Yarn stash

Bendigo 2023

| Sonia Knits

I’m just back from a wonderful break in Bendigo. The Australian Sheep and Wool Show in Bendigo was this weekend, but we headed up earlier on Wednesday to take make it more of a mini break.

We visited the Bendigo Art Gallery, which had a retrospective of 90 years of the Women’s Weekly Magazine. It was a great exhibition, which had a lot of nostalgia, especially for people whose mums made birthday cakes from the Birthday Cake book. My mum made the train for one of my older siblings, and perhaps one or 2 other cakes, perhaps the witch for my older sister? I remember looking through the book, and dreaming about my next birthday cake. I’m not sure I got one? The recorded interview with the cake maker/author of the book was interesting and priceless… just glue the pages of the tip truck cake together… hahaha. There was also a fashion display (it was impressive), and a bit of a crochet and knitting display, not to mention some great historical displays about women.

Friday, show day arrived, and I attended the Women of Wool luncheon once again. I think this year, the organisers did a great job of selecting the speakers. It was great to listen to inspiring, smart women.

I went back to the show on Saturday and I had a great time hanging out with Damian, his mum, friends, and sheep; as well as purchasing some lovely souvenirs of my time in Bendigo. I’m already planning for next year.

Surprise Sock Along

| Sonia Knits

After declaring I would not participate in another mystery shawl knit along… Stephen West announced his Surprise Sock Along! How could I not join in? Four weeks for knitting a pair of socks is more my speed, and I’m excited.

Unexpectedly, the very first clue dropped just after work on Thursday. Normally with Stephen West’s MKALs, his clues drop closer to midnight. I took this as a sign to cast-on right away.

The first clue on the right sock is done, and I’m about to cast on my left sock. I’ve decided to do the mirrored instructions for the left sock, because, of course, they’re going to look great mirrored! I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, Stephen West is a genius. I’ve loved knitting the first sock clue, I’m sure the rest of the sock clues will be as enjoyable.

The beauty of having a yarn stash (that would be me), is that I hadn’t decided on what yarn I was going to use until cast-on evening. The yarn I selected is Patons Patonyle, It is such a great sock yarn. I’m looking forward to seeing what comes next…

Craft Room update

| Sonia Knits

I saw my chance to rearrange some things up in our house this week whilst Damian was away for work. I didn’t have a lot of time, so there was really no time to lose. Tuesday night after work, I began by migrating D’s books into my old yarn shelf which now resides in the hallway. I dusted and wiped things clean, sorting his books in a logical order into his new bookcase; my part-time job as a teenager was a library shelver 2 nights a week at my local library. It was/is so satisfying to shelve books in order. The migration took hours and hours and then on Wednesday night after work, the work on the craft room continued, I was exhausted, but determined to achieve my goal of finally having my own room for craft.

We had grand plans for new shelving, new flooring etc… but at the end of the day I was just desperate to have my craft room space.

I was planning to purchase baskets to fit these new shelves, but after unloading ‘most’ of my yarn into the shelves this weekend, I realised that I liked seeing all of my yarn, baskets would obscure the view, as well as take up valuable shelf space. The plastic is not pretty, but I don’t want to leave my stash unprotected from dust or critters (not that we’ve ever had a moth problem (touch wood). The feeling of seeing all my yarn in one place is a mixture in equal parts of JOY and then OVERWHELM!

The room is still a work in progress. My tetris skills have been sharpened. There’s going to be a few difficult decisions still to be made, and that’s going to take some time. There’s still my craft and knitting books and magazines to be resolved. I want to keep everything, but I know that I’m going to have to make some choices.

When Damian arrived home, I didn’t get into trouble! And he was quite complimentary on how I rearranged things. To be fair, I’ve had a lot of time to think and dream about this craft room, I’m just relieved to finally have this space.

A different April

| Sonia Knits

April is normally quite a joyous month for me, because it is my birthday month! But this year Damian and I both got Covid before Easter. It’s taken us 3 years before catching it this first time (and hopefully our last) so we’ve done pretty well to dodge it so far. Our plans for Easter needed to change, including my very kind brother who collected these final Burch & Purchese cakes and delivered them safely around Melbourne to family members. It took Covid for us to realise how bad an idea it is for us to live so far apart…

Bunny Behinds by Burch & Purchese

I am hopeful Burch & Purchese will come back because it is/was my go-to place for special cakes. In fact, they are doing a pop-up for the King’s Coronation, if you’re the patriotic sort like Darren.

Whilst I was unwell, not a lot of knitting was going on… I felt like playing/planning with my stash, but after sorting out 3 or 4 pairs of scrappy socks I was exhausted! And, after doing an hour of knitting on the couch, I napped for an hour!

But I have cast-on some new things now, whilst my Stephen West MKAL shawl is still going on…

I’ve cast-on my Richmond Knitters ‘Bendigo’ project, which is going to be cowl. The motif (imagined by Brent) was created using Carla Meijsen’s Magic Motifs. I’ve also cast-on some socks from the yarn Danni dyed specially for the Richmond Knitters last Christmas. I’m still working on my Mystery Shawl, but it just seems to be taking forever, hopefully I’ll have a finished object photo for you next time. Can I say now, I don’t think I’ll participate in the Westknits MKAL this year, it’s just too slow knitting and not a lot of instant gratification. Can someone please remind me come October.

Birthday Cake by Lux Cakes
Our Spinning teacher Jane talking about the Spinning Certificate
My class and some of my teachers at the presentation
Yay, I got my certificate!
My final project on display
My plying class samples on display

Last weekend was very busy, catching up with ALL the things, belated Easter and birthday celebrations (Lux cakes, did a great job in filling in the B&P gap), visiting my sisters new house, my Spinning certificate presentation and going to a Footy match!

During our illness, I didn’t leave the house for 10 days, just because… and it didn’t seem all that strange. We are homebodies, and especially since the lockdowns we’ve had in Melbourne, I think we are changed forever.

Christmas is coming

| Sonia Knits

We put up the tree yesterday and I’m so glad we did. It’s one thing off the list before the silly season really begins. This year we did a combination of hand-made ornaments and colourful baubles. Normally I like to add a new hand-made ornament or two to the tree, but with the year that it’s been, there just hasn’t been time.

My Christmas ‘yarny’ preparations began months ago of course. The wrapped yarn on the left has been this way since July! It was the very last yarn Louley yarn offered before they suddenly announced they were winding up their dyeing business. I love surprises, so this package won’t be unwrapped until the 1st of December.

The 2 balls on the right were purchased during the Big Wool Show. Danni’s yarn is too irresistible to pass up, and it is the first yarn I purchased since the Bendigo Show (so yay for me!).

For this Christmas, I also ordered 2 yarn advent calendars from Little Woollie and My Creative Garage (I had 4 calendars last year, and that was a lot!). I opted for the 8ply versions this time, so I can make different scrappy projects with them. I’ll share more on those next time.

I’m finally getting down to putting my Spinning folio together. For each of the fibre samples we’ve spun, we need to put together a page with notes and samples. I think there’s approximately 50 samples altogether. There’s also the skeins we need to present separately which are 20-40 grams each, I was hoping to have these pages done before Christmas, so then I would ‘only’ have my major project to work on, but this seems like a pipe dream now. It’s good to have goals!

February WIPS and March cast ons!

| Sonia Knits

Setting myself knitting goals for each month of the year, I’m certain is responsible for how quickly March has come around this year. I am catching my tail, to keep up with the pair of socks and a sweater per month scenario let me tell you.

This is what I’ve got on my February sweater so far.

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Whilst it doesn’t look like much. I’m loving knitting the lace panels of the sleeves of Japan Sleeves by Joji Locateli.

I had a late start on this project, due to changing my mind about yarn choice. The yarn I am using now is deep stash. It’s Patons Patonyle and I think it’s going to be wonderful.

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I also had a set back on my hand spun socks.

I had finished the first sock, and it was the worst shaping I’ve ever done on a sock. It was all due to my heel flap being too tall. Luckily I only had to rip out half a foot, and the yarn is super quick to knit up.

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I’m pretty happy with these February projects. February is a short month you know, even with a leap year.

My March sweater cast on is, The Birkin Sweater by Caitlyn Hunter. I’m knitting this as part of a knit-along with the Richmond Knitters to wear to the Bendigo Sheep and Wool Show in July. Which is plenty of time away, because this is going to get finished in March along with my other WIPS… hahahaimg_0382

The yarn I’m using is Holst Yarn Supersoft. I’m looking forward to really getting into this project. I’ve done a couple of little gauge swatches to get stitch gauge. I’m going to wing the rest of it. No one in my knitting group can get row gauge anyway so there’s no point wasting precious knitting time fiddling with that!

And my March socks cast on, is a pair of plain ‘Pairfect’ socks by Arne and Carlos for Regia.img_0386

I think these will be super fun to knit up. The yarn has been sitting in my sock yarn box on my coffee table (yes there are other sock yarn boxes in the house), waiting to be knit for at least the last 12 months. It keeps getting past over because of newer yarn, but it really deserves it’s time on my needles.

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Speak soon

Stash Count

| Sonia Knits

It’s been ages since my last count of yarn stash meterage.

The last count was after my return from Stitches West in 2015, when my yarn count was a staggering:

296,937 METRES

Since it’s been about 3 and a half years since I took stock (I had no idea it was that long), I thought I should take a look at how much I have. It’s too hard to quantify when your stash lives in different spots in your house, so I downloaded the numbers from my Ravelry stash page. I summed the total of the column ‘Metres left’ and got:

265,310.9 metres or 265.3109 km

Yeah! Go me!

I attribute the reduction to one massive de-stash a while ago. And just a lot less purchasing. I’m trying to knit more than what comes in, but in reality I think I’m lucky to be breaking even. It was an almighty de-stash…

I don’t have any goals to get down to a certain level, but I think I would like less, so I can see it all in one part of my house. So I can appreciate and work from it. So that it doesn’t feel like a packet of Tim Tams that never runs out. My ‘stretch’ goal is to reduce the amount of stash to my cubed shelving unit. You know, because there’s probably some other things I could store underneath our bed.

I’m looking forward to the Australian Sheep and Wool Show (only 4.5 months to go!). Fondly known as ‘Bendigo’ or ‘Spendigo’, where all bets are off… mostly, (I’m showing a bit more restraint in the last couple of years). So I have something to work towards… here are some of my acquisitions from last year.

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I’ll come back to you before July to show you how much I’ve used!

 

Stash appreciation and LYS day

| Sonia Knits

Over Easter I had a stash appreciation day with my ‘living room yarn stash’. Whilst it’s always a good idea to stop and smell the roses, or take stock of how much bloody yarn you have, I’m afraid stash appreciation day was born out of a sore hand. I didn’t want to risk hurting my hand any further, so what is a knitter to do if they can’t knit?!

Playing with yarn, is almost as good as knitting with it. I could give it a try for at least one day anyway. So I pulled out all of my ikea boxes and spread out the stash across the coffee table.IMG_7287IMG_7288My hand-dyed sock yarn takes pride of place in my ‘collection’, I’m powerless against a beautiful skein of delicious yarn.

I quite like pink…IMG_7290… sprinkled with greenIMG_7291IMG_7293… think of the amazing sock yarn blanket I would be able to make with the left-overs of these skeins?  Only if they were left-overs and not complete skeins…

So I reorganised my boxes and tried to place the skeins in more logical places, for the record I remember purchasing each of the yarns I ‘found’. There weren’t any surprises, just lots of love for the yarn I have collected; and ideas, I’m looking forward to starting some new projects once things return to normal.

If you don’t have a LYS (local yarn store) at home (like me!), it’s LYS appreciation day next Saturday. I know that Sunspun in Melbourne is participating and offering a generous discount on that day. You should go, you might see me there!

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