Tag Archive | craft supplies

Whoa! Destash!

I got a whim today, a whim to go through my yarn and get rid of what doesn’t bring me joy. I’ve been pondering it for a while, but kept telling myself it wasn’t hurting anything to keep it all, and I had the space, so why not keep it just in case I ever needed it?

Well, I didn’t really have a good answer but I decided I needed to go through it all anyway. This is close to where I started. (This is an older photo. I’d added more yarn between this photo and today. So imagine this plus some.)

IMG_2C5458673DE5-1

I pulled out a LOT of acrylic, mostly stuff I’d bought back when I was making things to sell. Also, I tend to prefer natural fibers to acrylic now, so I only kept my very favorite acrylic blends. I pulled out a lot of cotton and blends. Even now in the heat, I don’t find myself wanting to work with the mercerized cotton. I don’t tend to wear the things I have made with it. I only kept kitchen cotton in the colors that are actually in my kitchen, and the cotton blends that are soft and drapey.

Then I moved into the good yarn, the wool and blends. If it was itchy, I pulled it out. A few yarns I pulled are gorgeous; I still loved the look of it. But I’d used some of it and didn’t like knitting with it or wearing it, so there was no point keeping it. If it was a color I would never use, or a weight I’d never use (like one skein of sport weight?), I pulled it. I was ruthless but it wasn’t painful at all. This was what I had in the end:

LJ8JozXRTwWaVgycx9++Yg

That’s a LOT of yarn. I mean, it’s kind of ridiculous when you see it all spread out like that! I’ll bag it up and see if I can sell it locally for a bit of money, and in the meantime, I’ll enjoy my newly organized stash. It’s gorgeous!

cAqPPU1CRdiGzu1r6Vtybw

Even looking at the shelves makes me happy! This is all yarn that I love, that I can see myself using. I even found a skein of Madtosh that I forgot I had! And that right there is a good reason to get rid of stuff I was keeping just for the heck of it: I can see what I have more easily, I can see the yarn I chose with intent, and I know that I could pick anything from my stash and be happy to knit with it.

p.s. yes I know it’s still a crazy big stash! I’m okay with that!

Pretty pretty yarn

Dec10

Recently we spent a day in Columbia, MO. I knew of one yarn store there that we visit each time we’re in town, but on a whim I did a google search and found another one. I only had time to visit one LYS, so the new one won. It’s called True Blewe Yarns and it was marvelous! The selection wasn’t deep but it was delicious. They carried a few favorites, like Madelinetosh, Manos del Uruguay and some Cascade superwash but they also had some new (to me) lines like Holiday Yarns and Three Irish Girls, and I fell in love.

My husband found this yarn. It didn’t jump out at me at first because it’s not my usual combination of colors, but then I looked at the name:

fullsizeoutput_8a7

YES! It’s Wonder Woman yarn!! And I do adore Wonder Woman. So this was my first pick. It’s from Holiday Yarns and it will be either a long cowl, to wrap twice, or a shawl/scarf thing similar in size to a Hitchhiker. I had a hard time resisting the Twilight, Batman and Black Widow colors. You can check out all their yarns online here.

Then I had to pick a multicolor skein from Three Irish Girls because they were beautiful and felt good when I petted them. This was the winner.

fullsizeoutput_8a8

It’s Adorn Sock in a colorway called Piazza del San Marco and I have no idea what it will become.

I admired this color because…well, purple, but wasn’t going to pick it up until my husband pointed out how nicely it went with my dark purple winter coat. (Oh, yes, I know I’m very lucky to have a husband who helps me spend money on yarn!)

fullsizeoutput_8a9

It’s Holiday Yarns FlockSock, 400 yards of fingering weight. Definitely a scarfy-shawl thing.

Then my daughter found these scrumptious beauties and I loved them so much I had to have two! It’s like Malabrigo Rasta only SOFTER. AND you get 109 yards per skein!!

The gray is going to become a big cowl (for ME) and the cream will become a hat with a BIG pompom (for…I don’t know who).

I had to quit after that but they liked me enough that they put my yarns in a nifty tote bag, and that’s happy because what knitter doesn’t need another tote bag??

fullsizeoutput_8aa

So if you’re in the Columbia area, I highly recommend you check out this jewel of a yarn store!

A Break for Beads

Apr1

So many things to share today! Nope, I didn’t cast on for that green and purple shawl yet. The right stripe sequence hasn’t come to me so I’m pondering it. Instead, I took some time yesterday to drive out to Half Price Books. I realized I only have one Stephanie Pearl-McPhee book in my library (the rest I’ve read from the library) and I thought it might be fun to have a couple to take with me, to get signed. And what do you know? I found a lovely hardback copy of Free-Range Knitter that looks unread! (I also bought a DVD of Sweet Home Alabama and a signed copy of Room. Bookstores are dangerous.)

And then, since I was near a Joann store, I had to stop by at least, right? I mean, I don’t get over there that often, and I had two good coupons, so I had to go. Any good crafter would have done the same. But the amazing thing is: I didn’t buy any yarn!! None of it called my name. I’m afraid I’m becoming more of a yarn snob, in that I enjoy the softness of fiber and the richness of color in premium yarns. I still like acrylic for some projects, but it’s definitely a lot easier to resist. So what to use my coupons on? I looked at needles; there weren’t any I needed. Knitting books? Eh. I found myself in the beading section and remembered I’d wanted to try using split rings for stitch markers. I only found one kind that looked big enough to fit on a knitting needle so I grabbed those, a bag of headpins, and then the beads were all 50% off so I had to get a cute string of beads too. I had fun!I think my favorites might be the baseballs with the blue for my Kansas City Royals! But no, I love them all. I did end up with a minor injury from using a letter opener to try to open a split ring, but we must suffer for our art, right?

Last night I needed knitting for American Idol, and I’m a little bored with my Hitchhiker, so I grabbed some gray Berroco Fiora to cast on for a scarf, called the Float Flutter Fly Scarf. Go on and look, it’s fine. Pretty, right? I discovered that ridge in the middle is created by slipping 5 stitches every other row, so this is what the back looks like. It’s just kind of…weird. The pattern does say to pull the stitches tight after the slipped stitches, and I’m trying, but maybe not enough? I don’t like the way the bottom slipped stitch hangs down. I put it down and ended up working on the Hitchhiker after all. Maybe frog and start over? I’m not that far in and now that I understand what the pattern is doing, maybe I could get that part snugger. I do like the feel of the yarn, and it is a lovely pattern…ok, fine. I won’t give up just yet.

Happy Friday, enjoy your weekend, and if anyone else is at the Knitting in the Heartland keynote tonight, find me and say hello!