A Little Yarn On The Side

It's now been 7 months and one day since I bought any yarn, fabric, thread, or other craft supplies.  I'm sort of proud of myself--which I can't say very often when discussing the purchasing of yarn or fabric.  I have made two overall spending exceptions this year.  The first was the book for the Great Discussions group--technically the $20 covered the book and the dvd for the group, so I still view it more as a fee for the class than anything else.  The second exception is a new pair of sunglasses.  Mine broke about 5 years ago, which was bad enough, but now that I have new contacts and am wearing them more often (like, as I'm actually supposed to), and contacts tend to make eyes a bit more sensitive to light.  I did think about it for about a week, but I decided eye damage in pursuit of a spending ban was taking it a bit far even for me. And why I can't do moderation in any form:  as soon as I made one exception, I immediately wanted to go on a ...

My name is Toni.  I'm a yarnaholic, and it's been 90 days since my last yarn purchase. Borrowing from Alcoholics Anonymous, the Cold Sheepers in the Ravelry Stashdown group have badges.  The one-year badge is gold , and I am just lusting after that baby.  Hey, if a woman can have 64,000 yards of lace yarn, she can lust after a virtual badge featuring a sheep.  It's probably not even close to the oddest thing I've done, when you think about it..............

It's January 1 and I am starting my SIXTH year of Cold Sheeping.  I swear my stash has gotten smaller, but it would be hard to tell overall because I didn't start out with a very accurate record.  I thought I started out with a pretty clear picture of the stash last year, but packing up the sewing room unearthed some MAJOR amounts of unrecorded yarn.  So, five years later , I think I can honestly say that all yarn has been accounted for because I have no idea where else it could be lurking.   So, I am starting the year with: 949.29 balls of yarn 199,734.1 yards of yarn Totally scary numbers--but in the last 5 years of Cold Sheeping, I have used up: 439.99 balls of yarn 83,483.9 yards of yarn Also rather amazing numbers, really.  I didn't keep a record of "reward" or "whoops" or even "allowed" purchases, but I'm sort of guessing there has still been a substantial stash decrease.  Which means the stash was COMPLETELY insane 5 y...

And time for a new Project of the Month bag: Cotton washcloths!  That works out nicely, because it fits in with the Christmas basket stashdash AND the fact that there are 60 days left in the year and 17 projects to go, and I am starting to freak out just a bit.  So, the new washcloth is already cast on: and I'm thinking I can get two washcloths and a tribble out of this, so that would be 1 1/2 projects, leaving me with 15 and a half to go.  Still "yikes." The Christmas stockings are moving along, but I thought I was about to have a major issue on the second heel flap:  I ran out of red yarn.  I'm moving about more, but I still can't really sit, so I was contemplating how to send Andy around town looking for a yarn that I knew the make of but not the colorway, and decided to simplify things by looking on the internet....................only to find the darn stuff (Bernat Berella) has been discontinued.  Who discontinues acrylic afghan yarn?????...

Or thereabouts. Someone asked me how many skeins I have left in my stash after removing 220.  I'm using Ravelry, and don't actually mark off yarn that I've used on an unfinished project, so their spreadsheet shows 705 skeins left in my stash, but I know that at least 7 of those have been used up, so I'm under 700 skeins.  If I use them up at the 2008 speed, I'd be totally without yarn in about 6 years--in the strictly hypothetical sense, of course, because if I ever got down to having enough yarn to fit in ONE tub, I'd be buying up yarn so quickly that my credit card numbers would probably melt completely off my little card.  So getting down to no yarn is just completely out of the question.  BUT, if I continue Cold Sheeping until the end of 2011, I could be down to under 600 skeins, which sounds like a nice number.  Maybe that will be my stopping point?  I admit, 500 is a nice number as well--heck, I have nothing against 100 to be honest--I just don't th...

I started "cold sheeping" on January 1, 2008.  Since then--aside from some year-end reward yarn purchases--I have been knitting exclusively from stash.  I admit, I was starting to feel like I haven't even made a dent in my stash, but on a whim I recently tallied up my stash-busting to date: Today I used up my 200th ball of stash yarn. YAY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! No matter how you look at it, 200 skeins of yarn is a lot of yarn.  Want to know how much 200 skeins of yarn actually is?  It would look something like this: From a how-much-closet-space-it-took-up point of view, this would be quite a conservative picture as I have knit up all my really bulky-weight yarns, and a good chunk of this pile is laceweight because it is the easiest bin to get to, but it is STILL an amazing amount of yarn.  No wonder the stash didn't all fit into the sewing room! I believe the planned/allowed purchases would come to no more than 35 skeins, so even with that, for the last two and ...

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/theroyalfamily/7069612/Prince-of-Wales-leading-wool-fashion-comeback.html Unless the drop in the English wool market really did start 2 1/2 years ago...........like when I stopped buying wool......................................

I know I have raved about their yarn & customer service before, but yesterday I received an email from Elann.com saying they had credited my account for the skein of yarn--bought TWO years ago--that I just sent back.  In my letter, I had even told them that I could completely understand if it was outside their time limit for returns and that it really was more about letting them know about a problem, but one of the reasons I am a devoted fan & loyal customer is their commitment to customers, and it's nice to see a company that recognizes that little things can go a long way.  In reality, it was only about $5, but they could have stuck to a "policy" and said it was too late.  Instead, they chose to spend $5 to make a loyal customer happy--how many companies do you know that would make that choice? Of course, now I get to go through an entire year of Cold Sheeping knowing that I have a credit at my favorite yarn source........uh oh.......

So, in deciding whether or not to buy yarn at the end of the year or do another year of Cold Sheeping OR do both, some helpful person--whom I will eventually be forgiving--suggested I reexamine my stash to see where I was at.  According to Ravelry, I have 674 balls of yarn and 128,777 or 73 MILES of yarn in my stash. Oh my.... Granted, some of that yarn is involved in my 14 wips, and Ravelry really doesn't account for yarn used until a project is finished....but there is also still some yarn that isn't on Ravelry, so they probably even out.  Part of me, of course, would argue that as it's my hobby and something I enjoy, why not just go ahead and have a really large stash and to heck with the cold sheeping.  Generally, I would be of that opinion, but the fabric and yarn stash has become a bit of a space problem.  I have it all crammed INTO the sewing room, but sometime I'd like to be able to put the doors back onto the closet and perhaps be able to walk around...

So, there are 57 days left in the year.....which means I can buy yarn in 58 days.  Of course, since I have only used up 57 skeins of yarn so far this year, there hasn't been much of a dent in the stash overall, so the question is......... Do I Continue Cold Sheeping in 2010? I'd like to say I have grown & matured enough to be trusted with the option of buying yarn without going on a total free-for-all with the Visa, but I'd like to be taller too, and that hasn't happened either. My original plan was to buy yarn for one sweater each for Andy & I, then go back to cold sheep, but that little naggy voice in the back of my mind that is always SUCH a kill-joy has nicely reminded me that I still haven't finished the Kauni cardigan, which was my reward yarn for LAST year.  I'll probably just Beginend up ignoring Little Miss Buzz-Kill, but that does raise an interesting point. Before I started the FIRST year of Cold Sheeping, I bought--well, and insane ...

Step 1. Admit that you have more yarn than you can knit within the next 6 months, unless you can learn to knit in your sleep. Step 2. Admit that sheep, llamas, and alpacas have produced fleece for hundreds of years, and they will probably continue to do so Step 3. Admit that some yarn in your stash you have never truly intended to knit–you just wanted to own it. Step 4. Admit that just because it’s 50% off, bad yarn is still bad yarn Step 5. Admit that, try as you might, there will always be a limit to how fast you can knit Step 6. Admit that other family members have rights to closet space, too. Step 7. Admit that visiting a LYS daily is probably not a good idea Step 8. Admit...