I’m not a huge fan of stash flashing.
Sometimes it just seems like crass showing off, sometimes I think of the world’s starving people, sometimes I think it’s a little funny when a middle age woman poses naked with it in a bathtub*, sometimes it gives me anxiety of having too much, sometimes it gives me anxiety about having too much of one thing but not the needed thing, and sometimes I’ll admit I’m a little jealous.
But we reached a milestone on the house – the floors and walls are done in all of the main rooms – so I’m finally moving into my teeny tiny studio and figuring out how to cram everything in.
And part of that involves taking stock of my yarn stash.
It was in relatively decent storage – a few big plastic tubs – but sock yarn was mixed in with sweater quantities was mixed in with random cones of mystery fiber…
And of course there was yarn shoved into other yarn…
Everything needed to be aired out – there was the odd unfortunate odor of our old apartment’s carpeting trapped inside some of the tubs, and a few lavender sachets lost their pleasant one. But all was well – no evidence of wool-munching crawling or flying f*ckers.
The sock and fingering weight yarns are now separated out into their own bin and I know I don’t need to shop for the stuff possibly ever again. I’d been wanting to make some jolly-colored tights for years now, but I haven’t even considered casting on for them, so maybe it’s okay to just make one pair of socks from one of three skeins, or consider making a blanket. I’d really like to make some pants, but though I’d like wacky tights, I’d rather have more dull pants (trousers to my friends across the pond) though I do adore my wool pants (underwear).
Need I remind you that I got everything really cheap? Yeah, the internet is good for that, as are Italian markets and those newer craft/construction materials thrift shops. I’ve been picking up the odd cone of stuff for a few years – I thought I’d be weaving by now and dying more too… And I do intend to use some of it in spinning…
My old favorite Lamb’s Pride is all in one place now too – this is one of the few yarns I have sweater quantities of – large coat or king-sized afghan quantities… I fell into a brief obsessive love with mosaic knitting several years ago and planned to make a cozy big long coat. I got a billion yards of two shades of green on the cheap online, but the colors weren’t contrasty enough and besides, I never got around to finding or making up a pattern, so it sits and waits…
And the bulky green in the bottom right was, for a short time and twice, an Owls sweater, but I never got the sizing right, so I frogged it and gave up.
I’m in love with that old gold greenish shade “golden mushroom” in the upper left, so it’s high time I cracked it open… I love nearly every shade of green though, so I’ve got some thinking to do…
On the day that I organized this stuff I had one of those disturbing time warps wherein I missed lunch. I never miss lunch. And the day was pretty much shot – I feel a bit guilty overall for “wasting” the time and that I have so much, yet I can’t part with it either. I got some of it up on ravelry, so I may sell some things if asked. But I also don’t really need any more clothes or blankets, so my knitting mojo for anything other than gifts, sales, or a few smaller accessories is pretty flat at the moment.
I’d like to replace a few commercial sweaters with me-knitted ones, but the ones I wear most often are grey. Do you see any grey yarn up there? Nope.
And since I work from home, I need nothing. Absolutely nothing. I don’t get the people who work from home or stay at home and are crazy prolific garment sewers and knitters… where and when do they wear the many, many things that they make?
(And I still have loads of yarn from unraveled sweaters, a nice bunch of that lovely Italian wool, and a smallish (relatively speaking) amount of handspun.)
And though I accomplished a needed organizing job that day, I ultimately failed when I realized that there’s still another box/bag/tub of the stuff somewhere…
*I’ve seen a few of these on ravelry, but sadly can’t find one at the moment for you – and no, I won’t do that.
So I chose some of the murkiest colors they had to offer, but I must say I love murky and they did a great job with a green that sometimes looks brown (Marsh) and a grey that sometimes looks blue (Storm). And the yarn base feels soft but durable and has a wonderful spongy sproing factor. It reminds me a lot of the wool I bought in Abruzzo last year about which I have yet to write and made a huge impact on the products I buy.
ASTITCHMATISM 