Ravelympics 2010

Behold my finished Clapotis #2!

Started in April 2008, my second Clapotis had been marinating in my UFO basket for several months when I decided to compete in the 2010 Ravelympics. My event...WIPs Dancing. To qualify for this event, my project must have been previously started and not worked on since at least January 12, 2010. My clap qualified without any problems. I registered, entered my project in the proper event thread, updated my project page and started training. In my case, training meant I needed to locate my pattern, locate the other skeins, wind the unwound skein, and figure out where in the knitting I had left off. I finished my training by 4pm pacific standard time 2/12/2010. The opening ceremonies for Ravelympics started at 6pm pacific standard time. I was doing well! I uploaded the picture of my project as it was before the competition. I had some time to wonder if I would finish my project by the closing ceremonies. I hoped that I had not bitten off more than I could chew. I showed up for the Parade of Nations. Because of my doubts, I started knitting right at 6pm. Within an hour or so, I had finished the working skein and was ready to attach the second skein. The next day, I had finished the second working skein and was ready to attach the final skein. I couldn't believe how fast I was going through this project after it had been sitting around for about a year! I finished knitting my Clapotis before I went to bed on Valentine's Day. As soon as I was up on Monday, I wove in my ends and dropped my Clapotis in Soak. I set up my blocking boards and set about blocking my shawl and taking pictures to post in the finish line. I FINISHED MY CLAPOTIS! and here is my reward:

Managing WIP's the Geek Way

I haven't been doing a lot of knitting lately. Mostly because I'm not always excited about knitting my WIP's and I don't want to end up as in times past with 22 WIP's at once. Mycki-2009 was all about finishing what I start. I'm down to eight projects on the needles now. That number feels a lot more manageable. Yet I'm not always in the mood to knit the same type of thing and if all eight of the projects are lace shawls, I have no variety! What to do?

Mycki-2010 is all about organization. I'm making great strides in organizing my home and everything in it. I decided that I should organize my WIP's. My knitting group may laugh and tease me mercilessly, but here is what I came up with:

I can have up to ten projects on the needles at any time. However, each project must fall into one of ten categories I have pre-determined. While one project may fit multiple categories, only one project is allowed per category. For instance, a sock may fall into the "sock" category or the "gift" category, but I can't have two projects in the "sock" category even if I leave the "gift" category empty. That defeats the purpose of having categories. I have figured out that I like to knit for others. But if all I'm knitting are gifts, I don't feel charitible, I feel cheated. The same goes for lace. I like it, but if that is all I'm doing, I don't have any social knitting or quick projects. I want to have a variety of projects going at all times so I always have something I want to knit. With that in mind, I tried to come up with general categories that would essentially give me variety in complexity, yarn weight, and finished projects.

Here are the categories I came up with:

-Garment (can be a sweater, vest, skirt, shawl, etc.)
-Accessory (can be a scarf, purse, wrist warmers, hat, sock, cup sleeve, teapot cosy, etc.)
-Shawl (can be triangle, circle, rectangle, capelet, poncho, etc.)
-Sock (can be any length, any construction)
-Lace (can be a garment, sock, shawl, tablecloth, etc.)
-Garter/Stockinette (no fuss projects: blanket, potholder, simple sweater, vanilla sock, etc.)
-Worsted/Chunky (can be anything using thicker yarn, a blanket, a sweater, a scarf, etc.)
-KAL (can be anything that is part of an organized Knit A-Long: sock, sweater, bag, etc.)
-Gift (can be anything as long as it is for someone else)
-Stash Buster (can be anything that uses left over yarn or single skeins from my stash only)

As I mentioned earlier, I only have eight projects on the needles now. I've put each one into a category listed above.

-Garment: Habu Giselle Sweater
-Accessory: Clapotis
-Shawl: Charlotte's Web
-Sock:
-Lace: Rona Lace Shawl
-Garter/Stockinette: Moderne Baby Blanket
-Worsted/Chunky:
-KAL: McGuiness Branch Socks
-Gift: Kaylie's Socks
-Stash Buster: Pinwheel Blanket

I now have variety to knit and I have leeway to start two new projects if I want! So what if I want to start a lace-weight neck warmer for my mom? Right now my open categories are "sock" and "worsted/chunky". I could wait until I've finished the project in the accessory category or (depending on how badly I want to start it now) use creative thinking. It could fit into the following categories: lace, gift, accessory, possibly stash buster. Can any of the projects I have in those categories be moved to one of my open categories? Kaylie's sock can be moved to the open "sock" category and I can fit the neckwarmer into the "gift" category. Yet strangely enough, I don't feel compelled to start any new projects right now in spite of the 'empty' categories. I'm perfectly happy to knit one of my current WIP's.