6 Bags Full

 Off to check my entire stash for mislabeled yarn.  I guess that I need to bring a wraps per inch tool to big shows in the future.  While doing a de stashed on Wednesday morning I found over $200 in yarn mislabeled as fingering weight yarn. I relied on the seller at a large yarn show would actually know the weights of the yarn she was dying and selling.  On closer inspection the yarn had over 500 yards for 4 ounce skein and required a U.S. knitting needle size from 1 to 3. Not fingering weight any way I look at it.  More like lace weight or super fine. Should have been labeled at a Zero or One.  It turns out it was only one Indy dyer had the issue. I have decided not to call her out publicly: however; I have not ordered from her since the pandemic began. So if I have ordered from you since then you are doing a fantastic job. 

Because of too many hand surgeries and arthritis I can’t use any knitting needle smaller than a U.S. 5.  Off to check out 23 shelves of yarn plus all my bins.  I might as well get it done sooner rather than later.  If I can’t use the yarn it does not belong in my stash. This way someone who can use it will be able to add it to their stash.  This might just take the rest of the week.

I am also glad that I did not order more bags to organize my projects earlier this week. It turns out that I have a few extra yarn bags right now.

I think I will pull in another chair and pull the yarn from each shelf off to that chair.  That way I can sit while working.  I am also taking Thursday off.  It is a well deserved break since I cleared 6 grocery bags of yarn that I pulled from my stash today.  I still have the bins to go through.  

Since I have gone through my stash multiple times in the past years, I urge you to go through your own stash’s.  If you are now no longer a beginner, your yarn tastes have changed.  Feel free to sell them or give them away.  I find it’s best to keep my stash to my current likes and abilities.  

Serial Knitting

 I have turned into a serial knitter. Well what does that mean?  It means I have one project for the kitchen table so I can keep copious notes on my rows.  I have hat knitting on the couch for television time.  I have a third project at my computer for zoom meetings and face time. What does this mean for you? Well you will get to see more finished projects.  What does that mean in general, more items will go to the kids clothing bank. What does it mean for my yarn stash, hopefully it will shrink this year.  

Knitting Scrappy Hats

I have finished six scrappy hats since May 15. It seems that the scrap yarn is multiplying. For every hat I make there just seems to be more yarn left to knit.  The yarn scraps are from other hats that didn’t require a full skein of yarn. I take all the partial skins and put them in one or two bags depending on the size of the skeins of yarn. This often leads to more than one hat being on the needles at a time. I currently have two scrappy hats in progress.

Maybe I shouldn’t of waited until the bags were overflowing before I started knitting the scrappy hats.  In the picture below you will see the two current hats in progress and the two bags of scraps. I really want to get to knitting other hats, but this will only lead to more partial skeins and more scrappy hats.  So I will trudge on and try to finish as many scrappy hats as I can.  I don’t think it will be more than a dozen more hats before the bags are empty. Then I will go back to knitting full skein hats until the bags fill up again. This seems to be my endless cycle.

This is how I am spending my COVID19 summer vacation. What interesting things are you doing?

Monday Where Did You Go?

Monday was a very busy day around here. We had a couple of appointments followed by  errands. This left me pretty tired. So I can't figure out for the life of me why after I picked Eric up from his day program I decided to start cleaning the garage. I was dressed in a skirt and blouse for the earlier appointments, not dressed for cleaning. I also forgot to put an apron on.

Thirty minutes latter John and I had made a very small dent. We had filled 1/2 of empty recycling bin, you know the big on that rolls out to the street. Added more to the garbage can and the charity bin. We were even able to move 5 storage boxes from useless piles to easy access. This might not seem like a big deal, but it gave me a better idea of which yarn was going to be used up next in my yarn stash down challenge.

I am just thinking that it will only take a couple of dozen more hats and scarfs before I can refill the cotton basket with more one of a kind skeins of yarn to make more hats and scarfs. This will intern make more room inside for yarn to come from the garage to used. Looking around the house and garage it seems to me that I am about 50% of the way done in my goal of having yarn in only one area of the house with none in the garage.

The only thing that is really hindering my stash down process is my need to spin more yarn. To that end I will try to list a few skeins of yarn either on my Raverly stash down page or my etsy shop. Either way I will add links to my blog.