Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Oops, missed October, and almost November


So late for September's check-in, never did October, and here it is the end of November. Well I must admit, knitting hasn't been high of the list of things I've been doing, though I have been in my yarn a lot.

I've been hit by a major urge to purge. Last Saturday I drove to Beckley, WV and delivered by Reeves wheel to its new mommy. That's its picture at the top of this post. I've never spun on it, since I vowed to finish it before I did. Its previous owner had spun very little on it. So the wheel is 10+ years old and hasn't done much but be home decor. I worried that I might regret the decision, but I'm really happy. Connie has a number of wheels, including a number of Reeves. I feel like the wheel is going back home almost, at least to live with some cousins. Plus, I know that it will be loved and used for what it was meant for.

Then I've been going the the stash with a brutal eye. Lots has been going on the "for sale" pile. Last time I did the math it was almost 20% in terms of yardage, and a fair bit more was added since then. Plus I have a "maybe" pile to go back through, that was about 10% of the stash last time I did the math. Why? Well I hit SABLE (stash acquisition beyond life expectancy) years ago, but continued to add. But I've really been thinking about why I knit and what I like to knit the last year or so and came to a few conclusions.

1) I'm awe-struck by fancy large lace shawls. I kinda enjoy the process of creating them (though I do tend to get side-tracked easily on any large project). I have no use for them once done. So..... large quantities of lace yarn were easy to let go of.

2) I don't really knit sweaters. I don't live in a climate where I wear them much. Plus there's the big project issue again. I've knit 2-3 sweaters in the 20 years I've been a knitter. Decided I probably wasn't going to get through the 20 or so I had in the stash!

3) Hard as it is to believe, I've decided it is possible to have too much sock yarn.

So pretty much anything I don't have a project in mind for is on the destash list. There's a link on the side-bar to the listing in Ravelry. If you aren't on Ravelry (and why not???), feel free to drop a note and I'll send you the excel spreadsheet. (Yes, I am that anal. Or as the t-shirt my sister saw says "I have CDO. It's like OCD, but in the correct order.)