As in previous years, I chose Fiber goals for 2022. There were 4 things:

1. Rainbows
2. Advents Past
3. Where we’re going we don’t need patterns (i.e. making my own designs and intentionally not planning to publish them)
4. Finish the sabbatical quilt.

I’d actually finished most of these at my mid-year check-in point, and I’d even made headway on some of my non-goal ideas for 2022 too.So let’s talk about what happened since July!

Goal 1: Rainbows

This has been my favourite goal. I’ve knit so many things! And they’re great for a dopamine hit because they draw both social media likes and in-person compliments. But even if they didn’t, I just really enjoy buying and knitting rainbows, and I love wearing them, so I think this one is going to be a forever goal now. Some finished-post-July projects:

The Rainbow Sweater (Pattern: Playdate from Tin Can Knits, Yarn from PassionKnits yarns)

The Queer Enough Shawl (design by me! Yarn from Knitted Wit)

The Spring Rainbow Shawl (design by me! Yarn from Chemknits)

The Family Dye Day Shawl (design by me! Not written up yet. Yarn from Knit Picks but dyed by the whole family.)

I also did some rainbowy tie dye with my kid, and started a lightly rainbowy quilt.

And I’m currently working on the Rainbow of Emotions kit which is obviously pretty rainbow-y, a rainbow sock to knit in my “spare” December time (between all the countdown calendars), and i cast on a rainbow pair of mitts (because I could use some longer fingerless mitts for winter dog walks.)

Goal 2: Advents Past

I “finished” the Little Box of Crochet advent from 2018! I say “finished” because I did skip two more religious ornaments (an angel and a baby Jesus) because I just wasn’t feeling it. I’ll probably do them later since I have the yarn, and I’ve got ample supplies to duplicate the ones I like. But I *feel* done so I’m counting it. Saving the book to pull out a few times later vs not having crocheted the ones I wanted feels very different.

I also finished the tree sampler from Dropcloth Samplers that I’d been working on for quite some time. Not an advent but the result was holiday ornaments so it feels like it’s in the same category!

That leaves me with one advent from years past that I haven’t done (mostly because I didn’t love the pattern), and one 10-day countdown that I have a plan for but haven’t cast on. Not bad! Well, plus all the ones I’m doing now, but I’m keeping up with those so far! I’ve also got two that are “yarn collecting” ones and I’ll decide what to do with them after I see the whole countdown.

Goal 3: Where we’re going we don’t need patterns

This has been a huge success in that I’ve played with a lot more of my own designs. The three rainbow ones again:

• Queer Enough Shawl
• Spring Rainbow Shawl
• Family Dye Day Shawl (not written up yet)

Plus the Steven the Bat socks.

I’ve found that if I don’t try to focus on designs that I can explain to others or where everything has to fit in a single chart and line up the repeats, I can be differently creative. Amusingly, this goal has resulted in me actually writing more partial patterns as you can see from the links. I feel like the notes are mostly written for my own use and if someone else finds them handy then good but I don’t stress over it. And I always have the option of writing up in detail later if I want to. This one is probably also going to be a goal I take with me forever now.

That said, my friend M really did knit the Queer Enough Shawl so that one at least can be knit (though she did have some fixes I need to add to the post).

Goal 4: Finish the Sabbatical Quilt

I did it!

This felt huge because I had a lot of Feelings around it — I felt shoved into taking the sabbatical and going part time at work, I was completely wiped out for most of the 7 weeks due to the first and second covid vaccines so I didn’t actually have enough time to finish it, and maybe I needed a more structured existing pattern for my first big quilt to take some of the mental load off. But the quilt is lovely, it’s on my kid’s bed and gets used every day, not only to sleep, but also he loves the little houses on the back so sometimes we make up stories about them during bedtime or spread it out and have his toys racing from house to house delivering packages.

I took a decent break after finishing, but I did start a new quilt learning from my experience with the first one: more pre-cut fabric (since I hate cutting), used an actual pattern (so I didn’t have to calculate stuff) and it’s smaller (so hopefully the actual machine quilting will be better). It’s going well, and I’m enjoying taking it slow and learning. It’s nice to have transferred this from the “hobby I have some regrets about” to “hobby I actualy enjoy on occasion.” And I’m *loving* the experience of looking at fabrics in a new way. So this goal was a success beyond where I thought it would be!

The “other” ideas

As in previous years, I fill my fiber goals brainstorming sheet with ideas all year, then just promote the chosen 4 to the top but leave the other ideas hanging around so I can read them and be inspired even if I wasn’t really ready to commit to putting them on the must-do list. So here’s some others that I did progress on:

Squishing the Stash — on top of destashing some acrylic, I’ve also been re-organizing my office. I used to have all my yarns sticking out where I can touch them, but after a few incidents with carpet beetles I had swapped them to smaller plastic boxes to reduce exposure to bugs. Unfortunately, the boxes with lids that fit in my shelves used up a fair amount of space leaving my stash in a bunch of large bins that didn’t fit on the shelf. So this year I picked up some more drawer-style things and a lot more plastic bags and I think I’ve found a reasonable solution. I still have a few bins for the bigger yarns, but I’m slowly getting things organized. I’d guess it’s around 80% there?

I haven’t resorted to vacuum sealing… yet!

More Kits – Both the advents and the rainbows helped me use things that I think of as kits, and in this second half of the year I also made a Tiny Giraffe kit from Barrett Wool Co. and made that, which was a total delight.

I also did a tiny Laura Nelkin cuff kit, which was fun! I’ll have to keep an eye out for new kits from her. They’re tiny and interesting to make.

Spinning – I did tour de fleece and tried to low-key join a spin-along immediately after, but got stalled out because I needed a physical break. But I did get all my handspun into a nice bin where I can see it and I have plans! I feel like I spun as much as I really wanted to and that’s fine, but I also want to plan so I spin a bit more year round so I don’t overdo it all during the Tour. Something to think about!

Embroidery – I continued to embroider (see: the tree sampler and the constellation sampler) but no pushing on big goals here. And that’s ok, that’s why they didn’t make the top 4! Embroidery continues to fill the niche of “I need a break from my knitting” and I think that’s about what I want out of it so we’re good.

The Act of Sewing – I made 1 shirt (it’s not great) and 4 skirts (I love them so much) but no pants yet! Expect at least one more skirt in the spring. I also have fabric and a pattern for a shirt that I think will suit me better; we’ll see.

Other Crafts – I made a tiny weaving!

And I did make the Giraffe toy and some gnomes, including a giant one that has been a source of much delight and a few owies.

Overall

I am so delighted with how these goals (and bonus ideas) worked out for me.

I’m pretty happy with how I divided my time between crafts: mostly knitting (since I can multitask) with embroidery and sewing thrown in when I need to use different muscles. Then a little bit of crochet and spinning when I have something I want to do, like (Tour de Fleece or the Little Box of Crochet advent). My only concern is that I need to spread out my spinning time a bit more so I don’t overdo it in the summer.

I’ll post my goals for 2023 on January 1!