboutit, ya hear?)

The Lacy Top has been fun, if kind of a grind--I wish I had chosen a cabled vest instead. It's two pieces, and is a free pattern from Patons. I bought the yarn at JoAnn, because I'm a sucker for that 15% teacher discount, and the only color they had in stock with enough balls of yarn for this pattern was...black.

Now, I love wearing black. I own four or five pairs of black pants and let's not get started on the shoes. Black is eminently practical, stylish, and chic. (Me personally, I am eminently...practical. One out of three ain't bad.)

But I hate knitting black. My excuse is that it was Vestuary, and I was caught up in the excitement, and the other colors weren't worth waiting for, and...black it was. The top'll be very practical when it's finished, it's just doing a number on my eyes. The lace pattern is only four rows and was easily memorized, so that's good...and, contrary to the photo above, I've actually finished the front (back) and am about halfway up the back (front). I just keep forgetting to take progress photos in daylight...if there's anything worse than knitting black lace, it's photographing it in artificial light. fuggedaboutit.

Anyway, I plan to tag the projects as I do them, so my Ravelry page should show my progress, and I will also put a list in the sidebar here.

As I type this, I wonder: why am I jumping on this bandwagon? Why stress myself out with artificial and imposed deadlines on what is supposed to be my escape from a life of artificial and imposed deadlines? (I do advise publications and work in a bureaucracy par excellence, don't forget. Deadlines are my life.)

Well--all I can think of is that it's fun to set some goals. As I enter year 3 of my serious knitting phase I have realized that I have tried most techniques and experimented with many (if not most) types of garments/projects, and that conquering techniques and trying new types of projects were what kept me interested. I've done socks, sweaters, shawls, scarves, vests, and hats; knit for men, women, and children; done lace, stranded knitting, cables, and textured stitches. I'm definitely not an expert knitter, but I am certainly a confident upper-intermediate knitter. It was time to set some different goals and figure out another way to keep learning now that there are few "first times" left in the technique arena.