Goals for 2014

Happy New Year! :D Time to put our shiny new calendars on the wall and pretend we can plan our lives and that we're all going to turn over a new leaf and eat less/exercise more/keep our houses clean/fix whatever bad habits we ignore or regret the rest of the year.

Actually, my sarcasm about whether or not we can change our habits or plan our lives is kind of pointed for me right now. There's so much uncertainty in my life right now, for all kinds of reasons but especially because of my health, that making any kind of more specific plan for 2014 about anything past "survive" feels like tempting fate -- or maybe just setting myself up for disappointment. However, I'm going to choose to be optimistic and decide that no matter what else happens, I am going to be sewing and blogging in 2014. So, here are some thoughts about my sewing goals for the year:

I think, like last year, my over-arching goal is really just to enjoy my sewing in 2014, to see some kind of improvement in my skills and to challenge myself to try new and more complicated things over the course of the year.

I have two really firm goals, which are both numbers goals:

• I've set myself a budget again for all my crafty endeavours. Let's see how I can do sticking with it!
• At the end of the year, I want to have used more fabric than I've bought. I really REALLY need to do this. I've posted before about the state of my fabric stash, and that really highlighted that I both need and want to sew my stash. I like the fabric I own and I really do want the garments that fabric could turn into. And as fun as buying new fabric is, I also need less stuff, not more.

I've also got some specific challenges in mind for myself: 

• Bag sewing challenges: I'd like to really go to town with handbags for myself this year -- leather, hardware, the whole nine yards. I love making bags and I'll keep making simpler bags to sell I expect, but I have this desire to make some more complicated bags for myself. By "some" I'm of course thinking maybe two or three rather than dozens!
• Garment sewing challenges: One that I didn't manage in 2013 but which is still a major ambition of mine: I'd like to make a collared blouse. New for 2014: I'd like to get to the point where I have a simple woven dress TNT pattern (once I hit a stable weight) with a princess seamed bodice in my repertoire; I'd like to make a lined jacket and/or a lined coat; I'd really like to try to make a pair of trousers. (I have already bought Pants For Real People in preparation!)
• Knitting challenges: I'd like to finish a jumper this year, even if it's only the sad purple jumper of doom from 2013.
• Other: I'd like to make some progress on the World's Slowest Quilt, which is something I work on sporadically and then abandon out of boredom (I am so very much not a quilter). Also, I'd like to work on taking better photos for this blog. They're routinely pretty terrible, so there's loads of room for improvement. The other thing that is sort of lurking in the background is my desire to have a flexible, awesome wardrobe. I feel like I actually have a pretty good grip on what I want that wardrobe to look like now, after many months of playing around with ideas, and I'll probably continue to write a bit about putting together my co-ordinated wardrobe over the course of the year.

Does that seem like a lot? I feel like the list of challenges is really best understood as just an indication of things I'd like to try to get to, rather than some big specific output list, which is a lot of pressure. The only things I really want to be completely firm about are the money and the fabric stash bullet points, because I really have to keep both finances and stash under control. If I end up doing something completely different on the wishlist front, well, so long as I have fun I am not sure I will be all that bothered at the end of the year.