Flashin' Some Keepers

Getting through the mountain of yarn, little by little. Here's the sock yarn that's sticking around. Pictures are a bit crappy. Hubby changed the settings on the camera, and I don't know how to change them back.
'Bout 25 pairs of socks. Must knit faster....

Lornas Laces


Koigu


Sundara


Socks that Rock


Sockotta


Lana Grossa


Misc. sock yarn, Trekking XXL, Magic stripes, clown, and Knit Picks

Thank Goodness for THIS!

A blog to use just for destashing! How cool.
I've gotta admit, when I realized how much stash I've got, I immediately started trying to decide how to unload some of my 'no longer favorites'. We used to own a web-based business, so hubby knows all about setting up sites, and shopping carts, etc. I thought we should start a 'yarn swap' site for people to list yarn they want to buy sell or trade (because listing on Ebay is just too expensive now if you have one or two balls left over from something.) Well, I found that someone beat me to my great idea, but they're charging WAY TOO MUCH as well. $6.50 per post! You might not even be asking that much for the skein of yarn! Lo and behold, the very next day, I saw the Destash blog on Margene's blog.
I've started taking pictures for destashing. I'll be posting lots of things on the cool new blog as I get the time. I've also set up a flickr account just for the yarns I'm selling. You can see that page here .

I've got lots of 'soaker' yarns from when I used to knit cloth diaper covers (called soakers) for sale. Those were the first that I photographed, but there will be a lot more variety of yarn than that.

On my blog, I'll be showing pictures of the "Keepers" that will remain in my stash. This will be a good exercise in organization for me!

Ummm, About that Stash....

I have to admit, I had no idea how much yarn I own. In my defense, all of my stash hasn't lived in the same house for the last 3 years while we've been remodeling. Much of it was packed up, and forgotten about.
As I've been organizing, I think I've pretty much gotten all of the yarn into one location, and I've got TOO MUCH! (For me, anyway.)
I'm not an incredibly fast knitter, and it kind of makes me feel pressured to own so much yarn. My other problem is that some of my ideas about what I want to knit have changed since I started stashing. I really want to begin doing some colorwork sweaters (think Poetry in Stitches), but can't justify buying the yarn for it when I'm swimmming in yarn already. I'm going to be doing some serious de-stashing in the coming weeks. Right now, I've got 4 large rubbermaid tubs, one super large tub,2 shipping boxes and 2 small sweater boxes all chock full of yarn.
Pictures will be forthcoming, I haven't taken time to do much more than get the yarn all collected into one spot so far.

Project Spectrum~April

I've been slowly getting things organized and unpacked, and just in time Project Spectrum's April colors of yellow and orange....Bless and I have become reaquainted!



Unfortunately, she's already had quite a bit of frogging done on her. You can't get much simpler than rows and rows of stockinette stitch, so you'd think an item like this wouldn't need frogging. Unfortunately, it's so simple, I just kept knitting and knitting, totally oblivious to the fact that I'd knit several inches past the point that I needed to start the sleeve decreases. But, now we've ripped, and we're back on the right track. The huge needles still take a bit of getting used to (especially when switching over from knitting socks!), but it's going along quite well.

The sock that I'm not showing is done to the point of the toe decreases. I'm waiting on the yarn that I want to knit my swatch in before I send the pattern/proposal off to the publishing company.

My other fun news is that the Secret Pal tables have been turned on me. My giftee, Astrid has sent me a gift!


These beautiful silver earrings all the way from Germany! What a wonderful treat.
Astrid has a side business of selling earrings on Ebay, and when I commented to her about how lovely they were, she asked which were my favorites. I never dreamed that my favorites would show up in my mailbox! Her comment about these butterflies was that they looked like springime. I couldn't agree more. Thank you so much Astrid!

My Buttons are Popping!

I'm one proud Mamma!
Have a look at this:



This is my 9 year old knitting her first sweater. She learned how to knit last year, starting with the typical scarf. She's done quite a few washcloths, and really wanted to move on to something more substantial. She's begun her own Klaralund (sized down and in cheaper yarn;-)
Lest you think the child is just fooling around, look at her tension.



I just realized that my photo is a little bit wonky, but trust me, it could pass for machine knitting! And she's done every stitch with her own little hands. I noticed that she dropped a stitch, and I'll help her out with fixing that up, but trust me, this sweater is going to be her baby.

One of my favorite bloggers, Nancy , was kind enough to give me some photo taking pointers. (This is something I really want to be able to improve upon.) I spent the afternoon taking pics. What do you think Nancy?



I discovered that it's much harder to get a good picture from children, but here's my favorite of the afternoon:



Now I also need to learn more about optimizing the pictures, because the originals are much clearer than the ones I'm posting.

PROJECT UPDATES
I have to say that I now like my Klaralund much better. Blocking did wonders for the fit!
And my sock, well, I'm not showing it. I didn't like the way my yarn was designing (my new word for pooling) with the sock club pattern, so I made up my own pattern. I like it so much that I'm going to try to have it published, so I'm not going to show it just in case it's accepted.
Note: I love the sock club pattern, and I'll be knitting it as well, just not in that yarn.

Flash your stash

I LOVE seeing everyone's stashes. Hubby knows why. It makes me feel better about all of the yarn I've got. I don't know anyone (personally) who has as much fiber or fabric as me, and it's comforting to know that I'm not deranged. (Or if I am, at least I've got company.)
HOWEVER, my stash is in about 10 different boxes and bins, mixed in amongst everything else in the world that needs unpacking, so I'll have to give a 'Flash your stash IOU.' I really will do it when I get things in order. I want to cull out the stuff I'm not crazy about anymore anyway.
Meantime, keep showing your stashes. I'm feeling better by the minute!