First I thought I would order a pattern because that way I would be able to get right down to knitting instead of messing around designing something that I would potentially abandon. I figured I would be able to finish an entire project if I found something I really liked, liked the yarn and wasn't too bored with the pattern... and could resist the urge to modify it. -Fine, I've never done it before. What's your point?

So I found St Columba.

Then before I ordered it, I started really feeling an itch to knit some fair isle.

I started thinking about Poetry in Stitches

which made me think about Norwegian knitting

which made me think about Kris and the Dale Baby Ull that she brought me back in June.

So I went through my stash looking for it.

and I came across a bunch of unfinished projects that I had completely forgotten.

I started thinking that I never finish anything.

So I went back through my blog looking for what I have started vs what I have made in the last 1.5 years.

Here's what I found: About a billion PRE-PRE-PROJECTS - Projects I want to make and stay up nights thinking about and imagining but haven't done more than that with. There are too many to even list. They are floating around in my computer and sketch books and head and always seem more exciting and potentially successful than anything I currently have going. 8 PRE-PROJECTS - swatched and/or designed but not cast on for. 3 GHOST PROJECTS - have already been knit and are just waiting for me to write them up and they haunt me and make me feel guilty to the point that I have trouble working on anything else. 12 HALF PROJECTS - half knit and not yet ripped nor finished - only 2 of which I have been working on lately. 2 EX PROJECTS - have been totally ripped but not forgotten. 18 FOs - that's more than I would have guessed and some weren't shown on the blog because they were for magazines/books.

So I didn't feel so bad about my lack of FOs, but I felt pretty bad about all of the projects that are just lingering and looking at all the yarn I have an all the unfinished projects gave me a burning desire to use some of my stash yarn.

So I figured I would start with the 6 balls (2 balls each of 3 different colors) of Dale Baby Ull I had and start something and finish it.

And I started to design something for Tadpole

but the design I liked the best only used two colors.

I realized I didn't have enough yarn.

I thought about making a vest.

I didn't want to.

I sent my mom to the yarn store to buy me enough yarn to make a sweater for Tadpole

and while she was there, I had her grab a few other balls (in the hopes that I could use them with the 6 balls I already have to make something else later).

So here I am again. Designing something that I want to knit and hopefully won't abandon and adding more yarn to the stash.

I need help.

That happens to all of us. I have a round shawl completed but I am thinking it's too small and I might want to rip and restart over (which is worse than you wanting to go back to your heel).

And I am now thinking of new projects! Help!

Stop that. You work the way you work. Stop feeling guilty about the difference between some imagined ideal of how you should be and how you freally are. It's all process, in this case. They journey is part of the destination. And I don't mean that in a cracknappy new age way, either. I just mean that you are making for yourself some kind of crazy. With a new baby, there's an impatience with what you do in the time for yourself, because that's all there is and it should be extra important. Be good to yourself. Be content. ((hug)) dude.

I love the Ghost Project designation!
I have a fair few of those myself.
I'd like a ghost writer now... so I don't actually have to write them up.....

Please, please, please cut yourself some slack for being the mother of a new baby. I never believed in "mommy brain" 'til it happened to me (3 1/2 years ago). It's a brand-new world you've entered, full of (blessed) distractions and a fatigue you never knew existed, but you'll adjust. And I'll bet it'll be worth every minute of it. Just please cut yourself some slack along the way.

Mes meilleurs sentiments...Bonne chance.

You have to ask yourself *why* you knit. If it is for the fun, enjoyment, relaxation, creativity...and you are having fun, enjoying it, relaxing, being creative (or what ever else drives you to knit) then THERE IS NOTHING TO FEEL GUILTY ABOUT regardless of how many projects remain undone.

Don't worry! I get like that too. I find it really helpful to step back and look at it from another angle. So with that thought I bet your stash doesn't look big through the wrong end of a telescope. Don't lost faith in yourself...something will click.

Just don't worry about it too much and enjoy tadpole...they grow up too stinking fast anyway. My baby is three and regularly knits alongside me with two fingers and whatever yarn is laying about. cuddle the tadpole and breathe in the babyness... and really a hat wouldn't take THAT long would it?

You don't need help, you're a mom. Ride the wave, enjoy the process (as messy and sometimes uncreative as it seems) and in what seems like a nano-second, Tadpole will be older, you'll be sleeping and you'll feel more grounded again.

Oooh - I have something in common with a fantastically talented knitwear designer:too many projects (and a little baby). The baby is 6 mo., his sister is 21 months. One thing I learned from #1 -- they grow up blazingly fast. If you're trying to pick one project at any given time, pick Tadpole. Everything else will keep (a cliche, but oh so true). I have Sunrise Circles on my "after the babies are older" list. Thank you for sharing your fabulous talents.

This all reminds me of the book we have been reading, over and over, If You Give a Mouse a Cookie!

At any moment, this line of thinking will end up with you getting a cookie! Hang in there!

Well now that's quite the thought process you've got goin on here. Don't feel bad, all us crazy knitters and bloggers go through the same thing.

You need help. ha We all do. But one thing that helps is time. And realizing (after time has passed) that things weren't really so bad, we just thought they were. My husband asked me a few days ago if there was anything I needed and I said, "Yes. More hours in the day." I stay up so late at night thinking and doing because that's the only uninterrupted time I get. It'll get easier eventually - as long as you don't have another tadpole right away!

I've already offered to be your personal pattern tester.... too bad Lee Ann can't help feed the baby too. hehe

At least you aren't alone. I think we're all a bit nuts or we wouldn't blog this stuff at all. Love your contribution to the current interweave. xox,

I love that you illustrated your thought process. Like you I have pre-projects, lots of sketches, not as many swatches as prolific you. But ah, time! I know I won't be the first to say BREATHE. But think of this project I'm pitching to you:

A Baby Fair Isle hat would accomplish four things: Fair Isle/2-color; your own pattern; for Tadpole; easily finished in 2 weeks or so.

What do you think?

That's a hellacious snow ball rolling down that hill.

You know, just do what makes you happy. New mom's don't have time or energy enough for guilt. There will be plenty of time for that latter.

You have heard all about what happens to your brains after having children right?

I used to be so focused and SO much smarter!

:)

Oh, Kate. You will NEVER follow anybody else's pattern, because - have you seen yours lately?! So don't try to and it's perfectly fine, so don't beat yourself up over it. But finishing something would be nice ;-)

I like how the arrows keep pointing down like you're sinking into the mire of your own creativity.

What I do: I make lists. I love lists. Right now my list tells me to finish the boring grey husband sweater before I am allowed to cast on for your Sunrise Circle Jacket... now I am pissed... :)
The others were right, all the stuff you had published recently and I imagine there's much more we haven't seen yet, you DO finish a lot of stuff!

*insert an arrow*
by the time you figure out what you want to do, the little bundle of yumminess wakes up and needs to be fed/held/changed/entertained.*insert another arrow*it's just mommy brain, i swear. it WILL get easier, your head WILL de-fog and you will again be capable of multitasking while simultaneously focussing on an enjoyable project. it's in our DNA, you know.p.s. just got "shining star" from kpixie a week ago and have already knit up 2 for my twins and 1 for our neighbor's new baby girl (using swtc karaoke - divinely soft). you are such the brilliant pattern writer, kate. and the way you color coded the sizing is perfection - thanks!

*insert an arrow*
by the time you figure out what you want to do, the little bundle of yumminess wakes up and needs to be fed/held/changed/entertained.*insert another arrow*it's just mommy brain, i swear. it WILL get easier, your head WILL de-fog and you will again be capable of multitasking while simultaneously focussing on an enjoyable project. it's in our DNA, you know.p.s. just got "shining star" from kpixie a week ago and have already knit up 2 for my twins and 1 for our neighbor's new baby girl (using swtc karaoke - divinely soft). you are such the brilliant pattern writer, kate. and the way you color coded the sizing is perfection - thanks!

I don't suppose it comforts you any if I tell you all this sounds totally normal...

I have a massive cold--if I were feeling better I'd come over there and hold kid while you write something down or knit something or, you know, consider the benefits of oxygen. Hang in, baby...it changes. Trust me. :-)

Breathe. No, big deep breathes.

Very good. Now then. It's ok. Some of us are NOT designers and have a bazillion projects we never finish or get past the idea stages, that happens when your time on the needles is unable keep up with ideas in your head. You are very busy with tadpole right now, and that's as it should be so it's ok.

I would, at some point, write down the patterns that are making me feel guilty. Your knitting is for making you feel better not worse.

:)

But don't forget about the 3 freaking beautiful sweaters published in IK this year. That's 3 more completed/original projects than most of us. From where I'm sitting you are a very prolific and talented designer! You're being so hard on yourself. Someday you won't be sleep deprived anymore and maybe it will get easier to focus?