A blog post! It’s a Leap Day miracle!

Would you believe that one of my New Year’s Resolutions was to blog more often? Heh.

So what’s been happening the past several months? My Flower Market Shawl pattern is now available on Ravelry, Patternfish and Craftsy and has been a great success! I am thrilled with the feedback I’ve gotten on it. I even got an email from Patternfish congratulating me on its success and telling me to “DESIGN MORE!” OK, OK, OK! I’m workin’ on it!

Of course, I’ve been knitting and crocheting (and not finishing) about a gazillion projects. Well, I did finish one sweater but I haven’t a) sewn it together or b) found buttons for it. Maybe I’m a “process knitter.” Someone who enjoys the actual knitting and not the actual finishing. Ahem…

Three of my current (constant) works in progress are:

The popular Aidez cardigan! I was watching everyone (and their brother) knitting this sweater and I had to get in on the fun. I’m a sucker for anything with cables. I have a cabled cardigan that I bought at Target years ago that I wear all the time and people always ask me if I made it and I sheepishly (ha!) answer “no.” So I wanted to find a pattern that had that “comfy cabled cardi” feel to it so I could retire the store-bought sweater and proudly answer “YES!” to that question. Aidez fit the bill perfectly. I am just two sleeves away from finishing it! Just in time for warm weather! My timing is truly impeccable.

My second go-to project (and the one that serves as my small, portable project) is Marigold Socks. Some of you may recognize this stripey goodness from a Chevron Scarf I was making for myself. Well, my heart was definitely not in it and it never seemed to get any longer! The Scarf That Never Grows became a big joke in my knitting group so I rrrrrripped it out and decided on a fun stripey pair of socks instead! I do not consider myself a sock knitter but I do have a pair of Pomatomus socks that I made years ago. I wore them a few weeks ago and was reminded of how incredibly comfortable handknit socks are. They’re like a hug for your feet! So I may become a sock knitter after all!

The Ruffle Rose Pillow is one of my current crochet projects. I never thought I needed a ruffly crocheted pillow until Allyson over at The Sweatshop of Love convinced me that indeed I do. My bed needs one (or more?) of these! This is my current “mindless” project that I usually pull out at knit night when gossiping intellectual conversation starts to take up most of my attention.

Another project I’ve been working on is ME! I’ve been trying to get into running for years. I would start running, injure myself, stop running, rinse, repeat. Since 2012 is my 35th year on this planet I decided THIS IS THE YEAR I BECOME A RUNNER. So I put my money where my mouth is and hired a running coach. He has me running three days a week and cross training three days a week. So I’m now doing an hour of some form of exercise six days a week. Sometimes I feel like exercising is all I do. Whew! It is exhausting but so rewarding! If any of you are on dailymile please add me as a friend! Lord knows I could use all the encouragement I can get.

This post is becoming super-sized so I’m going to end it here. I do have more things to share but I’ll save them for another post! I promise I’m going to start blogging more! Instead of a New Year’s Resolution, I’ll call it a Leap Year’s Resolution! Yeah!