2018 Review

I love these year reviews popping all around the Internet and I can't skip my own. I actually kind of  refer to mine as a sort of a diary of the year. As I get older years fly by with greater and greater speed, blink and you've missed one, so these reviews help me keep track.
As this is a crafts blog mostly, first a review of the items I made this year:

Six sweaters, mostly for Gaby. This year I've been obsessed with Italian bobbin yarn and I've bought many more bobbins to try. And I expanded my dyeing experiments to lots of large scale projects too - three of these six sweaters were made out of hand dyed yarn:

I knitted three big shawls, all out of hand dyed yarn. I plan at least one or two more this year:

I didn't knit many hats this year, as we have plenty I did in 2017:

2018 was definitely the year of socks, I love them as small projects to knit while watching movies and in between big projects, and as I not only knit, but also wear them (as does Gaby), I plan to make more socks in 2019 too:

I also sewed some real wearable shirts this year and two backpacks for Gaby, which are in active use. Sewing is the sphere I want to expand my skills in 2019:

Travel and tourism - we hiked a lot this year, though we climbed no major peaks. The most memorable hikes we had were
the climb from Bistritza to Cherni vruh and back (23 km, net elevation gain of 1260 m)

Seven Rila lakes through Zeleni ridge

and the Scary lake (Strashnoto ezero) on Rila:

And of course, the pinnacle of our travel life was our trip to Bologna and Florence in Italy:

New Year resolutions :)

• In 2018 I still wanted to study Spanish, but I lost interest in repeating the same lessons and quickly abandoned it. For 2019 I feel more like brushing up my Russian. Recently I came upon the youtube channels of some brilliant Russian speaking knitters and I've spent hours watching and knitting and training on the elliptical. So, combining 3-in-1, by watching Olga Kondratyeva's channel I intend to increase my knitting skills, revive my knowledge of Russian and keep my body in form :) We'll see how it goes.
• I totally failed on my goal to organize two and three days hikes with sleep over in mountain huts. I'm keeping it as a goal in 2019.
• I want to travel even more, both in Bulgaria and abroad. Another small trip to a big European city (I'm thinking Vienna) is a must.
• I want to continue dyeing and knitting and to expand my designing abilities and my experience with new yarn.
• And I want to sew more and more complicated and wearable garments. I want to make more clothes in 2019 and to learn more about different fabrics.

But most of all, I hope for a happy, peaceful and successful year, filled with love for my family and joy from my hobbies.

HAPPY NEW YEAR, DEAR FRIENDS!