Tag Archives: yarn stash

Winter Winding Party

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Here comes the cast-on-itis! I couldn’t deny it any longer so I threw myself a winding party!

In this pile I wound three skeins for my Into The Light shawl, one skein of DK sock yarn for some bed socks and the full skein from my 2020 Advent calendar. PB even helped for a little bit. He was mesmerized by the swift turning and turning and turning. But then he got bored and asked for the iPad, lol.

I definitely have a theme going here. I’m in a very pinky/purply place I guess. The front three skeins will be faded for my Into The Light garter shawl. I guess the outlier would be the teal DK skein for my bed socks. But that was a mystery skein so I didn’t really get to pick the color.

And true to cast-on-itis I have already kitted up that yarn into bags with patterns, needles and notions. From left to right there is: Into The Light in my TanneCasey bag, DK vanilla bed socks in my TanneCasey sock back, and 2020 advent socks in my Supernatural Yarns project bag.

Now I just need to find the time to get all this knitting done!

All The Canadian Sweaters Quantities

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I have been zooming every Monday evening with the ladies from the Wet Coast Wools LYS (Vancouver, CA) for their knit night. I enjoy it very much but I was WILDLY enabled this past month.

The shop ran a huge sale after Christmas on their yarns and add to that the favorable exchange rates for Americans…..I fell down the sweater quantity hole. I ended up giving Glenda all my Christmas monies (and then some).

I picked up six skeins of Lagom by Katia in a wonderful heathered grey color on a worsted weight. That is roughly 1,300 yards of yarn to make a nice nuetral sweater. Next up is eight skeins of Holst Garn Coast in a brown color. This is a fingering weight yarn I intend to hold double for a garment of sorts. Lastly I grabbed five skeins of Briggs and Little Regal in a heathered blue. This is another worsted weight but this one is pretty sheepy feeling. I think this will need to be a cardigan to be worn over an under layer for my princess skin.

All in all it felt nice to add some heavier weight to my stash. I have a TON of fingering/sock but I tend not to buy the heavier stuff to have on hand. I’m working on that in 2021.

Happy Knitting!!

My 2020 Advent Calendar

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I have completely unboxed my 2020 Advent calendar from A Girl and Her Wool. I ended up with the quite the collection of minis!

I have hemmed and hawed over what to do with these. I did some pattern searching and pulled down some possibilities. I had been leaning toward a cowl of some sort because the minis are all 10 grams I need something small-ish so that I can see good sized blocks of the different colors.

But then I threw that all out the window and I decided to make my own “advent” socks. I am going to use the full skein to make the heels toes and cuffs. And for each mini I will split in half and knit concurrent socks on two different needles. I think I won’t attempt any color management and will just use them in the order the dyer presented them.

And to keep myself motivated I am going to make myself finish my Carbon Sprinkles Vanilla Socks before letting myself cast on this new project.

Blanket Dreaming

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The other thing that jumped into my cart on black friday from Knit Picks was a blanket quantity of Knit Picks in Garnet Heather.

I am dreaming of a smooshy and soft throw for myself. This yarn is 50/50 acrylic and wool but it’s two ply structure and loosely spun nature just makes it so smooth and soft. Even Jellybean petted it and commented on how soft it is.

This will have to wait until after Christmas, but I’m excited about it!

Merry Christmas and Happy Knitting to all!

Coordinating Felici

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I fell down on black friday on the knit picks website. I needed two skeins of Knit Picks Biggo to finish my Peace Blanket and some how a bunch of other yarn jumped in my cart. I managed to snag coordinating sets of Felici. I got Felici Worsted and Felici Sock in the Goth Kitty and Punch Bug.

I am envisioning matching hat and sock sets. How cute would those be for future gifts? And if I get the sock yarn cranked into sock tubes they would be really quick (relatively speaking) gifts. At least that sounds like a good idea, lol.

Happy Knitting

Tossing The Stash

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I recently signed up for the Yarn Harlot’s patreon and I have been watching her videos. The most recent one was a tour of her stash and how to best care for your yarn. One of the items she recommended was to do a “toss” off the stash a couple of times of year to look for pests and to reacquaint yourself with what you have.

I got a wild hair this past weekend and pulled out every skein of yarn I own. Warning….yarn content ahead. Avert you gaze if chaos and piles of yarn will offend your sensibilities.

Okay, I warned you. The below photo is the entirety of my stash. I very carefully emptied every tub and examined every bag. I found a single spider but other than that my yarn appears to be clean and pest free. And then I had to put it all back….

I carefully curated each yarn category and repacked into clean bags. For instance my sock yarn and lace yarn is below. Starting at the bottom left working clockwise I have a large pile of variegated yarn, then above that is my self-striping, then sock blanks and sock tubes, followed by lace mohair or suri alpaca, below that is sock sets, then a small pile speckled yarn and lastly in the bottom right corner are my solid and tonals.

I packed each kind of yarn together and but into drawers. And then for the first time I affixed labels to each drawer so that I know where to look for various items.

Some of my categories were by weight, fiber content or sometimes by manufacturer. It may not make sense for everyone else, but I think it’s going to work for me.

What did I learn from this? I have WAY too much variegated sock yarn, less self-striping sock yarn than I would have guessed, very few sweater quantities and almost no worsted weight yarn whatsoever. I’m hoping this review will help me make more productive purchases in the future. But who knows….sometimes a knitter never learns, lol!

Happy Knitting

Oh Snap…..Gingersnap

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Happy Mother’s Day to me!! I sent my hubby a wish list this year and he came through big time! He picked some goodies from Gingersnap of Canadian fame.

He picked the PERFECT bag and a unique sock set. They aren’t colors I would have picked but they are kind of stunning. The hubby swears like a sailor and I will think of him everytime I use the bag, lol.

The yarn is their Zest Fingering in the Penguin Plunge color with the bright yellow contrast color. I’m thinking socks with contrast toes, heels and cuffs? Maybe a cowl….I think this needs to marinate for a bit.

What will not marinate is this project bag. It features nice long handles and a wire framed opening. I really need cast on a new project to christen this project bag. So many ideas!!

Happy Knitting!!

Yarn Mystery Box

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I have been listening to the Nomad Yarns podcast for a couple of years now. It is a married couple who ran a yarn shop turned into yarn truck as well as dye independent label yarn. They have small children and pretty much speak my life. In this time of cancelled events and social distancing they advertised mystery boxes. You pick your price level and give them some suggestions of colors, weights of yarn, etc and they put together a surprise.

You guys….this was so worth it! It was a happy mail day indeed. My box was bursting at the seams and full of goodies!

I received two skeins of West Yorkshire Spinners Aire Valley DK in a nice blue, a skein of Nomad Yarn Twisted Branch sock yarn, a custom needle gauge, two mini skeins of Nomad Yarns Pallete, a set of Carbonyz Size 2 double pointed needles, a set of Knitters Pride stitch markers, and some waste yarn.

I loved everything in my box and it was neat to not know what I was getting. I have zero idea what to do with any of this and my stash is already at SABLE but this was a good investment. I supported a small business and I got to have the joy of new to me goodies.

Would you every order a mystery box?

Stashing Down Scraps

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I am still riding the wave of accomplishment from finishing my scrappy DK Hibernation Throw last week. I was cleaning up the project bag it had been living in to put the needles and notions away and noticed how small the pile of scraps were at the bottom of the bag. When I started I had two gallon sized ziplock bags full of scraps and a CONE of undyed sock yarn. Now I’m left with two quart sized bags and one sandwich sized bag of scraps that don’t have a plan.

Now, full disclosures these are not all my scraps or mini skeins. I still have my mitred square memory blanket going. I “tossed the stash” so to speak and aired out that bag to make sure all my yarn was in good order. It’s safe to say I I have plenty to work with, lol.

I’m just the kind of knitter that gets a thrill from using up as much of every skein of yarn I possibly can. I like the idea of scrappy projects where I can remember all the cool things I made with the full skein. Its akin to checking completed items off a list for me.

I’m curious, are most knitters this way? Do you keep your scraps?

A Purple Present

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I have been mum about this but I recently received a promotion at my job. It’s been in the works for a couple of months and I didn’t want to count my chickens until they hatched but its official now. I went from a staff level accounting to a manager of accounting operations. I have four direct reports and new boss who is….challenging…to say the least. It’s been a ton of work and I have a lot to learn. But I’m excited to have gotten this opportunity. I’m 35 years old and this is my first promotion ever.

My husband decided to get me a little congratulatory gift. He asked for yarn suggestions and I said anything from KnitCircus. So he and Jellybean made an order. And shocker, since Jellybean helped its ALL PURPLES. That is Jellybean’s go to color. I don’t mind because they made beautiful choices.

The top skein is a Trampoline base in the Dream a Little Dream colorway. It’s 440 yards of a light fingering weight and the same kind of yarn I made my Sherwood Forest Wrap with. The bottom two skeins are the Greatest of Ease base in two matching 25 gram gradient sock skeins in the Knit Sky colorway.

My favorite part of these yarns? They are already wound up and ready to use! I like when that less than fun part is done for me. KnitCircus may be in my top five favorite dyers. Do you have a favorite dyer?