Category: stash

Yarn and Fasting

Marie Haigh11 Comments

Do you remember me telling you about the sweater jacket I had knitted, but hated to wear? I frogged it some time ago. This weekend I finally reskeined all the wool.

It took several hours. I had knit the jacket with two strands of yarn held together. So, first I had to separate the two strands and then I had to whirl them up on my umbrella swift. If ever I have been grateful that I purchased the swift so many years ago, my gratitude soared this weekend. If I had been required to wrap the yarn around a chair, I think my arms would have fallen off and my mind would have followed them.

Most of the advice I had read in the past advised me to simply steam the skeins. But, I had 19 skeins. I couldn’t even imagine how long it would take me to steam 19 skeins individually. Needless to say, I didn’t steam them. Rather, I gave them a good soaking and used my washing machine to spin the water out. It worked like a charm. They were hanging in my basement (laundry room) to dry in the course of 20 minutes.

Two days later, they are still drying, but I am in no rush. I still have a Christmas tree skirt to finish knitting before I can starting dreaming of my new sweater jacket. Since I first frogged the original sweater, I have been hunting for a replacement pattern. I found it a week and a half ago: Louhi by Tuulia Salmela (Ravelry link).

As adorable as Jake looks in the picture above, he is causing me grief. Periodically, he decides that rather than eat his Eagle Pack dog food, he would prefer to live off of dog biscuits and peanut butter. Mind you, on a typical day, he might get one small biscuit from the mailman and one large biscuit from me. He receives a kong filled with peanut butter as a bedtime snack. An 80 pound dog cannot live off of 2 dog biscuits and a scoop of peanut butter. It simply isn’t possible. Yet, Jake is a stubborn dog. He waits until he is famished with hunger (approximately 2-3 days of not eating) before he caves and starts eating the oh-so-boring-but-nutritious-and-hearty dog food.

We rescued Jake 2 years ago. He is 5 now. We have done this fasting dance at least 5 times. My will is rock solid for the 1st day. I truly believe that Jake will simply eat at the next meal. After Jake has gone 3 meals without food (breakfast, dinner, and breakfast on the 2nd day), I start to lose my resolve and slowly crumble into a half-crazed (frustrated, bewildered, and worried) woman. Hand feeding doesn’t work. Switching the dog food does work (as I learned the 1st time we went through this), but I prefer to not take that route. Experts say that switching dog food every time a dog decides he no longer wants that particular food will create a picky eater. The goal is to NEVER have to do this fasting dance again.

Now, true, it is summer and Jake doesn’t eat as much food as he does in the winter. Rarely do we do this dance in the winter.

It’s times like these I really wish I could talk to my dog. Although, I imagine the conversation would go something like this:

Jake, you need to eat something.

I don’t want to eat dog food. I want a tasty treat instead.

Jake, you can’t live off of dog treats. It’s not possible.

I don’t care. Treats taste better than dog food.

Well, you have a point there, Jake. Still you need to eat ‘real’ food.

I’m sorry you are upset, but I’m still not eating that.

Yep. Sometimes words aren’t necessary.

Lovely Packages of Wool

Marie Haigh9 Comments

Look what came in the mail yesterday!

and

The skein is 100% merino wool in a lace-weight. It was hand-dyed by Yarn Chef. The color matches perfectly with the yellow paint in my living room. I plan to use the yarn to make a curtain for the window in our front door.

The last picture features 2 four-ounce roving of Shetland Wool from Serenity Sheep Woolens, Montana. It arrived not a moment too soon. I should finish spinning the last of my Corriedale roving tonight while watching my Phillies play the Jays.

Speaking of the Phillies, did you see Worthy (Jayson Werth) last night? He was on fire! He tied a Phillies record by hitting 8 RBIs (Runs Batted In) via 3 home runs with one being a grand slam. The only other Phillies MLB player to do so was Schmidty (Mike Schmidt).

Doing the Spring Shuffle

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It is supposed to climb to 80 degrees F today. I have drug my feet long enough. It is time to put away the long underwear and wool sweaters.

Once I started, it was a joy to see all my summer dresses again. Dan, ever the laid-back man, was just as relieved to have his short sleeved work shirts back. Two crates of summer clothes came out of the cedar closet. Four crates and one basket have to fit back in. Unless I remove some of my wool, they won’t make it.

I am NOT removing my wool from the safety and security of the cedar closet. There are wicked and evil moths flitting about. I have skeins of wool that are OOAK (one of a kind).

I will be as reasonable as a yarn lover can be. I will tuck the hand knit and 100% wool sweaters into the cedar closet. My treasured stoles and shawls will remain tucked away in my cedar drawer. However, the cotton and acrylic clothing will have to make do in our guest bedroom closet.

None of this needs to be mentioned to Dan. If you see him, mum’s the word.

Flashing my Organized Stash

Marie Haigh9 Comments

It is finally done.

Two Sunday ago, I organized my yarn into separate bins labeled “All Wool”, “Wool Blends”, “Cotton and Cotton Blends” and “Acrylic”. I then wrote down all the pertinent information off the labels – on all the yarn that still had labels, that is. Last Sunday, I uploaded the last of the yarn information to Ravelry.

I should mention that I only organized the yarn that lives in the cedar closet. Yarn received as a Christmas present or yarn currently being used remains unorganized. Baby steps, People!

I even boxed some yarn up that I knew deep down I would never use. The yarn will be shipped to Jennifer Marsh for use in the International Fiber Collaborative. Now before you start singing my praises, let me mention that most of the yarn I am gifting is leftover from a previous project, purchased in one of my yard sale finds, or purchased in one skein amounts.

Yep, that’s right; I’m not as good as I seem. I still have lots of yarn that in my heart of hearts I know I will never use. However, this is yarn that is too beautiful or too soft or too sentimental to use or gift away.

Hopefully all of this organization will keep Dan from finding me in my pajamas, sitting on the basement floor, surrounded by boxes of yarn, rummaging frantically for the skein of yarn I just know I have!

My Whereabouts

Marie Haigh6 Comments

Guess where I went yesterday?

One can’t go to center city Philadelphia, home of three fab yarn stores, without going to at least one of them! It’s impossible. I told myself that I wouldn’t have the time and wouldn’t go. When I got out of my dentist’s office early, my resolve grabbed a canoe and headed down river. Next thing I knew, I was walking to South Street.

Of course, I had to leave with something for my troubles.


It is organically grown cotton by Blue Sky Alpaca. After swearing off cotton for years, I thought I would give it a try again. Why do I hate cotton, you ask.

My reasons for hating cotton:

  • If my hands get the least bit warm, it sticks to them like feather to tar.
  • Cotton lacks the stickiness of wool. Wool wants to lay down with its fellow kind. Cotton has no such feelings. Thus, as the Yarn Harlot would say, “it’s not as forgiving as lovely wool”. It separates with the flick of a needle and is slippery to boot.
  • It’s not as warm. In Pennsylvania, the cold months outnumber the warm months. It’s important to have something warm nearby at all times.
  • It’s not as easy, fun or enjoyable to knit as lovely wool. It takes a steadier hand and more patience.

Knowing how much I hate cotton, I was still wooed by Blue Sky Alpaca’s cotton. First, it’s organically grown. Second, it’s amazingly soft. Third, it was dyed in a lovely brown and Loop only had one skein (I needed 2) of the dyed merino wool that I wanted.

My plan is to knit this cotton into a Chevron & Diamond scarf for myself. I’ll be reporting back to you on what I think of the yarn.

Yard Sale

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I don’t normally go to yard sales. But, when the newspaper ad listed knitting and sewing supplies, I HAD to go. It wasn’t an option. What if they had bags and bags of yarn or fabric? I can’t pass that up.

By the time I got there, I had myself into a frenzy thinking that there was going to be a mountain of yarn and fabric.

Well, there were no mountains. There wasn’t even any fabric. The yarn, spread out over 3 blankets, was mostly acrylic. I was a little broken hearted.

Then, I saw a skein of wool in all that acrylic. So, I did what any self-respecing yarn lover would do. I got down on my hands and knees and sifted through the entire stash of yarn, pulling out all the balls of wool and cotton. I ended up with a plastic bag (grocery store size) full of yarn. I paid $1.00 for the entire bag. I tried to give her more, but she didn’t think it was worth that much.

I brought it home and laid it out on my dining table.

It was a lovely sight until I started looking closer at the yarn. Some of the yarn was worthless. The red yarn had frayed in so many sections that I had to throw the whole skein out. It looked like moths had just ravished it. They got to a ball of the green yarn too. Even the orange yarn, which mentioned it was mothproof, had damage on the outside of it. Thankfully, the cotton yarn was just fine.

After rolling most of the skeins into yarn cakes and securing everything into ziploc bags, I was left with this stash. It’s not half bad for $1.00.

I should go to yard sales more often.

I also learned that I should make a database of my yarn. In my efforts to jam everything back into my cedar closet, I came across yarn I had forgotten that I had.

A Gift from My Mother-in-law

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I have the best Mother-in-law in the world!

She came down to visit this week and brought me a gift: a whole tote of yarn from her stash.

Here it is all spread out.

Pink wool from Briggs and Little:
Lucky her, she is only one hour away from the Canada border. So, she slips across at least once a year to restock her wool supply.

6 balls of brown wool and one ball of white wool – vendor unknown


5 balls of brown wool:
This was a gift to my MIL from her MIL. It is very soft wool. It is also hand spun.

Several skeins of bright pink wool from Knit Picks. I will have to make this into a sweater … or a skirt … for my neice. She just LOVES this color.


Lastly, my MIL’s favorite find. She purchased this from a local fiber fair in Maine. The wool is hand dyed and hand spun. It is super soft. She was hesitant to give it up, but didn’t want it to sit in her stash unused for another year. I wound it up into balls as soon as I got home. It isn’t enough to make a sweater out, but it will be perfect for a shrug or a hat/scarf combo or a lampshade cozy.

Then, after gathering up all this yarn for me, she trolled through my blog and noticed that my balls of yarn were still done in the old fashioned style. In other words, I still wind them by hand. Insisting that she isn’t going to buy any more wool for quite some time (I give her 3 months before she caves) and that she has wound her entire stash into yarn cakes, she gave me her ball winder. Boy, oh boy, I can never go back to winding yarn by hand. I am converted! It took me 3 minutes to wind a ball of yarn. 3 minutes! Before it would take me at least 15 minutes even with my trusty umbrella.

My MIL made me swear that I would keep this yarn free from dirt and far away from those pesky _oths. Just to put her mind at ease, I took a picture of the yarn back in the tote, safe and sound in my cedar closet.

Thanks, Mom!