Who Needs This Much Purple Yarn?

I spent some time this weekend organizing my craft room, which also doubles as a spare bedroom and storage space for stuff I just don’t know what to do with. For the most part the room stays fairly clutter-free, but I’ve been on some yarn buying binges lately (can’t pass up those discounts online), and the yarn was slowly spilling out of the closet taking up valuable floor space. So, I bought a few more bins and made some discoveries as I sorted through everything:

• Discovery #1:  I have more plastic bags than any one human should have. I don’t know how they all made it upstairs to my spare room. I’ll take some of the responsibility, but I also have to place some of it on my nearly-16-year-old cat Buster who has an obsession with plastic bags. I can’t count the number of times I’ve seen him walking around the house with one in his mouth. Making it crunch seems to make him incredibly happy.

• Discovery #2:  I have A LOT of pink, purple and red yarn—all kinds of shades and weights.  I made a conscious effort to change that up yesterday and bought two hanks of orange Blue Sky Alpaca Melange yarn. So soft and a not a single shade like it in my bins of yarn. I’m holding it together with a cream colored Blue Sky yarn to create a woven pattern scarf. I’m  still playing around with needle size—I’ll likely have to bump it up to a size 15 or 17 needle to make sure the scarf has some movement (woven stitch tends to be stiff).

• Discovery #3: In general, I just have way too much yarn (six very full bins, plus some bags with yarn to sell or donate). I don't know what other knitter's/crocheter's stashes look like, but mine is starting to look a little like I have a problem. A friend asked me last year how the Stitches Midwest show was and I responded that it was like taking an alcoholic to the best bar ever. My name is Melissa and I'm a yarn addict. I will say that for this past Stitches I made sure to have a list of specific projects to buy for so that I wouldn't just buy yarn willy nilly, although there was some of that too. I commented to one of the vendors how impressed I was with the size of the event and she responded that it was nothing compared to Stitches West. I immediately became giddy with the thought of a place with EVEN MORE YARN. But, I'm a fairly sensible person. I won't spend money on airfare and a hotel stay just to buy more yarn. Even I have my limits.

• Discovery #4:  I really need to shred the old bills and statements on a more regular basis. I filled two large garbage bags with shredded material. It’s amazing how much stuff we accumulate and live with and not even give a second thought to everyday.

• Discovery #5:  I had a lot more fabric (really good upholstery fabric) in my closet than I thought. It’s motivated me to make a case for my double pointed needles and my crochet hooks. I really like to sew, but other than just raising the hem on jeans, I haven’t worked on any big sewing projects in at least six months. My mother was hinting around about some new valences for her living room. I expect an actual request to come soon.

So now that it’s all straightened up, I keep going back to the room and opening the door and thinking to myself “wow, I can see all of the carpet again.”  That’s a pretty good feeling.