In Which the Pirate Tallies.

End of year tallying-up post!

Incoming fibre in 2010:
3572 grams / 7.8 pounds – some handpainted top, some natural roving. Nearly four pounds of wool and one pound of alpaca were unexpected gifts to me! And I won a lovely 4 ounces of combed top in the Tour de Fleece, pictured here. It’s the brightest fibre I think I’ve ever owned.

Outgoing fibre in 2010:
Spun 450 grams / almost one pound. Participating in the Tour de Fleece sure helped with that number, but I’m hoping and planning to spin even more next year. Knitting with handspun yarn is a wonderful thing, and therefore I must make more yarn so that I can knit with it. This three-ply Corriedale would make great thick armwarmers, and I have some foresty green and gold merino/silk that would be wonderful as gloves or socks, and some bluesy-green Falkland that would be perfect as a hat.

Incoming yarn in 2010:
28 skeins in, which seems high, except eleven of them are small skeins for the twins’ sweaters.

Outgoing yarn in 2010:
19 skeins out, if I include the almost-done projects in my count. That might be cheating a bit. Twelve, if I only count 100% finished projects.

Here are the things I knit this year! Five pairs of socks, three of which were gifts. One pair was made from my very own handspun yarn. Two baby hats and a pair of baby booties, and an adult-size hat. Three more projects – Michael’s Fleeps, a hat and a secret baby gift – are very close to completion. Wow, I only finished two things for myself this year? Crazy.

Favourite project:
If I have to pick a finished project, Pirate-Husband’s Paraphernalia socks were the most fun to work on. Keeping them secret was part of the fun, and so was modifying the pattern to fit his feet.

If it’s not cheating too much to pick a project that’s not 100% completed, I’m going to say the Winterlude Hat(tm). It’s knit from two-ply Jacob yarn I spun myself, it was a fun challenge to do the colourwork and get it even, I learned how to do a crocheted edging, and it’s going to be the warmest hat ever after I line it with polar fleece.

Least Favourite project:
If I have to pick a project that I finished, I think it would be the Gnome Hat and Booties. Not because there was anything wrong with the pattern, but because the yarn was no fun to work with.

Since I liked everything I finished this year, I’m going to go back to an unfinished project and say the Kureyon socks. I love how they look, but knitting with the Kureyon sock yarn is no fun for me at all. Perhaps I will buckle down in 2011 and get them done, already, and never buy this yarn again. Some people really like it, so I’ll leave it to them.

Patterns Published:
Two! First the Sibling Socks, a fine-gauge sock that grew from the need for a suitable pattern to use with Trekking XXL at 45 stitches per four inches. Then, in a more sensible gauge, the similar Cakewalk Socks.

I’d like to release at least one new pattern in 2011, and maybe even two of them! I’ve got plans in mind, it really will just come down to having enough time to sit down and work on them.