Right, so the time has come to make a new destashing chllenge for myself.
At first, I tried to tie in my weight-loss goals to coincide with my destashing goals (i.e. I must exercise as often as I knit, and for every pound I lose, I get to reward myself with new yarn). It didn’t work out so well.
So, after buying a crapload of yarn at Michaels (and various other places), I decided that I needed something very tangible to help me out. And then the solution came in the form of the new, very cute reusable shopping bags at the Michaels store. Here’s what I came up with:
1) Fill the shopping bag with the recent yarn purchases, as well as a few other balls/skeins/etc. of yarn that I want to destash.
2) I will ONLY use the yarn that is IN THE BAG until the bag is empty.
3) Then, and only then, can I take the newly emptied bag and go shopping for some new yarn. But not a lot! Just a little. 🙂
4) Lather, rinse, repeat, until an acceptable amount of my stash has been liquidated.
Granted, my stash is not the worst one out there. Some people have an entire ROOM devoted to their yarny goodness. As for myself, my yarn is currently kept in several places:
-the STASHDOWN! bag
-a long, rectangular open-top basket in the living room closet
-a queen-sized mattress bag (this is where all my acrylic is kept – it’s about 1/2 to 3/4 full)
-the ottoman in the living room, which has a removable lid (all of my Patons Classic Wool, which I am addicted to, lives here – some 12-15 skeins)
-a basket in the bedroom which contains yarn for baby projects
-a green closed-top basket which is sort of a hope chest/yarn storage for future bebe projects (only the best for my wee ones to be!)
-a pink drawstring bag that holds all my sock yarn
-a blue plastic bin in the bedroom with various yarns, mostly skeins of Briggs & Little from my mom and from Wool-Tyme. Also, I have a few Mary Maxim kits in there that mom gave me.
Plus there are the odd balls of dishcloth cotton mucking about, a small zippered bag where I keep the Rowan Wool Cotton for Eric’s sweater, and a few grocery bags with some Patons Decor and large balls of Bernat cotton. EEK!
…I am starting to fear that I will never, ever run out of yarn. Even if I knit until I’m 100, and teach my daughters to knit, and they teach THEIR daughters, and we use wool culled only from my stash…well, they’ll still have quite a bit left when I croak. That’s right – my stash is going to eat me. 😉
The Pixie of Sticks 