Progress and other musings

Life, and posting, would be so much easier if only I had internet access at home. But I don't, and we are entering the season when cafes which provide internet are closing earlier so I don't have enough time to bang one of these puppies out. The tribulations of modern life. O spite! O hell!

Enough whining. I am almost done with the first of the two scarves I'm making for Tim and Mike. I ended the first skein on Mike's scarf the other day, and added the second yesterday morning. I reckon it will be about five feet long when done. I am also going much slower than I had projected.

I wonder about my inability to accurately reckon how long something will take me, or how much time in a given week I'll have to knit. I also don't figure on fatigue from sitting in a tailor position for a long time, which is usually how I sit on my bed at home where I do most of my knitting.

Trying to get a handle on this, I realised that the first half of the scarf was 30 inches long. So if the second skein will produce the same length, then I have to knit 10 inches each day to finish with a five foot scarf. I was able to knit the requisite 10 inches yesterday, and this morning before leaving for work, I was able to knit 30 rows, which is about five inches. So, another 30 rows before bed, and I'll be on track for this project today. If I can knit up another 60 rows tomorrow, I'll have it done, and can embark on the next project, which is the mate to this scarf, only in purple.

I am pretty sure I can get everything done before it's all supposed to be done. I am calm, I am collected, I am cucumberesque. No, really. Because I still have almost two months before Christmas, and three of the cowls don't need to be done until mid-January. And I'm confident. I am. Really.

I just wish I were independently wealthy so I could devote more time to knitting.

I am determined that next year I'm not going to do this to myself, and that I am actually going to knit some things for myself. I want to make a few sweaters, and actually use the yarn in my stash to do it (though I saw some awesome blue tweed yarn from Scotland that looks like it would make an awesome sweater). I also want to knit myself a traditional Aran sweater, in that creamy Irish yarn that is redolent with lanolin.

Next year will be the year of selfish knitting.