5 is Not My Number Today

Five can be a strange number sometimes in my life.  Today was a perfect example.  I decided to spend about 5 minutes cleaning up the table in the knitting room.  Well I feel into the rabbit hole I call deep cleaning.  I went through every kit that I had.  I decided that I did not want to do about 20 of them so I put them in a box to go.  That lead to every shelf having a through clearing.  I went through everything.  Then I decided to go through my yarn.  Let’s just politely say that in 22 years of knitting I many have kept a few to many skeins that I acquired.  Over the years my skills have vastly improved. My projects have changed quite a bit. My taste in yarn has improved. I tried to follow a few fads like lace knitting, not enough time, but I still acquired a lot of lace yarn.  Sock knit was also a fling that did not last long.  Sock knitting was hard on my hands even before all the hand surgeries.  I stopped doing some charity knitting but failed to pass on the yarn. 

So today’s 5 minutes of cleaning turned into an almost all day cleaning spree.  I have bag's and boxes of yarn ready to get out of the house. Except that I will have to go through all ten bags to pull the sock yarn for my current favorite scarf knitting project.  That should not take long tomorrow. 

I am trying to keep only the projects and yarn that I like.  The same goes with books too. Too much of any thing is clutter.  I am going for a clutter free lifestyle. I have even found a few projects that are almost finished.  That should help even more.   

Now my other problem with 5 happened at lunch.  I ignored the 5 grams of fat rule. I had 1/2 of a piece of tempura. That was a mistake that I will not ever repeat again.  Let’s just politely say that my body had a temper tantrum.  I guess when I can taste the fat it is not under 5 grams.   

Well even though I am very hyper from a fantastic day of cleaning, I should try to get some sleep so I can have another fantastic day of cleaning tomorrow.  De stash, de stash, de stash.  

Destashing Progress

Well this morning was spent cleaning the garage and condensing my yarn stash. I am happy to report that I have 4 fewer containers of yarn than last time. 2 -  under bed boxes, 1 -36 quart and 1 - 96 quart box are all empty. There are also no laundry baskets, boxes or bags of yarn in the storage room. That is about 25% less yarn than last time I went through my stash. The big secret that I don't want anyone to tell John about is that there is no more yarn in the storage room. By the way I have the storage room on his honey do list, but I already finished most of it with Kayla's help.

Since that did not take as much time as I had planned in the garage, we went on to the sewing room and organized that. I see running a vacuum cleaner through that room when my body stops yelling at me for doing so much cleaning in one fail swoop.

I also found enough yarn for about a dozen more scrappy hats. I also found 3 baby blankets in progress. I must have been meant to do this today because someone tweeted me about some baby blankets half way through the cleaning and 2 wip's are suitable for the project.

Well I think it is time for me to kick up my feet and rest before the boy gets home from school. So enjoy your families.

Yarn and Things

Well I have done it. I finally wound the last 18 skeins of wool boucle yarn that Nancy gave me for charity knitting 3 years ago. Just in case you were not in on that yarning  Nancy gave me a 33 gallon trash bag, yes one of those big black ones filled to the brim with it. To make warmer winter outer wear I blended it with worsted weight white yarn. Which I have rededicated, the white yarn was meant for 2 white wool blankets to donate to sick children; well being a mother of a sick child I know a white wool blanket is the very last thing that Eric would need or that I would want to do the upkeep on. So I mixed 9 skeins of white yarn with 18 skeins of boucle to come up with a warm colorful warm blends of 100% wool yarn that can be knit on US size 13 knitting needles. Yes it does make the projects go faster. The good news is that the bright orange yarn that the kids love is almost gone 1 or 2 ponchos at the most ( can you tell I am tired of bright orange yarn), then on to the red and yellow.

From that white wool yarn I am also rededicating 2 strips that were meant for a very complicated crochet pattern which was not included with the blanket but I was suppose to figure out on my own. I figure that once they are finished thay will make great scarfs , gifts for the shelter ladies that Nancy works with.

Today I also got some more organizing done. Since Eric had the day off from school we finally found the time to bring in the tabs that he and his friends from Taglit collected over the summer. He proudly carried in over 9 pounds of tabs to help the kids at the Tucson Ronald McDonald house. So If you have any tabs send them our way, this is a year round charity project for Eric.

Well John just got home so it is time to think about dinner. So have a great evening and enjoy your families.

It is Contest Time Again

I took advantage of my virtual day off today by organizing the yarn I dip into on a daily basis. The good news for me is that I have a better Idea of what yarn I have. There is also no yarn in the front hall closet. I thought a big announcement was the right thing for this mile stone of the de-stash process. By the way I also did find a stash of beads with the yarn so more stitch markers and earrings will be added to my shop.


It is contest time again at Handmade~by~Sheri. The good news for you is that I have a full basket of “What was I thinking when I bought this yarn”. The winner will get a full basket of yarn without the basket (I like the basket that I used and it will be less expensive to ship without the basket). There are cottons, wools, blends that include some nylon.  There is no padding under the yarn it is all yarn. Some are in the original skeins and some are wound. It could be all yours if your number is drawn.

It is going to be a little different than last time. So here go the rules of this contest.

1: You must go to http://www.tinyurl.com/handmadebysheri and comment on something you like in my shop. I have made some changes to my shop and I would like to see what is working and what is not. This will count for 1 entry per day. I will be updating my shop with new items as often as I can during the contest.

2: Follow my blog. This will count for 1 entry.

3: Follow me on Twitter for 1 entry. http://www.twitter.com/skaro964

4: Tweet about this contest. This is good for 2 entries per day. This is good for 1 entry per tweet.

5: Blog about this contest or include a link to my blog. This will count as 2 entries.

6: Facebook about this contest. This will count as 1 entry. Just leave a link.

7: Each entry must be logged separately. I will be going to RandomNumber.org to select the contest winner this time.

The contest will end May 18th at midnight Mountain Standard Time. The winner will be notified as soon as possible after that. Good luck and have fun.