A Most Productive Month!

It is very, very likely that I will finish my Abalone today! It is not yet 6.00, and I only have 1.5 button bands and the finishing left! I am about halfway through P&P (I had a great craving for it, even though I had just watched it two weeks ago), which should give me plenty of time to finish. This will mean that I will have finished both sleeves and the finishing in two weeks. I am mightily impressed with myself!

Penny being helpful this morning

I'm also moving along on my FLS- it is quite likely that that will be finished by the end of the month as well. In that case, in February I will have knit:

• a hat for Kyle
• a shawl sample out of Yowza (a full 560 yard skein)
• at least 1/3 of a stranded sweater
• a February Lady Sweater

I have decided that March will be the month of gift knitting-- more particularly, knitting (and finishing) gifts for family and friends that have no particular deadline (with the exception of the two birthday gifts...) Hopefully it will be as productive as February!

I will also cast on my next Starmore, of course. It will be St. Aula, as I think I could do with a super-cosy stranded sweater. I plan to make it a zippered cardigan, perhaps with some shaping and pockets, since my current favorite bulky sweater is the St. Peter's Port hoodie (well, the one without the hood. I don't wear the one with the hood nearly as much, as hoods get uncomfortable while driving unless placed very carefully.) I have been pondering the pocket possibilities while working on the checked garter bands of my Abalone.

Kitty Blankets

Photos of kitties on blankets:

Photos of kitties as blankets:

(My arms are not long enough to take it all in at once, so there are two photos. But when it is cold, and I sit long-wise on the sofa, they sometimes do this. It is nice, but makes it difficult to knit.)

I may well finish the first sleeve of my Abalone today (shown here before I cut the first steek). This means I may actually finish it in February, as was my goal!!

I'm also hoping to finish the February Lady Sweater I started this week- I'm maybe 1/4 of the way down the body at present, but it's knit on large needles (size 8!), so it's going quickly. I think February is an excellent month to knit an FLS, don't you? 

Then I realized that if I'm going to keep up with my goal of being on time with all gifts this year, I'll have to get going on Marie and Daddy's birthday gifts. I have a scarf started for Marie (actually 2), but one is such amazing mindless knitting and would be so boring to push and get done, that I think I'm going to keep it for when I am brain-dead. The other may be finished in time, but most likely not. 

But then I bethought me of the Lopi from Iceland, and the robot mittens! Clearly, I should start a new project, lined mittens, instead of finishing a wip.

For Daddy,  I have a pair or two of socks in progress. The pair I plan to finish needs to be completely frogged, since I've changed my mind about the cuff, but I think that I can finish in time, especially if one interprets "in time" loosely, as "in time for the next time I see them" rather than "in time for their birthdays." This gives me an extra two weeks- plenty of time!

My other knitting goals for the year are to buy much less yarn (none bought so far this year!! Yarn given to me does not count. But I'm still working through some stash, so that's good!), to finish as many wips as I can, if not all of them that I went into the year with, and to finish some large projects for me. The year is going quite well so far!

Back to my knitting- I've got to rescue the sweater before Gino settles down on it!