Homework: Deciding when, why and what to write about

This past year I made a goal for myself. If you've been reading or even glancing casually, I think it's pretty obvious what that goal was and whether or not I was successful.

The year is now almost over. I have a few days still to go but I feel confident in completing them. This of course leaves me the question of what I should do next year. Posting every single day was I must admit, incredibly taxing. If I didn't have a full time job, and blogging itself was my job, I bet I could do a daily thing again next year. Next year though I'd better slow it down a little bit.

The way I see it, there are three main questions that I have to ask myself:

When should I write (or how often)? Daily was a bit much, but weekly is a cinch. I do think that having a schedule and meeting deadlines is the best way to prevent stagnation. I think perhaps I should have no less than a weekly goal. I also would like to add to that an unrelated monthly goal. This way I have at least two different subjects to talk about and keep me from getting bored.

Why am I writing? I write because I want to share what I enjoy. So to answer this question, I suppose I have to decide what I enjoy. Naturally I enjoy working with yarn. I really do enjoy finishing things. I want to finish all my hibernating projects. I want to work on turning some of my favorite scarves from the past year into workable patterns to share with everyone.

Not related to yarn, I really enjoy learning about and experiencing the area around where I live. Even though I've been in this area for about 5 years, there are many neighborhoods, restaurants, parks and other points of interest I've never been to or even driven by.

Sometimes I just enjoy talking about nothing in particular.

SO! What am I writing? Results!

• Because I want to finish my projects, I want to have at least 1 post a month that is a finished hibernating project, or a finished pattern to share.
• Because I don't think I can help myself, I want to have 1 post a month that is a new (finished!) project just to show off a little.
• Because there are some new techniques I've been meaning to try and practice at, I want to have 1 post a month that is a progress report on my new endeavors.
  
• Because I want to enjoy my area, I want to have at least 1 post a month about my visit to somewhere I've never before been.
• Because sometimes I have something to say, I'll post any extra posts about any extra subjects that I happen to feel like posting about any time I happen to feel like posting.

That gives me a little bit of structure (4 posts a month) with more than 1 subject (3 about yarn, 1 about travel, and mystery posts) as well as a lot of freedom.

I think I need to expand my blog roll by quite a lot as well. After my scarf project is over, I'm going to take some time to go through all the blogs I'm following and really flesh that list out. If any readers out there think that their blog might also fit well in the roll and I haven't already discovered you, feel free to speak up :)

Interestingly, I think this year of scarves has actually made me realize that I enjoy deadlines. Is that weird? Ha!