Knitting Journals

Hello. I hope you are enjoying the after glow of Christmas. I love these days between Christmas and New Year's when the kitchen is full of leftovers and the Christmas mugs are out on the counter. Today the sky is heavy with gray clouds and the air is damp. The forecast is for precipitation of some variety and the birds are feeding like crazy - even a white breasted nuthatch. After I post this, I plan to make a cup of hot tea and thumb through several new books.

Juliann asked me to write about my knitting journal so here I am with my less than glamorous record keeping and probably more than you want to know. I am not a scrapbooker, nor do I keep a bullet journal but I do like journals and notebooks. In the 1990's and early 2000's, I kept a quilting and knitting record in a Steno notebook. As I spent less time quilting and more knitting, I began taping yarn labels into the back pages. In 2014, I created the first of three knitting journals from a half-sized notebook. I have used the same methods in all three. The current notebook has an envelope inside the front cover where I stash labels until I have time to tape them on to a page and write accompanying notes.

I divide the notebooks into two sections. Under the first tab divider, I keep track of projects. If I have it, I tape in a label and jot down needle size, pattern name, and date of the finished project. Additional details go on Ravelry. The "Notes" paper is a little heavier than generic lined filler paper. I used to buy it at Office Max in the section with papers for my work planner. I don't know if it is still available but I am about to find out as have come to the end of leftovers from my work days.

In the second section, I keep notes on a few techniques, like knitting without a cable needle, so I don't have to look them up on websites. Interestingly, the more I knit, the more techniques I memorize so I need these notes less often. This section also contains a page with measurements and/or sizes for gift recipients, for example the length of sock foot for my daughter. When these notebooks fill up and they do because yarn labels take up space, I transfer the second section into a new notebook.

I used to keep a yearly count of yardage of yarn in and out. Yardage out was a combination of yarn knitted into projects and skeins donated to a new home. Yarn in was the yarn I purchased. It was interesting to track that information and prompted me to make some changes in the way I buy yarn. Last year, I decided I didn't care about the numbers so I quit keeping that record. It took up time that I'd rather use for something else.

Last winter I added a second journal. When I ordered it, I did not realize it had lined, unlined, and graphed pages so I decided to use it for knitting. Why have one journal when you can have two? It has become a workbook for knitting without a pattern. Last summer, I used it when I knit the lace scarf by choosing stitch patterns from a stitch dictionary. I also charted a lace pattern for a shawl that I later abandoned.

In both journals, I found lists for possible projects. I knit about 50% of these ideas. This doesn't bother me in the least because knitting is one area of my life I choose not to be bound by hard and fast rules. I store both journals in the end table next to my favorite knitting spot on the loveseat where they are handy.

Thank you Juliann for prompting this trip down memory lane. What about you? If you journal about your knitting, what works for you?

On this Thursday, I link with Kat and the Unravelers because these journals keep my knitting life from unraveling.