On The Fifth Day

 Today is day 5 in a row of my massive fiber and yarn de stashing binge. Thank goodness it is the last day of going through every single fiber in the house.  Today was spinning fiber of which there is a whole lot less. Just about a closet full.  It took all morning.  I even found some yarn that needed to leave the house with the yarn mixed in with the fluff. 

I managed to fill a massive shipping bag full of roving that I will never spin because I just don’t like the colors.  I am also a better artist than a sales person.  This is why I am sending this huge bag to a person who is an artist and a great sales person.  

In going through all the fluff, I found one storage bag that was falling apart.  So the fluff got moved to other storage bags.  All the remaining fluff has been put away.  There is a lot more room in the closet including a 2 foot wide section on the top shelf.  2 containers were also freed up.  One went for yarn storage and the other went into art yarn supplies.  

I am officially too tired to move. My legs and back hurt.  My Fitbit gave me 59 minutes of in zone exercise.  So instead of mailing the fluff today, I will spend the afternoon resting.  Along with some Tunisian crochet or knitting.  I feel pretty good about all the work I have done in the past 5 days.  By the way the yarn that left the house this morning filled 1/2 of the back of a friend’s pickup truck.  Not a bad effort.  

Now is the hard part organizing my work spaces.  That is definitely for another day. 

This is a picture of the bag of fluff leaving the house.  I double bagged it, just because the bag is so thin. 

Bigger Steps

 Today I managed to do 2 loads of laundry without John. Empty the dishwasher.  Then pick up around the house.  Yes, it required a nap that was over 2 hours long, but I accomplished all of this on my own.  So I consider this progress.  Just a few weeks ago, I required a 2 hour nap after sitting and eating a meal.  Now if I could just build up my core muscles a little faster.  

After all the chores around the house I did not have the spoons to knit or spin.  Everything has a different priority on different days.  Just in case you were wondering. My to do list was only half finished. The top priority items all got finished.  

Filling the Car with DeStashed Yarn

 This morning I got into the garage very early, still in my pajamas to begin the last phase of my current de stash of yarn.  Included are novelty yarn, hand spun yarn and cones of yarn.  I filled 3 large plastic tote boxes to give to a friend to share with her family. Also one of the 3 tote boxes is newly emptied of yarn only to be filled up with yarn to give to my friend. I got to the garage a little after 6 am. By 7 am the garage was already in the 80’s and since it is monsoon season the humidity level is at 65% making the feel like temperature at least 5 degrees warmer.  

I had another small victory this morning  I landed up with an extra empty tote box. I set it to the side for later use.  The boxes in the garage are no longer in piles taller than me.  This takes a burden off me too wondering how I am going to use up all this yarn. It also gives access to fiber artists who have to normally drive miles and hours to get a very limited selection of yarn. This is a lovely win for everyone involved. 

I am normally a summer person who loves the hot weather.  However since I got sick earlier this year I have seemed to lost my tolerance for the heat.  I am hoping that it is just the medicine that I am currently taking.  I am doing my best to stay hydrated.  I am already at the 30 ounce of water mark for the day.  This is normal for summertime in the desert southwest. I don’t do sports drinks, but just plain water. For a treat I will add some fresh squeezed lemon juice.  I digressed a bit here.  

John loaded my car for me this morning.  As you can see from the pictures below my little pyramid of boxes did not all fit into the back of my car. I had to cover the back seat with a towel for the 3 rd box. I did say that they were the large tote boxes. They hold a whole lot of yarn. 

My plan to the rest of the day is to rest. Organize the house a bit.  Maybe do a load of laundry  or 2. Then do some knitting and spinning. 

As the days get shorter, I hope everyone is finishing up their holiday knitting projects. Also be sure to make something for yourself too. 

TTFN.  If you are not sure what TTFN means I would suggest a light summer time read of Winnie The Pooh. There is a 4 book series that were published between 1924 and 1928. They now come in a complete box set too. This would also be a good summer break from activities and just read with your children. 

Unintended Cleaning

This morning started off very early with a migraine at 4:00 am.  In order to take the aspirin I had to have breakfast at 4:30 am.  I don’t take aspirin on an empty stomach. Then once the migraine started to go away it was nap time. Most of the day was spent in that post migraine haze. But I managed to have a busy day anyway. Except for numbers.  John tried to run the same numbers over and over again, the numbers did not work for me today. 

Today was a day fill with 3 rounds of unintended cleaning.  First up was the kitchen starting with the microwave oven. Then the stove top which lead to the Keurig coffee maker. Which lead to the toaster oven. Which lead to the countertop. Which lead to the omelette pan that I brushed the crumbs into.  It was almost like the book If You Give A Mouse A Cookie.  Except that if you give me a cleaning rag.  Then it was lunch time and then nap time.  

This afternoon I tried to finish dispatching the mess I made by cleaning out my dresser and closet.  The odds and ends that can’t be thrown out, but need a new place to reside. I did make some headway on that front.  

Then after dinner I went on a quest to find my 2 hole punch.  I have not yet found the 2 hole punch, but instead managed to clean out a desk drawer. Fill a tub with items that we no longer need to keep and now needs to be shredded.  Put a huge pile of envelopes for mailing things out into the same drawer.  I also found some stamps that as of right now don’t fit in my stamp drawer.  That will be fixed soon.  

Then it was off to look at new toilet paper holders on line.  In the next few weeks we will be updating one bathroom to make it look like it belongs in this century rather than so the last century.  It was just too difficult for me to envision what they would look like in my house. So I will be going to the hardware store to buy it. Thank goodness I don’t have that problem with yarn.  The yarn always knows what it wants to be. Now if I could just spend more time knitting and weaving everything would be wonderful.  

One Less Bag of Yarn

I have done enough charity scarfs, both knit and woven that this huge tote bag is now empty.  All the yarn has been used. It holds the equivalent of a 30 quart tub. You might recognize the tote bag as one of Eric’s. The one were we carried extra medical supplies for road trips. By the way I did find a few expired pump filters and a spare connector in the pocket.  Apparently the pocket was too small to hold yarn.

This is one more small victory on my road to the great yarn destash. 

Progress

 This is progress at a snail’s pace.  I started spinning this beautiful Masham dyed by Indigodragonfly before COVID19 when I was still teaching drop spinning.  I found it during the organizing of spinning baskets.  I decided it must be finished.  I spun it on 5 different drop spindles of the same weight by 3 different spindle makers.  Today I finally finished the first spin.  

Now to get it off the spindles to ply the 5 skeins.   

The spindles from left to right: 2 Foresters, 1 made by a midwestern maker, 2 Kurdants

Progress Maybe?

 I did my first 30 minute workout since I got sick last November.  I am really hoping that this is not 1 step forward 2 steps backwards.  It did leave me tired. 

Baby Steps

I am making very slow but steady progress with my hand post surgery.  Tonight at dinner I managed to use a fork in my left hand for the first time since surgery. It was so nice not to have to worry about the food going every which way. I also used less napkins too. My hand was sore for a couple of hours, but no pain no gain.  

Eric also let me bring weaving into his room this afternoon. I made it 3/4 of the way through a mud rug before my hand needed a rest.  The mud rugs seem to serve two purposes right now.  The first is that it is keeping my hands and mind occupied. The second, that it is using up some hand spun yarn that is not soft enough to go next to the skin, but that I do not have enough to weave a full sized rug or a full set of placemats with. This is a very portable weaving project.  Did I mention that I also get to show off one off my cool handmade baskets too. I did not weave the basket, but it was made by another artist. 

I know that I should be sleeping now, but I woke up at 2:30 am with the headache from he double toothpicks.  As I am writing this I am waiting for the aspirin to kick.  I am also enjoying the rain and lighting show.  We are approaching the 3/4 of an inch mark since the rain started around dinner time last night.  

Today's Progress

Today I tackled 7 boxes in Teri's room.  I did the daughting task of separating her tea cup collection that she inherited from her Grandama Audrey from my own tea cups and precious memories.  My collection is now neatly arranged and Teri had 3 boxes to deal with.  I also found a lovely Spode serving dish that we got as a wedding present and never used waiting for a fancy enough dinner. I made the decision to unbox it and make it an everyday dish, because everyday is special.  

For those of you who remember what the shelf used to look like here is the new view.  I still might rearrange things so all the Woodland Flowers tea cups are together.  John on he other hand has 4 boxes to break down and recycle.  I also did not need all the newspaper that I thought that I would.  This means that the recycle can will be extra full this week.  

Progress is Good

I have been very busy with cleaning around here. The master bathroom is 99.9% done. It is just a few very small things that I have to figure out where they go. I have made enough progress in the craft room to set up the sewing machine. I got 1 repair  and a blanket modification done for some one, that makes 2 things out the door of the craft room today.

For some unknown reason I had a very productive day around here. The bills were paid before anyone one else was awake. I brought at least 2 baskets of recycling out to the bin today and got it hauled to the street tonight. By the way I managed to fill it 3/4's of the way full, not bad. I also started working on my Mondays to do list. I know, what was I thinking? I will never get ahead of the curve ball on this one, but at least I have a plan for tomorrow. The laundry is 3/5 done for today, but then again I know there will be more than 2 loads tomorrow...

John and I stole an hour together and went out for dinner. While we were eating a a cricket ( I think, I am not an bug expert ) hopped on the hood of our car. It must have found a sweet spot on the hood because it made it from the restaurant all the way home with out flying off the hood. I did have to shoo it off the hood before we drove in to the garage.

I also had time for a lot of knitting and a little spinning. I would like to write more but I think I will call it a night.