beautiful things

'Fessing up

I love sweater weather.  Not sweater and coat weather, but "just sweater" weather.  Sweater weather is sadly fleeting in NYC - spring and fall pass by in what seems like a matter of weeks and before you know it you're in sweltering humidity or freezing cold.

One of the good things about being pregnant is... sweater weather is magically extended!  I'm walking around the city gaping at people, most of whom are already in winter coats including many hats, scarves and boots, wondering aren't they HOT?!!!  I'm still wearing sandals, a short sleeved shirt and a heavy cardigan/sweater coat and I'm hot!  It's magical and really kind of awesome because usually I'm the one who's cold.  Of course, it wasn't so great this summer, which is usually my favorite season despite the humidity, if only because it's longer than spring or fall and who doesn't like the long daylight hours?  Summer, while pregnant, standing on hot sticky airless subway platforms?  Not so great, although I have to say that NYC subway riders have been fantastic and people have been giving me their seats left right and center since I first started showing, and now that I'm really showing, I rarely have to stand.

I think February is going to be a great time to have a baby, aside from the whole navigating snow and ice and possibly blizzards while nine months pregnant thing.  I'm looking forward to being less cold in the winter, and in January and February, usually my least favorite months, we will be... kind of distracted to say the least.  And by the time summer rolls around we will hopefully be somewhat in the swing of things and ready to get out and about a bit.

Of course, now that I have all this baby knitting queued up, I'm longing to knit warm cozy items... for myself!  Sweaters, cardigans, a cowl or two, a cozy scarf out of handspun... but of course I'm still excited about and focused on the baby knitting.  I'm not going to start sweater knitting right now, but instead I've been enjoying fondling all the knitwear in stores and have purchased not one but two cardigan/sweater coats which, I think, happen to look great during pregnancy but these are not actual maternity items and will work well after too.  Is there such a thing as a nesting wardrobe?!

I did go maternity clothes shopping last week by the way, and now that I know about the concepts of "wrapping and ruching" it does seem like most maternity clothing is designed more along the concepts of "shapeless and baggy."  I did manage to pick up a few things, and with the addition of some items online, I think I'm in pretty good shape.  The heavier cardigans mean I can wear my summer tops for longer and so far that is working out to be a good combination.  Plus I picked up a pair of really comfortable maternity jeans (a lot more comfortable than the cropped pair I had previously) and it turns out that this skirt also converts into a strapless dress so I may even be set for a wedding next month and a few holiday parties, although I may have to squeeze in a quick knitted shrug to go with it...

Anyway, now is the time, I guess, to 'fess up about all the yarn buying from last month.  I went on quite a tear last month but I'm doing pretty well on my resolutions.  I ended up skipping Rhinebeck.  I had a really busy day Saturday and wanted to stay close to home on Sunday (I had planned on going for the day) and frankly I was a little scared to go given all the money I've recently spent on yarn.  I did get the Pigeon Roof Studios bitter orange, but that was still in September, and I have ordered 1 extra skein of FSM (spring) as an addition to my Seasons subscription but as that is a one time opportunity I figured that was an ok exception!

Alright, deep breath, here are the stats for September:

skeins purchased: 315 (39) 

skeins knit: 121 (9) 

yards purchased: 60,224 (14,117) 

yards knit: 18.408 (1,283) 

yards remaining: 40,917

$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): um, I'm going to cheat and not say but it was a LOT

knitting since: 1/27/07

So, um, yeah!  That I knit 9 skeins seems like kind of a lot but I guess 6 of them were little pakucho skeins.  1,283 yards knit is pretty respectable.  To have purchased over 14,000 yards of yarn... yikes!  That's as much as my entire stash was at the beginning of this year!  Yes, most of it was sock or lace, but still!

Anyway, you probably want photos.  I'm starting to upload them to flickr a batch at a time so I'll have an eye candy entry up soon...

Playing with my stash

The funny thing about the knitting/fishing couple is that the two interests are relatively compatible. This week, I received a big box of yarn, and my husband received a big box of fishing stuff (hooks, lures, bait etc.)!  Even the costs seem to be relatively similar, although we haven't done a direct comparison.  Believe me, my husband is ecstatic that I've taken up knitting because it means that I don't complain when he disappears for hours on end on the lake (I am happily at home or at shore, or in some cases, on the boat with him, knitting).  Nor do I complain when our tv is set to the fishing channel for hours on end - when I really can't take it, I watch or listen to something off my computer, while knitting!  Fishing does slow down in the winter, at least on the east coast, but there's always the aforementioned fishing channel, and plenty of research and shopping online in preparation for the next season.  At least we both have our obsessions, although he has yet to start a fishing blog and I don't think there's a ravelry for fishing... yet!  I'm sure there are sites where people post pictures of their catch but I can't say I've gone looking...

We even share some of the same accessories.  Well, not share exactly, as in at the same time, but I have a nice fishing tackle box and some cute little boxes for some of my knitting accessories.

I also recently "lent" him some of my plastic yarn containers to hold all his plastic worms (don't ask) which were hitherto spread all over our living room floor.  Kind of like my yarn is now - I need those boxes back!

Speaking of which, well, yes, I've bought a lot of yarn lately.  Here are my stats for August (running net total, with total for the month in parentheses):

skeins purchased: 276 (17)  

skeins knit: 112 (2.5) 

yards purchased: 46,107 (5,795) 

yards knit: 17,125 (439) 

yards remaining: 28.083

$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): $542.40 (eek!)

knitting since: 1/27/07

Yards knit is pretty low for me - I spent too much time shopping!  And it's the most $ spent and yards purchased in a month so far... but not by much.

$ spent does include my first Sundara subscription payment for yarn I have not received yet (so is therefore not counted in my stash) and it does include my Madtosh orders which I have not yet received.  I've already counted that yardage though because, well, it's not going to get any better this month because well um yes cough splutter I have been trying my hand at purchasing yarn off the ravelry boards.  And succeeding!  Or failing... to keep to a budget.  But let's look at the positive shall we?!

Lurking around and frequently refreshing on ravelry to keep an eye on ISO (in search of) and destashing threads does pay off.  On Monday, I managed to snap up a skein of Mama Blue sock yarn which was very exciting as I have never even been close to obtaining this yarn.  I was also approached by a super nice ravelry user who saw my name on the "ISO list" and offered to sell me a skein of toasted orange over pistachio sock yarn that I have been seriously coveting for my giraffe project and also for general gorgeousness but had pretty much given up upon.  I can't tell you how happy I was!!!  I picked it up from the post office yesterday and oh my.

 

Why yes I did open it on the way home from the post office!

 

Doesn't it look great with my citrus zinger?

So of course now I am torn between a) starting a Little Giraffe right away b) waiting until my MadTosh arrives to see how those colors look and c) saving this beautiful yarn for something more "worthy" than a stuffed toy.  Neither color are exactly "wardrobe colors" for me but I think I'll wait for the MadTosh (where are they?!!!) to decide for sure.

This is kind of my dilemma with Sundara in general - there are many more colors that I love than there are colors that I'd like clothing or accessories in, but I really want all the colors that I love!  A given skein can be so pretty as an object in and of itself that is so hard to resist... but there's only so much yarn one can justify buying just because it's pretty!  The latest announcement about the new collections that are coming out has me even more confused and I think I'm getting a little carried away by the scarcity frenzy.  I'm keeping my four Seasons subscription and that should give me more than enough yarn, but then something like toasted orange over pistachio arrives on my doorstep and is so stunningly gorgeous that I just want more.  It's not easy, this endless cycle of self-restraint and gluttony!

That's not all - gluttony won over yesterday when I found myself purchasing not one but two separate skeins of Sundara Silk Lace... this after declaring myself officially "off lace" for a while following all my recent lace projects!  They were for sale on the ravelry boards and so rarely do a) people want to sell rather than trade for other Sundara and b) I see their posts within minutes so I stand half a chance of getting them that I just couldn't resist.  One is grey over pink which was a limited edition (I could only find a photo of the colorway in aran silky merino) and the other is mahogany over marmalade, the latest Autumn silk lace shipment (to those who were subscribed earlier this year ie not me!)  

Yeah, so much for a yarn budget!

I think it's about time I knit a lace project for myself though, don't you think?!

I'm determined to do more knitting this month because shopping is fun but... not quite as relaxing.  I have been working on the trellis baby blanket and it is coming along great, so I do feel I have my "knitting mojo" back.  It's the first time since my recent deadline knitting that I've felt truly addicted and enthralled and I am enjoying every minute of it.  I'll post photos soon.

In the meantime, I'm also going through my stash and assigning projects to it where I can so I can get a better handle of where I am.  Ravelry isn't quite set up yet to create such a list so I've started a page here on the blog for it, although it's mostly for my reference, so there are no links or anything.  So now when I feel like "shopping" I can look through my queue or other patterns to see if I can assign more of my stash to projects!  My first pass already reminded me of some leftovers from various projects that I could use to knit hats or blanket squares for the Stash and Burn 7 Long project (see episode 58).

I'm looking forward to more queue organization in ravelry though, so I can sort between "am definitely knitting soon", "would like to knit someday" and "just want to bookmark for now" projects.  It would be great to be able to link yarn to projects before "casting on" too...

What's next?

Well, the wedding was a big success, everyone had a good time, the stole was much admired by all... but no, I didn't get any pictures!  At least not of the stole.  Nor did I take any more photos before giving it so that may be it!

Anyway, that has pretty much exclusively been my knitting this past month, aside from one day knitting on another gift that I'm almost done with.  

Here are my stats for July (running net total, with total for the month in parentheses):

skeins purchased: 259 (0) (yes 0!)  

skeins knit: 109 (1.25) (but one of them was over 800 yards!)

yards purchased: 40,312 (0) 

yards knit: 16,686 (735) 

yards remaining: 22,728  

$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): $0

knitting since: 1/27/07

It will be fun to cast on for and/or think about new projects this month after being so focused on the one project, so much so that I haven't even been spending much time on Ravelry, reading other blogs or shopping for yarn.  I'm pretty close to finishing the other gift so I will do that first, plus I need to get buttons for the baby surprise jacket as the baby shower for the recipient is next week.  I have a couple of long term projects on the needles (the pinwheel baby blanket and my clapotis, which I did work on more this weekend) and I need to summon up the courage to sew a lining for my one skein clutch but other than that, well, what next?!  It's kind of wide open.  

I'm trying to decide on a blanket to knit with my Pakucho.  As I'm going for squares with my Big Tryst I'm thinking of something in one piece, possibly cabled, such as the Cross Lane Cable blanket (ravelry, flickr) or Stormy Weather from the same book (ravelry, flickr).  The book, Gorgeous Knitted Afghans, sounds pretty good.  Or maybe I'll go for giant cables like the Cable Comfort Throw (ravelry, flickr) although it would not be as challenging.  There is also this Reversibly Cabled Afghan (ravelry, flickr) or the Exquisite Afghan (ravelry, flickr).  Purity (ravelry) from the same book, Big Book of Quick Knit Afghans, also looks like a possibility, as does Endearing (ravelry, flickr).

Of course, I could always design my own pattern but I think that's a little too much thinking for me right now.  I may just order the two books mentioned above and do some swatching to see what I like.  I would be a good excuse to get The Knitter's Book of Yarn as well - it's been sitting in my cart for a while and would enable me to get the free shipping!

Also on my mind - something felted, either zinnia, or a pattern from my SP12 books.

June's stash update

I've been very quiet I know.  Mostly I have been frantically working on the lace stole I am knitting for my cousin's (well, my husband's cousin's) wedding on August 9th.  After all the fussing around with ordering yarn and returning it and ordering a different yarn I was not left with a lot of time.  I had to make a schedule for myself to make sure I don't end up with a last minute panic!  Basically, I have to do one 16 row repeat a day, and I can take a few days off here and there - that amounts to about 2 hours of knitting a day.  That's turning out to be harder for me to maintain than I anticipated, although I am able to catch up on the weekends.  Still, it's a lot of knitting and it's not super difficult but it's not exactly mindless, plus the yarn is very fine.  I'm happy with how it's coming out but I'm certainly looking forward to getting back to some thicker yarn!  I think that I'll be taking a bit of a break from lace after this.

I did do the stash math for June and... it's not too bad.  I wasn't sure how it was going to come out as I did make several purchases but I did return quite a bit of lace (the 3 skeins of ivory sea silk that turned out to be TOO ivory for the wedding stole, as well as 2 skeins of cashmere-silk as the print o' the wave stole only ended up using 3 skeins, although I had never added 1 of those skeins to my stash as I thought it was likely I'd be returning it).  The returns helped with both the overall yardage and the $ for the month.  I wasn't sure how much I had knit either as I've been all over the place a bit... still didn't quite make it over the 1,000 mark!

Anyway, here's what I've got: (running net total, with total for the month in parentheses)

skeins purchased: 259 (27) 

skeins knit: 108 (7.2) 

yards purchased: 40,312 (3,074) 

yards knit: 15,951 (976) 

yards remaining: 23,462 

$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): ($88.97 - although really it was almost $200 more not including the store credits I got on returns) 

knitting since: 1/27/07

After the various shopping sprees over the past couple of months I, dare I say it, might be ready to take it easy this month on the buying.  I haven't bought anything so far, and in fact haven't even really browsed for anything. The only purchase in my line of sight right now is for the Tidewater Wrap... but I probably shouldn't think too much about it as I'm sure I could come up with more!  

Here are some of my purchases from the last couple of months...

Debbie Bliss Cashmerino DK for a gift:

Classic Elite Allure:

This was funny because it was a WEBS purchase and I was just really drawn to the four remaining available colorways and how they looked together on the website page!  I'm thinking of making Zinnia with this and did a couple of sketches to try out color schemes:

My first Malabrigo... and some more Pakucho for a blanket:

Oooh, my first Wollmeise, won in a blog contest from tigerlilith, and some gorgeous sock yarn from sunshineyarns:

Here's the Alpaca With a Twist Fino that I'm knitting the wedding stole out of.

Another Etsy purchase, from Larimeloom.  On the left is Lavander Alpaca Handspun and on the right is Gray and Rosy Handspun Norweigan Fleece.  The skeins are tiny but the yarn is beautiful.

Also from Etsy, the very pretty Misty Violets Handspun Corriedale and unusual Snowy Harvest Handspun Superwash Merino from Aspen Moon Arts.  The Snowy Harvest colorway is unusual in that I don't see a lot of colorways like this and it is also a little outside the type of colorways I usually am drawn to.  As with most of my handspun, I have no idea what I'm going to make with it yet!

And lastly, my new obsession, sKNITches Big Tryst, an absolutely gorgeous superwash merino, cashmere and nylon blend.  This was my first sKNITches purchase and not only is the yarn soft and plus but I absolutely ADORE the colorways... seriously, I love ever single colorway shown for this yarn.  I'd love to make an afghan with a whole bunch of colorways.  It would be gorgeous.  I wonder when the next update of the store is going to be... according to the Ravelry forum it might be soon!  There's a beautiful cowl knit in Big Tryst shown here.  Anyway, on the left is Rosette and on the right is Featherby.

And... that's "it" for now!

May

So it turns out that buying yarn takes away from knitting time! I thought I'd have a much higher yardage knit this month seeing as the Voyager Lace Stole (May's main project) uses a much heavier weight yarn than the Print O' The Wave Stole (April's main project). But no...

Here are the stats for May (running total with total for month in parentheses)

skeins purchased: 232 (34)
skeins knit: 100.8 (9.1)
yards purchased: 37,238 (5,521)
yards knit: 14,975 (898)
yards remaining: 21,365
$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): ($514.65 - yikes!)
knitting since: 1/27/07

In addition to my earlier shopping spree, I made another little (or not so little) round of purchases last week. None of it has arrived yet, but overall I am pretty happy with my stash enhancement - it's a collection and an investment right?!!

I enjoyed knitting Voyager (by the way, it seems to be dry already!) but I'm ready for some color, and some quick fun projects, before I head back into stole-land. I still have a good chunk of the border to finish on Print O' The Wave before my mother-in-law's birthday in July, and next up is a stole for my cousin-in-law to wear at her wedding at the beginning of August. The yarn for that hasn't arrived yet so I'm thinking of squeezing in a Baby Surprise Jacket in the meantime... I've knit so many of these in my imagination with all the beautiful sock yarn that I see that I think it's time I made one for real!

I also have several FO's from the beginning of the year that I never posted about so I want to catch up on that too...

April recap

So the whole hunkering down with my knitting thing in April worked out pretty well and for the first time ever, my stash went down for the month!

Here are the stats! (running total with total for month in parentheses)

skeins purchased: 198 (1)
skeins knit: 91.7 (4.8)
yards purchased: 31,717 (128)
yards knit: 14,077 (1,394)
yards remaining: 16,741
$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): ($15.50)
knitting since: 1/27/07

I was helped a great deal by the April Spring Cleaning Challenge over on the Stash and Burn Group on Ravelry - the challenge was to destash 1,000 yards in April (up to 250 of those yards could be via trade or sell).

Here's how I did:

Yards to start: 18,007

Yards knit:

clapotis: 321 - no recent picture

print o’ the wave stole: 541 - I'm actually halfway done with the border now, and still loving it!

one skein clutch: 118 - I did go to Purl Patchwork where I obsessed for an embarrassingly long time about which fabric to use, and ended up hedging my bets and picking out three! It was all I could do to resist buying bundles of "fat quarters" just because they were pretty!

lala scarf: 370 - uh, still haven't blocked it

mermaid gloves: 44

Total knit: 1394

Yards bought: 128

Final yardage: 16,741

Stash burned: 1266!

And yes, I almost managed to purchase no yarn at all but I did end up buying one skein of Alchemy Temple which is strangely not listed on the Alchemy website or on Ravelry (at least not until I just added it) but is a beautiful machine washable superfine merino. I've been looking for a superwash yarn in green for a gift for a friend and was hoping to try something new so when I saw this, I snapped it up and it has not disappointed!

My friend requested some wristwarmers like these but I decided to try a different pattern too - the mermaid gloves, except I did not make individual fingers or make them as long. It was a great knit and I'm really happy with how they came out! I'll post photos once the gift has been received so it is still somewhat of a surprise for her...

I also visited two new yarn stores over the past couple of months - String and Knit New York. Both stores were kind of a revelation as they have beautiful but entirely different collections to each other and to Purl. I've been to Purl so many times now that I'm not sure how it could ever NOT be my favorite, plus it's more convenient for me, but I can see myself branching out a little.

String definitely has an Upper East Side vibe to it. They have a lot of beautiful cashmere, including Koigu cashmere which I fondled furiously... and they had the CUTEST little ribbed baby sweater knit in it that was just gorgeous.... but takes 3 SKEINS!!! $150 for the yarn for a tiny baby sweater - ouch! I have to admit, I would consider it for a very special baby. Speaking of ouch, how about Qiviuk? (That's a good scrabble word.) Yes that's right, $138 for 1 little 2oz ball! It has to be said though, the sample scarf they had there in this was just beautiful.

I loved Knit New York too, and they have tons of colorways of, amongst other things, Malabrigo, Debbie Bliss Cashmerino, Noro Silk Garden and Kureyon and oh my oh my, the Artyarns 5-ply cashmere! That is definitely going on my shopping list one day. They had a beautiful pair of fetchings knit up in a pink colorway and, well, need I say more? I will be back!

And no, I didn't buy anything at either store! (Oh wait, I did get some Lace Addis for Print O'The Wave at String but no yarn!)

My "hunkering down" knitting is going to continue into May I think, although I'm most likely not going to meet the 1,000 yard goal this time, seeing as I just bought 10 skeins of Pakucho at an amazing price for the Voyager Lace Stole shown on the same page. I seem to be all about the stole lately. This one is for another friend whose birthday is at the beginning of June. She asked for a stole, any stole, any color, winter or summer, and when I saw this I jumped on it, or rather, waited patiently until no-buying April was over and hoped they wouldn't sell out!

I could possibly still make the goal if much of my knitting is on bulkier yarn - here are my possible goals for May:

Starting yardage: 16,741

Definite goals:
Finish print o’ the waves stole: approx 400 yards
Finish mermaid gloves: approx 80 yards - DONE!
Make voyager lace stole: approx 880 yards

Possible other goals (need another 520 yards total)
Make progress on clapotis: approx 650 yards if I complete it
Make baby surprise jacket: approx 360 yards if I complete it
Make zinnia bag: approx 500 yards if I complete it

And oh yeah, I almost forgot, but I won not one but TWO contests! Much to my amazement, I won second prize in a blog contest at Kathryn Ivy and I am getting Alice's package. I believe there were something like 96 entrants and two winners so, wow! And then, on top of that, I won one of the Ravelraiser prizes - a $20 gift certificate to the Diva Knitting Store. Not sure what the odds were for that but given that they raised over $70K and you got one entry for every $10 donated, I am doubly amazed! Thank you Alice and Cheryl for the prizes!

Stash stats

Well, in my newly stash-organized mode, here are my stash stats for March 2008 (running total with total for month in parentheses):

skeins purchased: 197 (15)
skeins knit: 86.9 (5.2)
yards purchased: 31,589 (5,601)
yards knit: 12,683 (1,448)
yards remaining: 18,007
$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): ($320.90)
knitting since: 1/27/07

Yes, I am omitting total $ spent on yarn! But I will keep posting how much I spent for each month.

Out of all the months I have been keeping track, I spent and acquired the most this month, but I also knit the most this month.

Organizing the stash!

(Don't forget to enter the blogiversary contest!)

Well, it had to happen sooner or later. Yes, that's right, I am succumbing to the allure of the clapotis. I mentioned this beautiful one the other day, and then today saw this one from Octopus Knits (she of the tessellating fish baby blanket I mentioned the other day as well). Between these two projects she really has me hankering for earthtones with blue highlights. I love the subtlety of the Lanas Puras yarn she used in Mountain Sky - from afar, it looks like a neutral, but close up you see the blues.

I have been assured that it's quite ok to do so, but it does seem like a bit of a creative cop-out to copy someone's yarn choice and color choice for a project, especially something like Clapotis where there are so many choices. I guess it's no different than going with the yarn specified in the pattern. The thing is, I'm still pretty nervous about substituting yarn as I don't have enough experience to know how the yarn will knit up, especially if I am buying online. It's hard to tell even from photos how a piece really looks and feels in person.

Of course, Ravelry helps immensely here, and from looking through the thousands of Clapotis (4823 as of right now) well, just a few of the thousands, some other yarn choices present themselves. Well of course, there's the yarn specified in the pattern, Lornas Laces Lion and Lamb (there's a nice color chart here where you can see the colors better than you can on the Lornas Laces website). The endless color options are rather mind boggling. The clothing wearer part of me would like a neutral shawl that I could throw on with anything, so a colorway like Aslan would work great. The knitter/color lover part of me would like something more interesting. Edgewater is along similar lines of blues and browns (and greens). For blue, Cool or Sand Ridge are appealing. For something more colorful, how about Watercolor? I don't know... it's impossible to choose colors online!!!! And I'm sure every one of these colorways would look beautiful in this pattern.

Another possible choice is Cashlana used here. I'm not sure what color though. Perhaps stone.

Ooh, this one is pretty in Malabrigo, which I have been dying to try. And yay for a really good color card.

Too many choices.

To help justify/rationalize some new yarn purchases, I have finally got around to organizing my stash! You may remember I used to post monthly stats on my stash, but over the past few months fell behind. So today, as I had the day off, I set about going through my entire stash, photographing and documenting all the recent purchases that hadn't yet been entered into my spreadsheet and/or on ravelry, and organizing everything into plastic containers.

Here's what my stash looked like before:

Yes, it had got to that "shove everything into the cabinet and close the door quickly before it all falls out" stage. This is what would happen when you opened the door...

Wait a few seconds longer and more would tumble out (see the bag of Noro Silk Garden previously in the top left hand corner?)

To the right of these photos above you can see a few of the plastic containers where I had already started storing some of the yarn scattered around the house. Here's the rest of my stash spread out on the floor. It actually didn't look as bad (ie large in quantity) as I was fearing:

Perfectly reasonable, yes?

Here it is all organized:

Before and after:

I feel so much better!!!

Of course, it takes up more space in the containers, but not only is it more organized, it's easier to handle and I'm no longer worrying that yarn is getting squished being stored in bags.

Here are the stats as of 3/1/07:

skeins purchased: 182
skeins knit: 81.7
yards purchased: 25,988
yards knit: 11,235
yards remaining: 14,753
knitting since: 1/27/07

Anyway, I think a stash of under 15,000 yards is pretty reasonable. According to this thread on ravelry, most people seem to fall in the 10-60K range. The highest number I can see is in the 230K range!!!

I'd like to keep in this range, maybe allow myself to go a little higher but not over 20K which would I guess be around 2 years worth of knitting, if I stay at the same pace as last year. I used all 20 containers I bought (I was impressed with my estimating!) and could fit a few more in the cabinet (yes, that is soda in there amongst my yarn).

There's actually not a lot in my stash that I haven't knit at all yet:
1) Artyarns Virtue (cashmere) and Sublime Yarns Kid Mohair for Elefante (ravelry)
2) Socks that Rock from my KVVS partner
3) Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Bulky for felted bowls from One Skein by Leigh Radford (ravelry)
4) Lorna's Laces Grace Multi
5) a bunch of Noro Silk Garden that I ordered to try and make a teenage boy appropriate striped scarf for my nephew (ravelry)
6) a bunch of Rainbow Wool that I ordered from Appleseed
7) Rowan RYC Soft Lux for Sirdar Baby Bolero #1676 (ravelry)
8) KPPPM for Shibui Knits Vintage Baby Cardigan

And here are a couple of recent buys from a particularly inspiring trip to Purl:

Habu Mohair Loop A-123 and A-126

Blue Sky Alpacas Bulky Naturals and Bulky Hand Dyes

Aren't those colors gorgeous together? I was thinking I would knit up a stripy scarf similar to the valentine's scarf but the only thing is, while I love my superbowl hat it sheds like crazy and I am sadly thinking that perhaps I should return this yarn. Any thoughts?

In the meantime, to celebrate my stash reorganization and relatively low total, I am making a few purchases. I already ordered the extra skein of KPPPM I need for the vintage baby cardigan (I'm not sure why I only ordered two, and now I'm worried that I won't be able to find a third skein that matches).

I also ordered my first Malabrigo while I was at it! I ordered 1 skein each of glazed carrot and indigo to knit up some hats and get a feel for the yarn. It's pretty impossible to tell what the colors are really like, but I found that by searching for different colors under all the Malabrigo projects on ravelry I could see a ton of projects in most of the colors I was interested in and it was a quick way of getting a bit of a better feel from them.

And now I'm going to order the Lanas Puras Mountain Sky!

A feast of Koigu

First of all, it's been a while since I did a stash stats update so here we go:

As of 9/1/07 (running total with total for the month in parentheses):

skeins purchased: 126 (9)
skeins knit: 46.85 (5.5)
yards purchased: 18,959 (1,530)
yards knit: 6351.75 (848.5)
$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): $1,234.76 ($64)
knitting since: 1/27/07

As of 10/1/07 (running total with total for the month in parentheses):

skeins purchased: 136 (10)
skeins knit: 51.6 (4.75)
yards purchased: 20,359 (1,400)
yards knit: 7039.65 (687.9)
$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): $1,336.51 ($101.75)
knitting since: 1/27/07

My numbers seem to be dwindling with almost half the yards knit in September than I knit in June, but I am using lighter weight yarn... and have also been pretty busy.

Speaking of stash, my major, in fact my only yarn purchase in September was for the pinwheel baby blanket which you may remember was rudely interuppted due to, well, lack of yarn.

That is no longer a problem!

After lots of humming and hahing and googling and list making here is the selection I came up with:

This was no mean online shopping feat as various sites have pretty widely varying selections of colorways, and I didn't want to order from too many places, and I wanted to get a whole bunch of different skeins that would come together in the one blanket. I don't think there is such a thing as clashing KPPPM colorways, but I'm also trying to make the blanket unisex so I didn't want to go too pink or too blue. I'm still not exactly sure how the blanket will come out... I am kind of "painting" with the yarn and improvising as I go along.

I ended up placing three orders, at Knit Purl, Personal Threads and Purl. The 2 colorways I ordered from Purl are missing in the photos above as the order hadn't arrived at the time and I couldn't wait any longer to get started!

Here are the colorways:

p820:

p115:

p207:

p118b:

p111:

p118a:

p131:

So far, I've used almost two skeins, and I've been "feathering in" the color transitions by knitting every other row or every two rows in alternating colorways. Some of the colorways are so similar that I probably won't need to do that. I'll have to post a new WIP photo soon.

Stash update

I know, it's been yonks, aside from all the quick iPhone posts that is. Work has been busy, and any spare time has been spent knitting rather than blogging.

Here are the belated stash stats for last month (running totals with the totals since the previous month in parentheses):

skeins purchased: 117 (15)
skeins knit: 41.35 (2.4)
yards purchased: 17,429 (2,074)
yards knit: 5503.25 (974.1)
$ spent on yarn (not including sales tax or shipping): $1,170.76 ($172.45)
knitting since: 1/27/07

July was really all about Kushu Kushu and Hanami. I guess I have a Japanese theme going! (I had to guess on my Habu yardage for my stash stats by the way - I really don't know how many yards I either bought or used for Kushu and I just took an overall weight and rough guess at the yardage of the sample kits.)

Believe it or not, I haven't bought any yarn yet this month! Here are the details of my last purchase at The Point where they were kind enough to give me a 25% discount even though I had left the coupon I was e-mailed at home.

Noro Silk Garden in color 252.

Noro Silk Garden in color 268.

Noro Kureyon in color 149.

I guess I really do have a Japanese theme going!

I didn't really have anything in particular in mind with this yarn, I just went with what was pretty.

And while I'm at it, here are some other long overdue stash updates:

Brown Sheep Lamb's Pride Bulky in M-01 Sandy Heather, M-02 Brown Heather, M-69 Old Sage, M-56 Clematis, M-59 Periwinkle. I bought these to try some of the felted projects in One Skein. This was part of my WEBS purchase back in May. I love each color mixed with the creamy and brown heathers.

Mon Cheri from Cherry Blossom Fibers.

Ohhhhhh, pretty! I bought this lovely collection of Rainbow Wool from Marianne over at Applehead. Yes, this shipped all the way from Australia. I bought 4 skeins of Raindrops in Rosegarden (top left), 2 of Raindrops in Coconut Ice (bottom left) and 2 of Popcorn in Rosegarden (top right).

Those of you with really good memories may remember that back in May I fell in love with this hat that Marianne crocheted and thus the yarn. I have it in mind for a hat/scarf/fingerless glove set for my older niece.

Finally, while I'm at it, now seems as good a time as any to take stock of my summer knitting goals:

1) Finish fingerless garter mitts - DONE

2) Finish Clementine Shawlette - DONE

3) Finish Yankees set (I just have to tidy up the color work on the hat and add tassles to the scarf) - haven't touched

4) Knit two sets of baby hats and booties for the grandchildren of my husband's recently retired boss and his wife - DONE

5) Knit something for another friend's baby girl who was born last September - haven't started at all

6) Knit the indigo ripples skirt from IK Spring 2007 - haven't started

7) Knit something stunning for my mother - DONE (I'll block it today)

8) Knit the Lacy Hooded Tunic from Vogue Knitting Spring/Summer 2007 for myself - I finally picked it up again after finishing Hanami over the weekend. I'm knitting both sleeves at once and I'm not very far along. Front and back is knit, so after the sleeves it's just the hood, and putting the whole thing together. (What happened to the Vogue Knitting website by the way - looks like the whole site is down!)

9) Knit a white cardigan for myself - nope nothing.

10) Buy a swift and ball winder - DONE

Five out of ten - that's not bad right?!