Happy New Year's Eve!

Wishing my blogging friends, visitors, friends and family near and far a Happy New Year.
Thank you for stopping by throughout the year. I really appreciate every comment and all of your kind , supportive words : )

I decided to write a longer post~some of the technicalities-scanning photos etc...didn't work out. So I will put half of the post today and hopefully the other half tomorrow...

1st 1/2:
Do you make new year's resolutions?
In my previous post, I mentioned one of my creative resolutions...I don't really make 'official' resolutions. I try and contemplate things I'd like to do, more, better, quit. Perhaps call it a 'goals' list.
I find I feel more motivated, get more accomplished and am less stressed, if I have specific goals written down on a list I can scratch off as I go. A visual. A sense of getting something accomplished-finished. When, if you're a (work at home) mom~ the never ending piles of laundry and stacks of dishes, meal cooking, fill in the blanks_______, ________make me, at least, feel that I'm just spinning my wheels in never ending, never finished chores.

So...in no particular order...here are some of my, mostly creative related goals for 2010:

Goal #1 is to improve my blog/shop/business. More specifically marketing, taking better photos, adding more things, more often to my shop. Doing some shows-I really miss those. I haven't done one in 2 years :(
I also want to write tutorials, submit things for publication and more.

Goal #2 is to finish my workspace-we have a guy coming Sunday to give us an estimate (!) yippee!!

Goal #3 ~Improve/advance my sewing skills- try out more complicated things. I am mostly self taught -and have never really been that great at making clothes, unless it was something really simple. For Christmas I received this book and this book-I know they're kind of advanced, but I am determined... I can't wait to make my own things....

Goal #4~ Improve/advance my knitting skills...I have never made a sweater(!) I bought needles and yarn yesterday to start this project. O.k, it's not really a sweater..but I think I should start with a project that has no sleeves. And I think it's cute.
I did make this, this month. From this book:

It turned out smaller than I had hoped because I used smaller needles.Thankfully I know someone who can wear it ; )

I'm pretty impressed with myself. I even noticed a mistake(??) in the book, that I tried over and over to get right. I didn't give up. I emailed the author and she kindly gave me the correction/explained what I was doing wrong.
I also want to start adding my projects to to my ravelry page~photos of things I'm making. I have ideas for patterns I'd like to try and write out ~stay tuned for that : )

Hopefully I can iron out the technical difficulties and post the rest tomorrow. Meanwhile have a Happy, healthy , safe New Year's Eve :)