Late night musings on the knitting year ahead...

Because who doesn't need a gratuitous cupcake picture? For the record, this is what my work-mates get when they behave themselves...


Perhaps it's just a beginning-of-the-year thing, but over the last few days, I've found myself thinking more about the things I'd like to knit this year (why yes, I am a little obsessed, thank you for asking, and help yourself to tea and biscuits on the way out). Obviously we knitter-type-people do this a lot in terms of seeing patterns online, or garments worn by people on the street, which then cause us to get inspired and start trying to knit or replicate the design. But this time I've found myself thinking less of specific patterns and more about themes/basic elements.

So for the record, in the year ahead I'd really like to try and knit:

More cables.
Or more to the point, more traditional cables. While I did dabble in cablework over the course of last year (my Gathered Pullover being the most recent example, and who can forget the never-ending saga that was my Sylvi), it was not exactly conventional cablework. I adore both of these designs, but I think that I'd really like to try something a little more basic. I have an entire book of aran and cable patterns on my knitting shelf - it's really about time I cracked it open and got stuck in.

Stripes.
I worked a bit with stripes last year, but it was generally in a minor way, an uninteresting way, or with a self-striping yarn which to me isn't really entirely the same thing. None of these really scratched my itch at any rate, so I see more stripes in my future. *sigh* Better start perfecting that whole jogless stripes in the round thing, Anna...

Shawls.
As I mentioned during the write up for my Wandering the Moor, shawls and I didn't see eye to eye for a very long time. I had knitted a couple of shawls before, and although I'd put quite a lot of work into them (*cough* my Luna Moth Shawl *cough*), I never really wore them all that much. Mostly because I couldn't figure out how to wear them, or because I didn't have anything that went with them, and so on. But over the last few months I have actually found myself wearing both of the above mentioned shawls, so a part of me is itching to explore this area a little further, now that I know that the fruits of my hard work aren't just going to languish in my cupboard.

More Basics:
Wonderfully coloured knitwear is all well and good, but sometimes you just don't feel like cranking out something as vivid as a lot of my garments seem to be. Sometimes it's just a little too early in the morning. Given my bleedingly obvious penchant for making clothes, it's kind of galling to end up resorting to some dodgy black jacket that I bought from Target, just because I want something neutral and un-attention-grabbing. So, in order to alleviate this, I would very much like to knit some nice, wearable pieces in greys, blacks, subdued blues and greens, maroons, and so on. With an emphasis on the wearable: I'm not going to start a new paragraph for this because I am seriously thinking about devoting an entire post to it in the near future, but I want to knit more wearable things. Most of the things that I knitted last year I have worn, and worn a lot, and I would like to continue that way. I enjoy the knitting process, really I do, but I equally, I want to knit things that I will love wearing, and not look at guility every time I open my drawers, only to pass over it for the fiftieth time.

There are other priorities - more handknitted socks because my existing pairs are falling apart, more hats, more gifts for other people (because really I'm not sure I actually need as many knitted garments as I am ending up with as a result of this hobby!), and so on. But those are the big four. Let's see how I go!




In conclusion, here is a project that I finished before I went away but forgot to blog about earlier. It's a mildly ridiculous hat that I made from the wool/alpaca blend yarns that I acquired at the Bendigo Sheep Show last July (purple and brown stripes, but the picture completely and utterly fails to convey this fact). I'm quite happy with how it turned out - originally I was going to do something original, but in the end I got complacent and basically just turned it into a Felicity style hat. I don't regret this. And please excuse the sunglasses - I don't know why I'm wearing them indoors (and for that matter, I don't know why I decided to take a picture in the bathroom either). Go ahead, mock away...