Unfinished Business

One would expect, that given the untold hours available at home at the moment, that much would be getting done. Not so. A little bit here, a little bit there, some surfing on the internet to vicariously live through others' knitting and writing, a tiny bit of application to paperwork or phone calls that need to be taken care of. Puritan ethics fighting against general lethargy.

For some reason, it's making me feel better today to chronicle all the unfinished projects in the house. Here, then, they are:

1. The "In the Sculpture Garden" bag from a wonderful Noni pattern. Handles attached by the shoemaker (he devised narrow leather straps to feed through the end of the acrylic handles and then sewed the straps tightly to the felted base). Many, many flowers made. A pile, a garden of flowers, yet this perfectionist hasn't found just the Right One. Move on, right?

2. What I've named the Odds and Ends Swallowtail Shawl. Evelyn Clark's pattern, on size 8 needles, with leftovers of Blue Sky Alpaca (sport or worsted weight?) from my stash. I love these colors and have been thinking, for a while, of combining them in a shawl. My favorite part: the blue stitch markers against the fuchsia yarn, with the acid green in the background. Coming along. If I can sneak over to the knitting store today for another skein of pink, I'm on my way towards done. Hmm, maybe driving isn't such a good idea two weeks out of surgery? Ah, heck, it's for the knitting, right?


3. Bianca's Jacket. I'd claim the pictures are not to scale, but I was taught never to lie. The back, smaller than the two fronts. The sleeve, so so much bigger. Will this sweater work? This time, I'm bravely following directions and letting the chips fall where they may. I do like sleeves long enough to tuck your cold fingers up into, so there may be some promise here. And a good, mindless pattern, just right for someone fresh into the world again.

4. Another Swallowtail Shawl, this one out of a Noro yarn that I fell in love with. Very early stages, probably might be happier on a larger needle, and there definitely isn't enough of this wildly expensive stuff to finish the shawl. Creative options? Nah, Sugar 'n Creme, no matter how great the Mason-Dixon gals can make it look, just won't work with Noro. This one is on hiatus for now. And Blogger seems to have reached its tolerance for pictures, cause I just can't manage to download any of my portraits of the shawl in earliest stages. look back here for an idea.

5. The Cabled Bolero. Mucho largo. Pienso que necesitamos un sewing machine para completar? (And that's how far I am from connection to this project, that it brought bad Spanish skills back from high school). Wanna finish, just not sure how to.

What I need is a challenge. . .something to bring out that competitive nature. Anyone, game on for setting a goal of finishing half-finished projects by the end of March? Prize could be a skein of something beautiful or perhaps a book? We need at least three competitors to make it happen, no pressure if you don't feel like playing.