knitting success?

so, i was reading this post on the livejournal knitting community today, as well as a post that K2Knits made a few days ago. it made me think about success in knitting. what does it mean to you to be a successful knitter? there are a lot of different components, the most obvious certainly being the execution of difficult patterns. but for me, it's more than that. let me preface this by saying that i primarily knit for other people. i occasionally make things for myself, but my primary goal is usually to make gifts for others.

when i knit for other people, i take a lot of factors into consideration: their lifestyle, their personality, their favorite colors/textures/clothing items, their age... all of these and more come into play. there is, i think, a certain skill in selecting the right pattern, the right yarn, the right colors for an individual. i particularly enjoy playing with color and texture, though you'll almost never catch me doing intarsia or other blatant colorwork. i prefer things that are subtle and carefully crafted. knitting success, for me, is about combining all of these disparate ideas together into a choesive, beautiful, well-crafted piece that the recipient will USE. i want my piece to be so well thought-out that the recipient will immediately integrate them into their life without any hesitation. i don't want to just make a sweater that someone will think is pretty and might wear once or twice. i want to make their FAVORITE sweater. if i can do that, then i've achieved success.

and just as an aside, here's a pic of my current project. this is the first block. i'm concerned, though, because i think it seems too small. i need to check my gauge and re-read the pattern to make sure i haven't made any mistakes. i started it while on heavy painkillers, so it's entirely likely that i messed up somewhere. anyway, enjoy!