A Little Yarn On The Side

"I have measured out my life with coffee spoons" -- T. S. Eliot "I have measured out my life with fluffy purple swoopies" --Toni Sutton I'm up to 4 swoopies now. It's not halfway, but it's 4 instead of 3. And the only thing that is keeping me from flinging myself at the stash to find something--anything--different to knit is the knowledge that I have only about 70 yards more on this ball of yarn and I can add it to the TALLY. Well, that and the white chocolate martini I have promised myself when I do finish this ball. I might bathe in them when I finally finish this shawl...

This purple in fact-- It might take me that long. See those swoopy-parts? The bottom of the shawl actually has 10 of them. I have knit 3. I have all this: still left to knit. And this: is how much of the original yarn I have left to use, which is about 100 yards. I guess as long as I broke my one-year ban on buying yarn, I'm glad I just proved it was totally & completely necessary, but what if I hadn't been able to find more of the yarn???? Victorian Lace Today is so far off on yardage requirements that it is SCARY. I bought 3 more balls--681 EXTRA yards--and I might use up most of them!!!! That's a pretty big variance, even in lace knitting. And on a related note, 46,000 yards of lace yarn might indeed be a bit.....well...insane, really, but I just used up another 227 yards--which of course makes a HUGE difference..... At this rate I could actually RUN OUT of laceweight--probably in 2015???? I shudder at the very thought......

* Everyone else has one, and you are such a "joiner" if merino is involved! * No matter how awful the project is, the other on-line knitters will say nice things about it. * Your family is sick of hearing about the intricacies of lace knitting. * Knitting has become "hip" and it is the first time you are really "with it" and it needs to be documented. * Even if you managed to sew the sleeve to the neckhole, someone online will know how to fix it. * "Real life" people will find your stash insane. The online knitting community will be supportive. And a little jealous if it's REALLY big. * When you are excited that your husband has scheduled a "Boys Night Out" and you excited that you will get quality time alone with some alpaca, the online knitters will understand. And the number ONE reason: The online knitting community is completely & totally fabulous!!!!!!!

The deceptive thing about some lace projects is that it really feels like you're almost done when you reach the edging. The reality is, you're not even close. I have been working on the Lady's Circular Cape pretty faithfully (for me) for the past couple days, and this is how far I've gotten. It looks pretty far & feels pretty far until you look at how far I have left to go just on the bottom. Those are some very closely scrunched stitches, and each of those requires 2 rows of edging. Doing a little math, which is rarely a good idea at such times but I did it anyway, there are 684 stitches on the needle by the time you finish the body. Each of those requires a minimum of 2 rows (sometimes 4, but that's just too overwhelming to contemplate right now), so the bottom ALONE takes 1368 rows of knitted edging. Then there are the 2 sides and the top as well.... Heaven help me. The good news is that in the Year of the Stash Plan, this was optimistically listed as...

The good news is, my stash progress makes math really easy. The bad news is, I had hoped for more progress by now. Of course, considering I have even slightly less yarn than I started out the year with is huge progress for me--not to mention a real first. Today I finished THE PROJECT OF MISTAKES. Seriously, if there is a mistake that can be made on a quilt, it's on here. The blocks are done backwards, so the cool intertwining circle motif doesn't exist, I decided I didn't want to have to bind the quilt, so I sewed the edges together much as one would sew a pillow together, which in turn made it impossible to lay out flat to quilt. I tried out some machine embroidery in the center of the circles, not noticing until too late that some of the embroidery designs were set as squares & some are on point like a diamond. I started this thing about 4 years ago & all the mistakes had banished it to the Project Time-Out Bin ever since. I have occasionally taken it o...

Today I finished the Fruity Pebbles socks which brings me to 50 balls of yarn used this year!!!!!!!! HAPPY DANCE (in some sporty new socks even)!!!! Just think how exciting that would be if I hadn't bought 75 balls of yarn in December....that would actually be a net stash decrease....but I'm still hopeful for a net decrease overall. I do still have 7 more months. In a fit of resolution, madness, or total rebellion because I really did have other projects I needed to work on, I even finished a fall table runner that I started about 3 years ago: which means I average about one square a year. Truly a scary concept if I ever decide to make a king-size quilt--does cotton rot in 50 years????? And the latest obsession-- the Lady's Circular Cape, which is now at the border stage. I love the cleverness of knitted-on borders--it's such a great way to finish lace. Even if it does take FOREVER!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Last night I finished and blocked Sweet Pea and am now stuck with trying to figure out a way to wear a wool scarf in the summer because I am STILL madly in love with this scarf & really, really, REALLY want to wear it. And better yet--I have now used 49 balls of yarn and over 7000 yards of yarn from the stash!!!! Happy dance!!!!!!!!