Year End Review
We’re in the last days of 2016 and while I see a lot of people saying goodbye and good riddance, 2016 wasn’t all bad. Like any year, there was a mix of good and bad, on the whole and for me personally. I’d love to just talk about the good things that came in 2016, but that wouldn’t paint a complete picture, and some times good things come from bad. so here are my highlights from this year, the good and the bad. Feel free to tell us some of yours in the comments, or in the Kephren Knitting Studio Ravelry group.
The Augusta Cardigan was my most popular pattern published this year. Photo credit: Harper Point Photography/Interweave Knits
I had 11 new patterns published
The good: Six of the patterns were published in magazines, which is pretty awesome! Five I published myself, and the timeline from idea to published pattern is getting shorter. I’m getting faster!
The bad: My goal for this year was 16 new patterns. I had planned to do another eBook like Knitting The Beach, but it just didn’t work that way.
The Madeline shawl, photo taken September, 2014
A Thousand Rainy days, photo taken July, 2016
My photography skills improved
The good: One of my goals for 2016 was to take better photos and more of them, and I have! I signed up for Emma Davies’ A Year With My Camera email course and stuck with it for most of the year. I found myself taking better photos and having more fun doing it.
The bad: I stopped keeping up with the course when we got to the section on organizing photos, which is something I really need to do! I didn’t keep up with my 365 day self-portrait project either, and got tired of taking a selfie every day after about a month.
I’m getting better at this social media thing
The good: More of you have found me on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook, and you’re signing up for my mailing list too! Thank you! I’ve also started to set up systems so you’ll be sure to see something from me on all of these social media outlets a few times a week.
The bad: I’m an introvert, and until a little over a year ago I didn’t use social media at all, so there has been a steep learning curve. I still feel a little shy about putting myself out there, and I often feel guilty about not blogging enough, or interacting enough on social media.
A relationship ended and I moved out of the swamp
The good: It’s always painful when a relationship ends, but it wasn’t a healthy one and things were only getting worse. Now I’m back in Wisconsin with my family, I have the love and support of my friends in Wisconsin and Louisiana, and I got custody of the cat!
The bad: I miss my friends in Louisiana.
A lot more happened in 2016, but those are the highlights, and the low lights, the things I’m proud of and the things I need to improve. I’ve already started thinking about my goals for 2017, and I’ll share some of those with you in the coming weeks.
Thank you for knitting!