All The Pretty Skeins

I got stalled for a minute, but I washed and dried all the plying that has been hanging around.

The top skein is chain plied long draw. It came out to 14 yards over 40 grams which is a very inconsistent bulky yarn. The middle is some BFL I spun from a batt. This skein came out to 30 yards of yarn over 44 grams which is Aran weight. And the bottom is some lamb that I failed to launch. This was one was 55 yards over 54 grams so its Aran-ish to Worsted-ish.

All of these skeins are headed to the handspun stash to percolate for awhile. And my wheel is down to only one spinning project 🙂

SSK Door Prize

One really cool feature of SSK is the simply astronomical number of door prizes that the KnitGirllls are able to source. I’m talking like close to 50 or 60. You win tickets, earn tickets and get some tickets for just attending. And then you can put those into drawing for prizes and I won one!

This was one of the bigger grand prizes. It is a foldie travel bag with two yarn baby skeins of CeCe’s Wool. That is a new to me yarn brand and boy howdie is that a lot of sock yarn! The color is “Over The Raindow” and it’s 2,240 yards of fingering weight sock yarn. It’s also 100% merino. Enough that I can knit a full Rachelle sized sweater!

I am super grateful for winning a prize and I really want to find a sweater to knit but less enthused about a sweater on US 2s or 3s, lol.

What should I knit?

SSK Minis For Granny Stripes

Last Friday I showed my SSK Haul and today I wanted to highlight the mini skeins I collected to help fill in color gaps for my granny stripe blanket.

I don’t tend to yellows or oranges so I grabbed a couple of those. And also some darker colors and variegated skeins. I think at least one of them has some sparkle in as well. Another bonus is that my SSK conference swag bag is big enough to fit my growing blanket. So these are added to my big bag of scraps and minis all zipped safely in the new larger project bag.

Now, how do I open up more time in my schedule to craft??

Caution: Wool Fumes Ahead

Okay, even for me…..this was unprecedented. I fell victim to the wool fumes and blew past my budget. I am aware this is a privilege and I am incredibly grateful. I just was surrounded by so many great SSK vendors that I had to support them all. Now I have a lot of crafting to do to spend this down….

I focused on adding to my spinning fiber inventory and one sweater’s quantity. After I achieved those items I added to my single skein stash for worsted and DK. I don’t believe I had yarn from any of these dyers except for maybe Miss Babs?

  • Oink Pigments
  • Old Rusted Chair
  • Geektastic fibers
  • Miss Babs
  • Urban Girl Yarns
  • Republica Unicornia
  • Sweet Tea Yarns
  • Another Crafty Girl
  • HipStrings

It is my intention to talk more about these skeins as I use them. I also grabbed some Tuft Woolens restock of hand lotion and wool soap. I had just run out earlier this year so it was nice timing.

Happy Yarn Fumes!!

Bliss Yarns Haul

On one of my breaks from SSK classes, I hopped in my car and navigated to Bliss Yarns in nearby Brentwood.

It was a lovely store where there was a knitting group going on. They were so delightful and we shared lots of regional crafting information. Turns out the shop owner grew up in Kansas and was delightful.

I walked away with a skein of Twisted Ambition Yarn Sweet Sock in the “Gold Rapture” colorway, a skein of Big Sky Yarn Squish DK in the “Do You Want to Build a Snowman” colorway, and finally some Whimzee Stitches Yarn Co Select Worsted in the “Love My Tennessee colorway”. And as a SSK bonus prize, I got to pick out some needles stoppers and I chose cacti.

I would highly recommend this yarn store to anyone. It has a great selection, easy location and great customer service. Happy Shopping!!

Tossing The Stash 2024

Thanks to the basement flood, I had some wide open and clean floor space. I decided to toss the stash! I happen to be headed to an event where I can rehome my yarn to appreciative new homes.

The kiddos and I worked through all the Sport to bulky bins. We checked everything for bugs, dirt and damp. Then made sure all the items were safely tucked into ziplocks. I had kind of fallen off that practice.

The fingering and lace weight stash was next. This is the bulk of my stash. I got this nicely organized and I really need to make some big shawls or blankets with all these single skeins, lol.

In the end, I cleaned half a large trash bag of donation yarn out of my stash. I was Type A enough to even remove it from my Ravelry account. All my yarn is safely organized and tucked away. I do actually feel lighter!

Happy Stashing!!

Restocking Hat Yarn

With all this hat knitting, I needed to restock my worsted yarn. I stopped by YarnBarn in Lawrence and grabbed three new skeins. All Rios but in English Rose, Hojas, and Medusa.

The Hojas color is already on my needles per yesterday’s post. I tried to grab some colors that were different that what I already had made. And I love that YarnBarn already wound these for me. Worsted doesn’t take that long but it sure makes it easy to start another hat super easily.

Happy Stashing!!

KITH Yarn Haul

In between Knitting In The Heartland events, I did some time in the market. After an initial lap around the vendors I decided to focus on mini skeins for my scrappy granny stripe blanket.

I have all my scraps organized and I noticed some gaps in the color wheel. So I tried to pour through booths and find colors to help fill out those missing areas. Mostly I need the warm colors of red, yellow and orange and some more jewel tones.

I think I did well! I also nabbed a tshirt going out on clearance, a knitting book for my friend and a couple of worsted skeins to replenish my hat stash. I am pretty proud of myself and saving most of my yarn funds for SSK this summer!

Happy Yarn!

This Could Mean Trouble

My new job means a new commute. The silver lining? The new area I work in has a LYS! And on a break this week I fell down in the store and my card bought new yarn.

Am I going to Knitting in the Heartland conference in less than two weeks? Yes. But I was feeling good this day and the yarn fumes got me. I picked up three skeins of Malabrigo Rios in Matisse Blue, Cian, and Purpuras. Then one skein of Malabrigo Arroyo in Sea Slug. All of these skeins are destined to be hats. My brain cells are taken up by the new job some easy hat knitting feels good.

Next up was two skeins of 316 Dye Studio in their House DK and graffiti colorway. I have some of this in my stash for a sweater and my post COVID body needs more yardage. They are different dye lots so I will have to shade/alternate. But I’m okay with that. Lastly are two bunches of fiber from Malabrigo Nube in Solis and Indiecita colorways. I think I will spin each as singles and ply together. They coordinate nicely.

Someone asked me what I was making and I said ‘Happiness’ because you should never ask a knitter about their stash!

Tubes For Jellybean

Jellybean really hit my heartstrings this winter by asking to wear my handknit socks. Like full commitment….to school and everything. Even to the point I had to pull them off his feet to wash them. Now, he’s a kid so I don’t trust him with just any pair but I found a few that he could keep as his own and he was delighted.

Admittedly, my socks aren’t perfect for him. But his feet are still growing so it’s hard to invest too hard in his current size. I settled on finding some already cranked sock snakes on Etsy. These are 64 stitch tubes in hardwearing sock yarn. They are Jellybean approved colors and I just need to find contrast yarn for heels/toes/cuffs. This way we get to finished socks for him without hours and hours of knitting by me. Win win.

They are really long tubes so I should be able to get a few pair out of each tube. I tried to get Jellybean to tell me if he liked long/tall socks and how he wanted the finished pair to feel. He didn’t 100% understand what I was asking, so I will try again another day, lol.

Happy Knitting!!