More than a lifetime

Ravelry is great. A community of people who love to knit and crochet. They have all kinds of ways to interact with others and one of them is your stash pages.

I've recently updated my stash pages with just about every little bit of yarn I've collected over the years. Some of it I've listed in the trade/sell section and some is just in my regular stash pages.

Well-- I've been collecting for over 30 years now, and as you might imagine, my stash was a bit out of control. The stash pages ask you information about your stash-- kind of yarn, yards per skein, numbers of skeins, colors, etc. They also have the ability to download in excel format.

So...

I finally faced the facts. I downloaded the spreadsheet. Calculated the total yardage of yarn I have by each yarn weight. I sampled how long it takes me to knit one yard with the project I'm currently working on. I figured that this was worst case-- as its a textured stitch with something different every few stitches. I adjusted to take longer for the lighter weight yarns and less time for the heavier. So now I have an estimate of how long it might take me to knit-- by hand-- the yarn I have in my stash right now.

Guess how much time I have? 225 years !

Thats knitting textured stitch patterns every day. 2 hours a day. For 225 years. WOW.

Of course, there are plenty of ways to improve this number and make it work within my expected life-span. More hours per day. Stockinette stitch. Combining yarns and using larger needles. Working them up in simpler projects with little shaping. Using crochet rather than knitting. Weaving with some. Working some of it up on the knitting machines.

I admit. Part of my reasoning when I bought some of this yarn is to have something to do when I retired. Thats why I still bought yarn even when I was not finding time in my busy life to knit any of it up. Another reason I bought the knitting machines.

So-- in addition to the thoughts above, I think I'm going to apply a wonderful technique from database performance (my other life) to this situation: parallelism! I love to come up with patterns. I love to do the math to figure out how to knit them in various sizes. I love to knit the samples up to make sure it works. Now, I'll just have to up how many test knitters I have working on those at any one time-- and use yarn from my stash. Lets see... if I can keep 10 projects going at any one time, then it should cut us down to 20-some years. That might make it even possible sometimes to get some new yarn!

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Still working !

Still working on the Jacket. Decided to make a few changes... so a bit of frogging (done) and re-do (not done yet). Overall it will be much better and easier to write the instructions for. Hoping to perhaps submit for publication so no photos...

Also working on the example swatches for two new classes I'll be teaching at Twisted in the Fall. Double knitting and Slipped Stitches. September is just a few weeks away!

I've got a trip to Seattle for work coming up and someone else will be driving! What a luxury to have all that knitting time. Looking forward to it.

Am also adding back in the Level II of the CYCA Teaching program. So there will be swatches to do there as well as some smaller projects.

All in all still plenty of knitting projects.

Oh! And I'm starting to photograph my stash-- its up on Ravelry for sale... a bit at a time. Nice to see it going to good homes.

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More Ravelry and Holiday Bazaars

I've met a few friends now, went looking for people in the Portland area, and found some that I have met at conferences. So the list is growing. But I am spending more time on posting my patterns (finished except for the "Just Bamboo" blouse, which I am re-knitting first), and creating my list of books and projects.

It turns out Ravelry is a much better place to do what I said I would do in my blog heading-- document the knitting projects I've done over the years. So I am rather excited about that. I've put up my current WIP and posted one entry for an entrelac sweater I finished a couple of years ago. Now I want to photograph the old FOs and get as many as I can up there. I really do like the idea of looking back at old accomplishments every now and then.

Then I am really going to move into the stash. I have one of those true mountainous stashes, some in the studio, some in the home office, some in the bedroom closets, most in the attic over the garage... I really, really like the idea of having that documented so I don't forget what I have and so that I can have a true idea of what I can make out of each grouping.

There are so many great stash-buster projects, but that would be a waste (maybe/debatable) if I really have enough of one yarn to finish an entire garment.

Yesterday my sister and I went out (with my great-nephew) to a couple of Holiday Bazaars. It was great fun and I bought a lovely, truly lovely, batik large enough for a bedspread at one and at the other found Peggy McMullen of K2tog, the Oregon Live blog. She had some great stash for sale there nice wool that I was very tempted by, but having already just mentioned my stash here (and when I get it posted at Ravelry some of you will be able to see) that I just couldn't add to it right now... at any rate they also had some nice earrings (bought 2 pair) and I bought a cute organic cotton soap bag-- for all those little left-overs. A great idea.

We are planning on heading out Hillsboro way next weekend for more of the same!

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