and in with the new! I can’t believe how fast this year has gone by, and now here we are for the obligatory End of 2006 post. So much happened to me this year that I’m not sure how to condense it into something readable, but I’ll do my best to not drag it out too much.
Let’s start with the first big knitting event of 2006- the first ever Knitting Olympics. Almost every knitter I know had at least a brush with the Olympic craze, but for our little group of knitting athletes, the Knitting Olympics happened at a time when we were going through a big falling out with the former owners of the LYS where we had made our home. Drama, anger, and hurt feelings were present in abundance, but everything turned out okay (even better than okay, IMO) in the end. The experience was extremely unpleasant, but I made new knitting friends and strengthened my bonds with my original knitting friends. (And discovering new yarns stores in the bargain wasn’t such a bad deal either!)
The Olympics also served as my primary motivation to start a blog. The funny thing is, I had started a knitting blog in the summer of 2005, but I stopped because I was too embarassed to admit to my other knitting friends that I had a blog! Isn’t that nuts? I obviously knew that they were knitters, but I guess I didn’t know that they were KNITTERS, if you know what I mean. Fortunately, Liz started us on a group blog for the Olympics, and as soon as I realized that at least one person wasn’t going to laugh me out of the knitting group for my blogging tendencies, I was ready to start my blog anew. I’m so glad I did!
In March I got tired of being fat. Ordinarily this wouldn’t be such a big deal, since I’ve been getting tired of being fat for about the last decade or so, but this time I actually decided I was going to do something about it. I joined Weight Watchers online on March 26th, and according my final weigh in for the year, I’ve lost 45 pounds since then. I’m a little disappointed with that number, because I know if I would have stayed focused on my diet every week after March I could easily have lost double that, but still, 45 pounds is nothing to sneeze at!
Most my feelings about the weight loss can still be summed up by the post I made back in August when I found out that I’d met my initial goal of losing 10% of my starting body weight. Today, I would add that even though I haven’t followed the plan perfectly every week since I set out, there is absolutely no way I could turn back now! Seeing numbers on the scale go down instead of up is fun! Fitting into pants that I never dreamed of fitting into again is fun! Getting complimented by people who haven’t seen me since high school is fun! Fun is not something I would have associated with a diet before, but like everything else, losing weight is what you make it.
I know I’ve only said it about a zillion times, but thanks so much to my knitting friends for their support. I wouldn’t have made it half this far without you. Thank you, thank you, thank you!
I met the Yarn Harlot in April, took a vacation to the home of Bob’s family in May, and faced up to the ridiculous amount of UFO’s I have flying around the apartment in July.
Also in July, Bob and I added Fat Louie to our family. I hate to admit it, but our main reason for adopting Louie was so that our first cat, Jet, could have a friend. Little did we know that Louie would immediately snuggle his way into our hearts, and now it’s hard to imagine life without him. The hardest thing we had to deal with this year was Louie’s serious health emergency in September, but luckily Louie pulled through like a trooper.
In November, I started rotating my knitting projects to help me get more done, and I think it’s really helped. Sadly, rotation came too late to really help me kick my Finished Object Ration into gear for 2006, but I have high hopes for next year. I think I might have finished for except for the misery of Christmas knitting, which I am officially renouncing. For my close friends and family, I will probably still try to knit birthday presents, but knitting for Christmas wasn’t much fun, and more than anything I think knitting should be fun. We’ll see if I can actually stick to my resolution when the next holiday season rolls around.
Which brings me to resolutions!
I’m not usually a huge fan of New Year’s Resolutions. They’re pretty much a joke, and most people make them fully realizing that they’ll probably fail. I’m not saying that I’ll for sure accomplish everything I set out to do in 2007, but if I say I’m going to do it I’m at least going to give it a helluva try! So finally, I give you my 2007 New Year’s Resolutions:
- I am going to make my diet a priority and lose weight every week. It seems risky to throw out a number, but I’m going to fly in the face of danger and say it: I want to lose 100 pounds. For a person of my size, that’s a very reasonable number, just a couple pounds every week. I know that if I set my mind to it, I can do it!
- I am going to work on being a better partner to Bob, a better daughter to my mother, a better caretaker for Jet and Louie, and a better friend to everyone I care about.
- I am going to knit more, finish more, and blog more! I waste a lot of precious time doing things I don’t really care about. Obviously some things (like work) I have to do, but I’m sure I can find unused time floating around in my day that could be used to the improvement of my knitting life. Time to cast on (and off) with a vengeance!
In closing, I want to wish you all the best year of your lives. 2006 has been a good year for me, due in no small part to having a great group of knitters and friends around me. May all of your skeins be free of knots and all of your stashes free of moths!
Happy New Year!!!
Knit on My Cat 