Bitty Bits of Blather - The 2016 in Review Edition

I felt this overwhelming urge to do some bitty bits of blather. I have missed our time together going over the minutiae of my life in tiny bite sized pieces.

Let's do this more often shall we?

1.
I think I posted around 500+ times on Instagram this year. Not bad. 

Or really bad depending on how you look at it. Unlike the Kardashians, none of my photos came with pouty trout mouth and I was fully clothed the entire time. You can thank me later.

Here are some of my favorites

2.
I watched approximately 125+ movies/documentaries. It is an approximate number because, even though I am anally retentively obsessed fairly careful about keeping a list of the movies I have watched, I do occasionally forget. That list also includes several TV shows that I might have binge watched, including The Great British Baking show.

Can I just digress for a minute to say that without Mary Berry, Mel Giedroyc and Sue Perkins, the show is now dead to me. I will just have to live on re-watching the first 7 seasons. 

3.
I managed to read 71 books this year. That is a grand total of 22,635 pages. And I can tell you that because of the fabulous "AutoSum" feature in Excel.

Thank you Microsoft.

My favorite books of the year were:
On Living by Kerry Egan
Seeking Allah, Finding Jesus by Nabeel Qureshi
The Crime of the Century by Dennis Breo
Nine Princes in Amber by Roger Zelazny
Junk by Alison Stewart
The City of Mirrors by Justin Cronin
Girls & Sex by Peggy Orenstein
Valiant Ambition by Nathaniel Philbrick    

4.
2016 was again The Year of the Wedding. I coordinated/attended/attended & coordinated 11 weddings. There was everything from the bride who wore a sparkly pink dress, had no attendants and could not speak English to the wedding with 10 bridesmaids. Yowza. Here are my favorite pictures from those days.

5.
There was some knitting that happened. That cannot be a surprise to you. I knit a total of 15 pairs of socks. The evidence is below, although this is not all 15 pairs.

This picture is short at least two pair of socks because those went to Mimi. She always appreciates them and knows how to take care of them. 

As in years past I have already taken out 12 skeins of yarn from THE STASH, put them through the ball winder, put them in brown paper lunch bags, stapled the tops shut and labeled them with the months of the year. The January 2017 Mystery sock is sitting with my sock knitting bag just waiting to be cast on tomorrow! Below are the yarns that will become socks in 2017. That is not to say that these are the ONLY skeins that will become socks. It is just that these are the planned skeins.

There was other knitting going on as well. Three baby blankets, several cowls, a number of hats, at least one lace project as well as ongoing work on the Never Ending Sock Yarn Blanket and a couple of other things.

Speaking of knitting, as we are, today I will also evaluate the current "WIPS" (works in progress for the non-knitters) sitting in my UFO (unfinished objects) pile and make the decision as to what projects will actually continue into the new year. I always swore that I would be a momonogamous knitter, only working on one project at a time.

I am obviously a big fat liar.

There are projects that you start with great intentions and enthusiasm and then you just lose interest.  It is better to just frog and put the yarn back in the stash for another day. I know that there is at least one knitted vest in there that is half finished and will never be finished because I don't like the yarn with the project.

Life is too short to knit something that doesn't bring you joy.
 
6. 
The rest of today will be used with cleaning out and cleaning up in preparation for 2017. I am cleaning out all of the articles I had stashed in Pocket because I don't use that any longer and I am trying very hard to just delete things that I don't use on a regular basis. I have found that the digital age just makes it easier for some of us with hoarding tendencies to hoard but not take up any space that anyone else can see.

Yarn stash is never to be counted as a hoard. No need to look over there.

I will be looking through ALL of the iPhone photos that I have taken over the course of 2016 an eliminating all that don't really need to be kept. That would currently be 1149 photos that I have to go through.

There is a bunch of stuff to scan. There is planning to be done.

So many things to do before the Ohio State - Clemson game comes on tonight and I start stuffing my face with shrimp and beer.  

7. 
OK all, lets go out there and have a happy and safe New Years Eve.

Personally, I will be sitting around, sans bra (but with pants on) watching football and eating junk food cuz, you know, I was SO smart to schedule my annual physical for a week after the new year.

See you in 2017.