Almost New Year round-up

This year I have completed: seven sweaters (two of which, the Ribbed Baby Jacket and the minImogen, are baby-sized, but I'm still counting them, the rest being the Twinkle Rockefeller Cardigan, Vine Yoke Cardigan, Imogen, Hourglass pullover and Textured Circle Shrug); three pairs of socks (Garter st resoleable socks, Alexandrite Spiraling Coriolis socks and Child's First Sock in Shell Pattern); two shawl/scarfs (Storm Cloud Shawlette and Crayola Baktus); the Isabeau purse; one Star-Crossed Beret, three Aviatrixes and one Calorimetry (so kind of five head coverings/hats). And counting, because it's still November and the year is not over quite yet.

My favorites from this year are the Imogens, both for the process as well as the finished product, the Crayola Baktus (more for its portability and then also for the extremely stretchy and wearable finished product), and the Aviatrixes. No socks made the list. Maybe I'm turned off on socks. So perhaps it would be a bad idea to start pondering a yarn diet for 2011 and work on stashbusting for a year. After all, I have enough yarn for more than a dozen (really, I just tallied) pairs of socks. Although it might get boring just working on socks.

But then I could work on perfecting the perfect architecture. I like Cat Bordhi's Sockitecture book (the first one) but it doesn't seem to be the best fit for my foot for some reason. The (gasp!) no-gusset short-row heel seems to be a good fit for me, but I need to figure a way to also fit in heel stitch on the bottom of the heel since that's where I end up wearing out my socks.

There are socks that have been in my queue forever: the Waving Lace socks and Embossed Leaves socks from IK's Favorite Socks book. Queen Kahuna-method socks. Lace patterns from Charlene Schurch's Sensational Knitted Socks (Oriel) and More Sensational Knitted Socks (Little Arrowhead). I figure if I can make a good dent in my sock yarn, then and only then, can I buy more. And then I plan on buying me some Briggs and Tuffy Durasport and Tuffy.

I have a fantasy, a sock fantasy. Where every day I wear handknit socks. And that I have so many pairs (kind of like that picture of a bunch of different socks from Knitting Vintage Socks) each pair only gets worn maybe once or twice a month, so they don't wear out for a super long time. Of course, this ties into my handknit fantasy, where I wear at least one handknit every day.

And I've wanted to knit more hats and scarves and mittens, but being in Southern California I am not very motivated. And I have the lace-weight yarn for a Whisper cardigan, but I hate knitting in lace-weight yarn, I always feel like I'm about to break the yarn, so while I've started it twice, I need more impetus to restart. Maybe soon.

But. . . I also have gigantic skeins of lace-weight yarn waiting to be made into shawls. Specifically, I have a 250 gram ball of Fleece Artist's BFL 2/8 (in Ivory), and a 150 gram skein of Hand Maiden's Sea Silk (in Midnight). Wait and see, I guess we'll wait and see.