Weekending

My weekend was pretty low key, solitude was my friend as I was home alone for much of it and glad I was because I had a plan to get a lot done. Did I? Well, I may have and it may even be actually near what I anticipated getting done, but not quite as much or exactly what I wanted to accomplish. Capeesh? Or Capisce? Something like that.

Anyway, I spent my weekend with yarn, I have a fair amount and a looming deadline to get it ready for storage. Usually, when a project comes up or flies back into my radar I can check the stash on Ravelry or hop down to the basement and go on a search. The stash in the basement, up to a certain point in time, is organized by weight, which helps, but nothing is marked and then there is a bunch of yarn that has been purchased and not added to my virtual stash tracker. My goal for the weekend was to take care of that and to organize and store itall in marked containers so that if I have to go into a storage unit to look for something I will know exactly where it is.

In my mind this was going to be a day of just cataloguing the new stuff, moving things around and making sure there was room for the rest and marking the boxes and adding that info to Ravelry. Then I started and in my usual 'take any job and make it as difficult and time consuming as you can' fashion morphed it into a gigantic venture of making sure all of my projects were linked to the yarn used for it and the correct weights of leftover yarns were logged in so that I can find that info at the click of a button.

Because......... you know.

I have LOADS and LOADS of partial skein leftovers from years and YEARS of knitting. Some I ditched, but many I added in. By added in I mean a lot of them never made it to my Rav stash page, the info was usually on the project page, which helped, but I was adding yarns to the stash, finding some of the projects to weigh them against the yarn I found so that info would be correct (ish) on the project page (because I like to know how much yarn is actually used for a project! I try to put all the info I can on a project page because it can be helpful and that is what Ravelry is, a resource that is driven by user participation and information and I'm doing my part).

I could have done all that and not had photos of the yarn. THAT would be a totally normal thing to do. THAT is reasonable. THAT would never fly in my world, though. I reeeaallly wish it would.

So I am working in batches and wondering over odd balls of mystery yarns that I want to keep, but can't remember why I have them or what on earth I made with them. That is annoying me.

I love the idea of having this all set up and keeping up with it from now until forever. It suits my perfectionist tendencies. And now I want to knit ALL! THE! YARN!!! RIGHT! NOW!

Twenty-eight. After this is the fabric, quilting and sewing patterns and tools! And the deadline, it looms....

Comments

[Lynn]

Oh, do I want to knit all the yarn right now! The Spirit Trail Polwarth/silk. The Corrie cross a friend spun for me (I'm going to weave fabric for him). A cowl. Gloves. Ten or twenty cabled sweaters.

Ahem. Anyway, if it helps, I have two bins labeled Miscellaneous Yarn, left over from my Kaffe Fassett days. All the partial balls go in there, and to hell with keeping it organized on Rav - I have knitting to do!

[Carole]

Okay, maybe this will be a great resource for you but I'm of the opinion that done is better than perfect. If this takes too long you won't get it done, right? And what's the deal? You moving? Renovating??

[margene]

You've hit upon the reason I give my leftovers away as soon as the project is finished (unless I really think they'll be needed). Partial balls of unknown source make me a little crazy, but that's just me. Your photo styling is nice!

[Kim]

I don't keep too many partial balls of skein any more. It just got to be too crazy, so now, I just keep enough to repair something and let the rest go unless it is really enough to knit something else with it.

I think I recognize that last ball. ;-)

[Sally]

Spending an afternoon with my stash is one of my favourite weekend activities. I get such terrible startitus though!