What Do I Work on Next?

  There are two shawls I want to work on right now.  I have a knitted one that I have had floating around in my mind for a while and I also have a pattern that was written by one of my friends.  I have already tried to start the shawl by Sally twice.  The first yarn I used was a really good color for it, but was too thick, and the second yarn I tried was the right weight, but the colors were too crazy and you couldn't really see the pattern.  Third time will hopefully be a charm.  I have a cone of yarn that I've been trying to save for the perfect project.  While I'm not sure this is the perfect project for, I know it will be a good one.
  I've also been stuck in The Hat Zone.  It's been so hot that even though I really would like to start a bigger project, I have not been able to fully commit.  I've also been really enjoying trying to perfect this latest hat pattern.  It is based off a sweater I vaguely saw on the episode of Days of Our Lives I watched while waiting for my car's 100,000 mile service to be done.  There might even be two patterns that came out of it because my mom said she really liked the first time I tried it, even though it wasn't the effect I was going for.

  Tea, knitting, and crochet have really been helping me lately.  I know everyone has their every day stresses, but I feel like mine have been hiding in shadows and have all been jumping out at once.  I was feeling fine about work, then suddenly felt behind.  I have been severely neglecting the basement because I feel overwhelmed when I think of cleaning the yarn.  I know I could just toss it, but I also know I can fix it.  I also feel like I have a back-log of patterns I'm designing that are ready to be put into a more official format than my bullet points of rows on Google Docs.
  I have started to work on the stuff in the basement and it hasn't been as bad as I was worried it would be.  I had to throw out about 2 large trash bags worth of old food that was old and also eaten or crawled on by mice.  I have also learned a lot about mice preferences.  They really like cotton yarn, but not wool.  They also love pecan swirls, fruit granola bars, but don't like powdered mashed potatoes, or dried pasta.  I've also had to throw out two skeins of 100% cotton that they made nests in.
  I know that I just have to keep chipping away at it.  Baby steps are better than no steps.  Happy Friday the 13th everyone!