New Knitting Challenges and Goals for 2011!

I was guest blogger over at yarn-love this week and talked about my 2011 knitting goals. Thought since I need to stay accountable to these goals someplace I'd post over here too!

1. Lace - Like for REAL, not a lacy pattern in worsted weight yarn. One of the very first skeins of yarn I bought at yarn-love back in 2008 was a beautiful skein of Claudia Hand Painted Silk Laceweight. I remember fondly petting it on multiple visits. Staring at it from the table on a couple of First Fridays. Finally I broke down and bought it. I had no project in mind, and did search some on Ravelry looking for inspiration..but never came upon a project I wanted to do. I've also started to incorporate lace stitch patterns in my work. I love lace panels on socks to help keep me interested in what I'm doing. And love doing fingering weight shawls. But in setting goals for myself for this year, I've decided I finally need to knit up this gorgeous skein of yarn in a true laceweight project.

2. Colorwork - This is actually carried over from last year. I was looking for a new challenge and decided to try not just fair isle. but fair isle and STEEKING! For those of you who don't know, steeking is when you cut your knitting. ON PURPOSE! Terrifying right? I started knitting a fair isle vest last year with the intention of not only doing two handed stranded knitting, but also trying out steeking. Well.....I have made quite a bit of progress....I'm on the decreases for the arms and deep v neck. But since I tend to be a very promiscuous knitter....well.....it hasn't been touched for a while. So last year I got the colorwork part down. This year, I want to finish this vest so that I can steek it!

3. Speaking of my promiscuous knitting ways. I have a LOT of WIP (works in progress for those who are like what?). My love for yarn, and seeing all the amazing new projects on Ravelry, result in me getting cast-on-itis. Looking at my current WIP in Ravelry, I've got: one shawl, three sweaters, three pairs of socks, the aforementioned fair isle vest, a baby blanket, and a pair of fingerless mitts all in my current WIP (that ignores the 11 WIP that are "hibernating"). I need to learn to be more faithful to my knitting. But with SO many WIP ... I don't know that I can do that this year. So, for every new project I cast on, I'm also going to try and make sure I'm finishing up an OLD project. perhaps if I get good at this, then NEXT year I can have a goal of say, only 5 WIP at one time.... maybe....

4. Last but not least, I have a goal to do a NON-worsted weight sweater. Those of you that may remember me knitting Decimal last year (DK weight I think?) will remember that I was NOT so fond of how long it took me to knit up a non-worsted weight sweater. But I fell in love with the Austin Hoodie, by Connie Chang Chinchio, late last year. And have a sweaters worth of Madelinetosh that is destined for that sweater. That would be fingering weight. Yikes! And if that isn't enough, there's also a sportweight pattern I happen to be sitting on yarn for. That would be Goodale, by Cecily Glowik MacDonald. So, my goal is to knit at least one, if not both, of these non-worsted weight sweaters in 2011.