Project Fail

Well, like so many other high hopes I have, that may be unrealistic, my project for the Ravellenic Games was a failure.

Remember this yarn, that was going to be a Caeles?

I did actually cast-on and get started during the Olympic Opening Ceremonies - I had already done my swatch the day before! - and things were going along pretty swimmingly.  I got a little bit beyond this point

when I ran into the type of directions that say, "Begin to decrease for the armholes, while also shaping neckline, decreasing 4 stitches every 8th row 6 times, and at the same time, begin neck shaping by knitting the first 10 stitches for 2 rows in stockinette stitch, and every 18th stitch on every 12th row in seed stitch, while also baking a cake and paying your bills, when not doing backbends."

OK, it didn't really say that, but at the point I was reading it, things sure sounded that way!  I realized I would need time to slowly read through the directions, perhaps make notes, and be sure I could actually read said notes, before going any farther.  The problem being, that the last couple of weeks turned out to be really hectic, and particularly busy at work.  I'd come home in the evening, and the last thing I would have been able to do was concentrate on the pattern directions.

So nothing else was accomplished.  I am disappointed, but not really upset, since I know that even though I'm putting it aside for a time out right now, I will go back to it.  I like the pattern and the yarn well enough that I don't want to NOT end up with a completed project!

I also realize that in the real world, I would not even make it to the Olympic trials, so it's not that I didn't win a medal, I didn't even go to London.  And that's fine, since it was more of a personal challenge than anything else.  I am willing to keep plugging along with my knitting, even if I am not patient enough in most other activities in my life.

I want to finish three other projects that are in different states of development before I even pick it up again.  And I've started to think about holiday gifts, even though I only have one project in mind that is a sure thing, and it's a quilting project.

Congratulations to those of you who accomplished your goals!  I hope you are feeling proud of yourselves.  I know that I'm impressed, truly.

So tonight, as I watch the Closing Ceremonies, I'll be sad that the Olympics are over, since I do enjoy them, but I'll also be enjoying watching those who were there celebrate just the fact that they made it in the first place, whether or not they are toting home medals.

(I probably won't be knitting though ...)

In Which I Ask: What Was I Thinking???

If you have been a reader of the blog for even a short time, you know that I am not exactly a knitting machine, cranking out things like crazy.  Which I'm fine with, I enjoy knitting, and though there are things I wish I had/would finish(ed), I'm not really in a race with myself.

But I really do have to wonder sometimes.  Take the past two weeks, when - besides working on the Cranberry Waffle socks - I have taken on more projects.  Why?  You may well ask, as I have wondered myself.

Let's review:  I have a pair of the aforementioned Cranberry Waffle socks on the needles, and a long-time-on-the-needles project of my Mallard Sweater, and my Turquoise Narragansett, which I have vowed to finish by the end of the summer.  And there are other bits and pieces along the way.

So ... WHY in the past couple of weeks, have I felt compelled all of a sudden to start knitting:

1)  What I am calling my Lemming Shawl.  It's a KAL on Ravelry by the Loop Group.  I wasn't going to even think of trying it, and then others started posting pictures of their completed ones.  Of course, I bought the yarn and got started.  As a matter of fact, I bought two more skeins in a different color to make another one at a later date!

2)  But Oh, I wanted to make something for my new[ish] great nephew Parker, who lives in San Francisco.  His parents are not much for homemade things, but I have made something for all of my other great-nieces and -nephews, and wanted to make something for him.  I decided a toy was a good idea.  So I started the Baby Bobbi Bear:

and then, 

3)  I decided to try to do something for the Ravellenic Games (formerly the Ravelympics).  Of course, there is a "team" for those who want to finish WIPs, but did I join that one?  It didn't occur to me, as clearly I didn't think it through at all.  So, I have started Caeles:

I have until the end of the Olympics (roughly two weeks) to finish.  HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!  

Dear Diary:

What was I thinking?  Why would I do all of this - or rather, try to - all at once?  Oh diary, I fear that I have done something foolish here.  Hello, my name is Bridget, and I have a problem ...

Love, Bridget

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In other news, Pip finds that the Olympic Women's Cycling Road Race can make one quite tired.