Tag Archives: stash

Oct15

Vlogtober

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Vlogtober

I’ve been enjoying October. I decided to dive into Vlogtober and record and publish a short video every day on my YouTube channel, Stitches and Slapdashery.

I learned the most important thing is to keep it manageable, both in recording footage (because you have to edit it at the end of the day when you may be tired) and in the final length, because many people are following multiple channels who are also doing Vlogtober.

Some days I have more to talk about than other days, but I’ve managed to be consistent with my publishing so far.

My phone became so clogged up with large files that I had to be brutal and put a lot of larger files in the Trash. Once they are up on YouTube it’s unlikely I’ll want to edit them again. But I kept the photos so I would remember to add them to the blog.

On of my WIPs is this bag, which I am crocheting with Scheepjes Softfun, a DK weight cotton/acrylic. I made the puffy flowers first from a tutorial by Hooked by Robin and then started on the bag.

The tutorial is here.

The size of the bag will be dictated by the yarn I have and how it looks on the hook. I have made quite a bit of progress up the sides since taking the above photo.

I went a little nuts with this cellphone zipper pouch. It’s a tutorial from My Passion Crafts.

The first two are for gifts. It’s a good design, really useful for a phone in the front pocket and room for some money, cards, keys or whatever in the zippered compartment.

This project bag was made following a tutorial from Little Drops of Wonderful.

I made it blingy because I’m going to send it to her for a Strictly Sockalong prize.

New additions to the stash were acquired at Thread and Paper in Salmon Arm, BC. If I owned a store, I’d want it to look just like that one. It’s gorgeous! Packed with quilts, fabric, yarn, samples, thread, embroidery floss, patterns, you name it. I went around the store at least twice as I had lots of time to browse while my husband did the job he was in town for (I accompanied him on his work trip for the day).

Yesterday I had lunch with friends and spent the rest of the day reading. I really must get out into the beautiful fall day today and get some fresh air and exercise! The weather has been so mild. We haven’t turned the heating on yet.

I hope your October is going well and that you are enjoying some quality time with yarn or fabric. I’ll come back at the end of the month with another roundup of what I’ve been doing. See you then.

Jan22

Flash the stash (fleece version)

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It’s been an enjoyable weekend. Last night we went to our first hockey game in years and had a good time. Unfortunately our local team didn’t win but the visiting team did deserve their victory, in our opinion.

Today, friends came over for a potluck lunch. The theme was Asian, because it’s Chinese New Year so I thought that was appropriate.

I made General Tso’s tofu, rice and stir-fried vegetables, our friends brought potstickers and soup with noodles, and we had two desserts as well. Our monthly potlucks always leave us stuffed to the point that we often don’t eat dinner!

I used the recipe from Nora Cooks for the tofu and it worked out well.

This evening I spent a couple of hours in my sewing room. I pulled all the fleece/chenille/jersey knits out of the cubbies and sorted them all.

The photo above shows it all dumped on the floor!

That massive pile is made up of (a) remnants that I brought home from work (when we get to the end of a bolt and there’s less than a metre left, we roll them and discount them by 75%), and (b) remnants from projects that I’ve made, which means that those pieces are odd shapes and sizes.

Once I had sorted them, the chenilles and knits went back into their cubes and the fleece was heaped on my cutting table. I then took a look through my sewing patterns to see whether I could Frankenstein an actual garment from it all.

I reckon this might work:

View C with the short shaped hem, pocket and hood instead of collar. I’ve made this pattern more than once now so I’m familiar with it. Can you see the back and front in the large check with the sleeves in the smaller black and white and the hood and pocket in red? Wacky maybe.

I’ve also grouped some pinks together, and some red/black/white, and the peace sign print with two solids, with a view to making something usable. I think the pinks would make good PJ pants.

I’m too sleepy to actually start sewing tonight but the next chance I get I may start on that buffalo plaid sweatshirt idea.

Jan11

Fabric fun

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Since my yarn stash flash, I was considering doing a fabric stash flash, but that isn’t quite what I ended up doing this afternoon.

The quilt cottons had got a little out of hand. I’d been rooting around in the bins, taking things out, putting them back, and generally making a mess of the shelves, so today I had a bit of fun sorting them out.

I originally put two colour groups in each bin, e.g. purples and pinks, blacks and reds. But some bins were getting too full and the lids didn’t close. So I had to review.

The above groups are new to the stash. Obviously there’s no rush to use up the Christmassy ones but I grabbed them on sale after Christmas.

The snowman panel and odds and ends of the coordinates have been in the stash for some time. Must use! And the blooming ocean panel and coordinates are absolutely fabulous and I will come up with a project for those soon.

I have a massive piece of the purple so it’ll make a good quilt backing. The “cut sew repeat” print pulled me in just the other day. That would make a great bag lining. And the animal print is cute as heck!

And these are just a few more that made me go Ooh!

All tidy! The green thing top left is my pattern box, which is just a cardboard box covered in fancy fabric. Next to that is a bunch of stuff I’ve made which I need to assess again to see what I really want to keep.

The lowest shelf in the photo has the water bottle for topping up my iron and bags of elastic, cords and zippers.

Then I set up my sewing table for some scrap attacks. I tipped my bag of scraps out, put a cutting mat, rotary cutter and scissors on the left of my machine, and the iron and pressing mat on the right, and grabbed my thread and bobbins. Scrap projects are a great way to use up spools that don’t have much thread left on them.

A bit of sewing followed and currently I’m at this point. Building new fabric from scraps focusing on the black and white ones.

This is obviously going to be an ongoing project as the pile of scraps is huge!

This crocheted amigurumi was my weekend project. I used a free pattern that I found via Ravelry but adapted it to be Edna Mode from The Incredibles. The person I made it for was delighted!!

And that’s my crafty catch-up! Excuse me while I go and cook dinner…

Nov9

Snow, sew, and stash

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Winter has arrived!

We’ve had a fair amount of snow in the last few days and as usual it feels like it took everyone by surprise. The roads are icy and not everyone has their winter tires on yet!

I just had a couple of days off and made sure that one of those days was a Sewing Day which I totally embraced by wearing my Hello Kitty fleece onesie ALL DAY!

I sewed three zipper pouches and three drawstring bags (they don’t have strings yet) out of some really cool nylon or polyester fabric that my son brought home from work one day, ages ago. The fabric panels used to hang in a computer store and have some great colours in them.

I also made this Reader’s Wrap from a ribbed velour. It has two pockets and since taking this photo I have added a label embroidered using text on my sewing machine. It’s for my mum who is having a bit of a health crisis right now.

And the stash has been enhanced with the addition of some Hobby Lobby I Love This Yarn in autumnal colours. A friend just had a holiday south of the border and she asked me if there was anything I’d like from Hobby Lobby or Joann’s and I suggested this yarn. I’ve heard it mentioned a lot online. It feels pretty nice and I can make something 70s inspired or some fall decor maybe.

My Wool Warehouse order is on its way which is very exciting. When it arrives I’ll be able to put together this year’s Advent collection for myself.

Jan1

Happy New Year

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By the time you read this, it will be 2021. I spent a lovely couple of hours in my sewing room tonight in the company of Kate from The Last Homely House YouTube channel.

She did a two hour livestream today between 10pm and 12 midnight her time (UK) but I didn’t find it until it was finished. Because of the time difference I was able to watch it all before the new year arrived here.

My thread collection was the first job! I love those jewel tones. Unfortunately the threads on the metal bobbins have been neglected since the spring because they were for my old Janome and I use plastic bobbins in the new one.

After that came the yarn. These kits have been sitting around for a really long time. I did start the monster one, but it’s thin yarn (and not very good quality at that) and therefore a skinny crochet hook. They came in as a one-off product at work a few years ago and they were only about $3 each!

These are the natural fibres, from the green hemp at the top of the photo to the cottons at the bottom. The white yarn is for dyeing. My goal for the last couple of years has been to focus more on mindful purchasing including some natural plant content, rather than 100% synthetic, and the stash reflects that.

These are the worsted weight yarns, mostly acrylic with a teeny bit of leftover cotton blend from Scheepjes.

This is the DK acrylic, mostly Stylecraft Special DK, some Lion Brand Mandala, and a few other miscellaneous yarns.

And this is the stuff that didn’t fit into the other categories – mason line, sock yarn, bulky fluffy stuff and some gold crochet thread.

That was a lot of fun and now it’s all packed away neatly. I have to confess to giving my fabric more attention lately, but once I have the Turtle Dove sweater finished (not far to go) I do have another knitting project in mind. It was a valuable thing to flash my stash and remind myself what’s there for projects in 2021.

Do you have a New Year’s Eve ritual that you do every year? I can’t say I do, but maybe this sewing room clean-up is a good way to end the old year and start 2021 with an organised stash!

Dec27

Ravelry review

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One of my favourite makes this year

I love to look back at my year’s knitting and crochet projects on Ravelry every December. Even when I don’t think it’s been a very productive year, I am usually surprised at how many Finished Objects I made.

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One of my few yarn purchases

This year was a good year for using stash. I signed up with the British Banter group on Ravelry to join their Bash the Stash 2019 challenge. The plan was not to go Cold Turkey and buy no yarn at all. My goal was more Lukewarm Sheep. Curb the acquisition of 100% synthetic yarn. Allow myself to mindfully purchase yarn which had at least some plant fibre content.

And, you know, I did pretty well. In January, I bought that pack of Scheepjes Stonewashed and Riverwashed mini skeins. It’s so pretty and I still haven’t found the perfect project for it. But it is on display in my sewing room and I know I will really enjoy using those amazing colours some time in the future. An LYS was going out of business in a nearby town and I bought some cotton yarns from them too. And then…nothing until November, when I went into Michaels and fell for some clearance yarn.

My totals at the end of the year, as posted in the British Banter group, are;

Total out this year: 8115 grams (knitted or crocheted into finished objects or given away)
Total in this year: 3700 grams (purchases and a few gifts)
Net output: 4415 grams (stash reduction)

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I love the finished item even though the garter stitch got tiresome!

Ravelry tells me I made 56 projects this year, but in fact some project pages include more than one item, so it was more like 77.

The summary:

18 hats, 16 dishcloths, 13 decorations/ornaments, 7 cowls/scarves, 7 bags, 6 shawls/wraps, 4 blankets/loveys, 3 toys, 2 headbands, 1 pr socks

and a partridge in a pear tree!!

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My favourite blanket of the year

I have four Works in Progress right now. The pink and grey sparkly shawl which I started in Maui. The Moe of Change blanket which I started in October and then neglected because it requires careful attention to the pattern. The scrap blanket that I’m knitting in the round on a huge number of stitches, which I think will get more attention now that the granny blanket is done. And finally, the cardigan, which was being made from a Secret Yarnery YouTube tutorial and which I had high hopes for. But even though I still like the colourway of the yarn (Lion Brand Mandala Baby in Echo Caves) and even though I actually ordered more yarn to get this cardigan finished, I think it’s going to be frogged. I can’t see myself wearing it and being happy in it. So officially that leaves me with three WIPs to carry me into 2020.

Considering my enthusiasm for sewing right now, three yarn WIPs is plenty. (Perhaps we should talk about my fabric purchases….or maybe not!) I really need to keep a good notebook for my sewing projects the way I do on Ravelry for yarn projects. Past notes tend to be scattered throughout various small notebooks and loose bits of paper, which means that if I want to make another version of a bag, for example, and want to know what size pieces I had to cut, it can be challenging to remember or remind myself what I did.

So that’s my year. What are your crafty highlights of 2019? Did you knit or crochet or sew something you were particularly proud of? Let me know in the comments.

 

 

Jan4

Flashin’ the stash

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Well, it’s that time again. The calendar is showing us a new year and a new thread has opened up on Ravelry called Flash your Stash 2018.

I’ve done this before and it’s rather fun, and interesting too, because you get to see what’s been lurking in cubbies and bags and boxes for a while and you can make sure that everything is photographed and listed on your Ravelry stash page.

I have a relatively small stash compared to many yarn collectors…erm, I mean knitters and crocheters on Ravelry. Some have entire rooms dedicated to yarn and their photos look like actual stores.

However much one has, I think it’s important to keep it organized and bug-free and current. (I find it’s also good not to have it get out of control, because then I feel pressured by it. Your mileage, as they say, may vary.) This time around I have decided to give away a couple more things that I don’t love.

Here are some photos…

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These two pictures show the entire stash. The yarn above the gap in the first photo is acrylic, mostly worsted and bulky, except for a few DK cakes. The yarn below the gap is plant fibres like hemp, cotton and linen. The second photo is all my solid DK, organised by colour, which is a mix of Stylecraft Special, Deramores Studio and Carolina. The squares were going to be an afghan, but I changed my mind on that so they are waiting for inspiration to strike.

More shots of groupings, e.g. plant fibres, Stylecraft Special Aran, Loops & Threads Impeccable, cakes, worsted and bulky. The navy blue balls in a clear plastic bag are Willow Yarns Wash Bulky from a frogged sweater. Those have probably been in the stash the longest.  Click on the thumbnails to embiggen.

 

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And my WIPs, which are possibly not going to continue to fruition. The four-strands-of-aran-weight-yarn sweater which I was so excited to start on 15mm needles is looking a little messy. The knitting is sloppy and the gauge, while close to that asked for in the pattern, is looser than I’d like. I can foresee this being a sweater that loses its shape quickly, stretches out, and ends up in the closet. So I may try a smaller needle with three or four strands instead and see if I like the fabric, then make a sweater based on my personal gauge.

I’m typing the draft of this at the gym while on a stationary bike. It’s a great way to pass the time. Better than staring at the wall anyway. Tai Chi Man and I were joking that we’d probably see an influx of people after January 1st because, you know, New Year’s Resolutions. I like the upstairs ladies-only part of the gym when I’m alone. If we both go, then we use the co-ed part downstairs.

I probably should get off here and do some weights so I’ll upload the photos to this post later.

Three hours pass...

OK, now adding photos and editing my typos. Dinner is done and it’s couch time. The yarn has been taken back to my craft room, though not put away properly yet. Now that my stash is officially flashed, both here and on Ravelry, I should spend a little time putting it all away neatly. Unlike many of the flashers, who say they have too much and want to go on a yarn diet, I am happy to look out for yarn for sweaters this year. Sweater quantities, in other words enough of one yarn or colour to make a whole sweater, are something my stash lacks. And now that I’ve made something for just about everyone I know, it’s time to be a little selfish and make some garments for myself this year.

Do you flash your stash? Do you even have a stash? Let me know in the comments 🙂

 

Jan1

2017 project review

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2017 project review

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Hi all and Happy New Year. It’s getting to the end of the first day of 2018 and I’m ready for bed (and it’s only 9pm). Last night we didn’t do anything special to see in the new year (as usual). Tai Chi Man was in bed early (as usual). I stayed up and binge-watched season one of a series on Netflix called Rectify. I found it strangely compelling.

So what I’m saying is that I did stay up past midnight, but not because it was New Year’s Eve!

The trouble with watching too much TV is that your brain is hopped up on electronic vibes and when you do go to bed, overtired, you can’t get to sleep easily. Still, I just lay there knowing that I would eventually get to sleep, and I did. But of course I woke up at the usual time so didn’t get enough rest, and I’m feeling it now.

I just did a quick review of the projects I have knitted and crocheted in 2017. This is why I love Ravelry. I can quickly scroll through  my project page, noting down what I made (of course if I had remembered to tag each project with the year, I could have done it even more quickly).

My favourite projects of the year would be the Spill Shawl, Anouska’s bag (the camper van one) and the Hungry Caterpillar baby blanket and cocoon. (All links to my Ravelry notebook.) I picked the shawl because the yarn worked perfectly with the design, and it’s in my favourite colours, the bag because I designed it and my niece loved it, and the baby blanket because it was a labour of love and the new parents loved it. And they’re all cute!!!

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So, what did I make last year.

9 scarves/cowls, 2 baby blankets, 2 loveys, 1 pair of baby booties, 1 baby cocoon, 31 hats, 4 squares/coasters, 7 bags/cosies, 8 dishcloths, 3 baby sweaters, 1 poncho, 1 twiddle muff, 2 towel loops, 1 tank top, 1 baby dress, 6 rugs/cat mats, 2 shawls, 1 wreath (sunflower, pumpkins, leaves), 1 basket, 3 pairs of mittens, 1 pair of slippers

That makes a grand total of 88 items, counting the bits for the wreath as only one. Not bad at all.

However, there is an absence of larger projects. No big throws or blankets (I do already have a good pile of those so didn’t really NEED another one) and no adult sweaters or other garments, except for the linen tank top. So what I’m thinking for this year is that maybe I’d like to make a goal (NOT a resolution, of course, because I don’t make those) of knitting or crocheting a sweater a month. Doable? Maybe. FullSizeRender (1)

As for WIPs, I still have a couple of those and I’m not sure whether or not they will be finished. And I have some squares that I made for a blanket out of DK yarn (pictured above) that were joined together, but I decided I didn’t like how it was turning out so I took them apart. The ends were woven in on the squares so I didn’t frog them but will have to find a use for them later on.

I see a new thread was started on the Ravelry forums today – Flash your Stash 2018 – and I may well do that one of these days. My stash is quite manageable at the moment as I used some up or gave some away, so it wouldn’t be a huge task to pull it out and photograph it. I had culled the vintage stuff out and just kept the ‘nice’ stuff, but of course this then seemed to create a vacuum into which more yarn arrived. A co-worker gave me a bag of her unwanted acrylic. I kept it, though, as much of it is black and can be used in future scrap blankets or whatever.

So what else? I’ve already mentioned my thought of making a sweater a month. Another monthly goal that would be awesome to follow through on would be to sew myself a garment. I would add unique items to my wardrobe while getting more proficient at making things that I can wear in public. (I still want to make the sweater pictured below, it would be a quick knit, achievable in a month, but I STILL haven’t found the right yarn for the job!)

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Weekly goals are simple. Continue hosting my Hygge group on Monday nights, keep in touch with friends, and call my mum. Daily goals include doing something active (gym, walking, yoga, work) and being grateful for everything. I shall have to write these out and put them on the wall somewhere so I see them every day.

Now it’s time to love you and leave you, as they say, and I will talk to you again soon. Happy crafting.

 

Mar26

So relaxed!

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Day 4 of a block of five consecutive days off between shifts. I don’t know what I did to deserve that, but I’m loving it.

Today I did one of my favourite things, which was tidy up my craft room as I had dumped yarn all over the place. I also updated my stash pages on Ravelry. I have acquired extra skeins from a couple of friends who were clearing out either their own stuff or someone else’s. There were some knitted pieces, two of which I darned in the ends on and will donate to the SPCA and the other two I unravelled.

Tai Chi Man and I had a pleasant walk along the waterfront this afternoon. It was raining but we had our new Costco waterproof jackets on so we were comfortable. Treated ourselves to some good tea from our favourite tea shop (and a cookie – oops!).

Friday I took myself off to the ski hill for some snowboarding on my own. I’ve never done that before but the boys weren’t bothered so I went. The drive started out rainy and ended up snowy. The road between the highway and the resort is about 20km and the second part was very slushy and slippery. Bit of zigzagging and tire spinning going on, and when I parked in the parking lot I just knew that I was going to have trouble getting out again, winter tires notwithstanding.

I had a free lift pass so that was great, but I had to rent a board and boots as usual. I have my own helmet (that’s saved me from many a potential concussion)! I did a couple of runs – first one always feels like I’ve forgotten everything. Second one was better. Snow was quite soft and deep in places and caught the board a fair few times. Got to the top of the quad chair and was pushing my way to the spot to anchor my right foot back in when someone asked me if I’d lost a binding. Oh great, the ankle binding had come off as a screw had come out and got lost in the snow. Told the lift guy who radioed down. Not sure why it took so long, but had to wait over half an hour before a snowmobile appeared to take me down the hill. I did get to warm up inside the hut at the top of the chairlift and chat to lift guy for a while.

The snowmobile guy was a fellow Brit and very nice and I enjoyed my ride down the mountain back to the village centre. Never been on a skidoo before, but it’s a lot of fun. Asked the girl at the rental place if there was any chance of a refund as had lost 50 minutes of boarding time out of my limited afternoon session and was told yes, and I could still get my binding fixed and do more runs first if I wanted. Did a couple more runs and then got a FULL refund (would have been satisfied with half) so was very chuffed!

As anticipated, car was bogged down in snow in parking lot, tires were spinning and I was going nowhere. Nice young man appeared in front of my car and pushed a few times while I was attempting to reverse and got me out. Drive back to highway was again rather hairy – nearly sideswiped a van coming the other way as I went around a bend. A pretty eventful day that could have turned out badly but thankfully all I had were a few sore muscles the next day.

And finally after all that blabbing I can show you a bit of yarn…

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Sorry for the fuzzy nighttime shot – I was very limited in what I could do as the iPad is plugged into the laptop, syncing and backing up. I decided to carry on with this baby cardi and trust that I will have enough yarn. Cross fingers! One front done.

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This is a finished gift. I bought some handmade soaps at the indoor farmers and crafters market yesterday and decided to give one to a friend. The mesh bag is Tunisian crochet, the washcloth just a basic granny square. The yarn is Stylecraft Classique Cotton DK.

The poncho has been neglected but not forgotten, as I have the skeins of Stylecraft Special DK lined up in front of the coffee table so I know which order to use them in. Thank goodness we don’t have any small children or curious pets in this house.

And finally, I almost forgot, the caterpillar set (book, blanket, cocoon and hat) which I mailed off to the UK weeks ago has arrived safely and the new parents-to-be love it. Yay!

I hope your weekend was wonderful. Have a peaceful and productive week and I’ll talk to you again soon.

Jan5

Time for a flash…

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Nudge nudge, wink wink!

Flash your Stash, I mean. Yes, it’s January, and that means there’s a new thread on Ravelry’s Yarn forum where people can pull out their yarn, photograph it, and show it off. There’s actually a good reason to do this. If you have a lot of wool, it’s good to “toss the stash” every now and then to check for moths or carpet beetles. (Not an issue for me, obviously.) Also, you get to see what you have. It’s easy to forget the treasures if they lie buried most of the time. My yarn is mostly on view in clear zip top storage bags in cubbies in my craft room,  but when I laid it out on my queen size futon it surprised me how  much I had. And that’s another good reason to pull it out – to stop you from impulse buying a craptonne more yarn when you’re not using up what you have.

So, I flashed my stash in January last year. At the time, I had a lot of worsted/aran weight yarn but had just bought some DK colour packs from Deramores. I was a bit nervous about the skinnier yarn, wondering how I would get along with it.

This year’s stash flash shows a heavier emphasis on DK, then worsted, then the usual random skeins of bulky, super bulky and novelty. I didn’t buy the novelty yarn – it was given to me. May end up clearing that out.

Anyway, here’s the main photo. This is my queen size futon, and it only just fits. I think I’d be uncomfortable with more than this as I’d feel like it was too much pressure!

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I did  a lot of stashbusting this year with projects that used multiple strands of yarn, like a pouf, rugs, wraps, blankets and more. Since my large Deramores order at the beginning of last year, there have only been a few small purchases, like the Red Heart With Love and the souvenir yarn from my holiday. Plus one Wool Warehouse order where I bought extra gold for the Demelza blanket and extra black for the granny square coat.

The only colour pack I haven’t broken into is the Stylecraft Special DK Coast Pack. Fifteen balls of loveliness which may eventually become a sweater.

And now it’s all packed away neatly again. The only WIP I have going right now is the Hungry Caterpillar blanket. I didn’t think to include that in the flash, but there will be a fair whack of Impeccable left over when I’m finished.

Have you ever flashed your stash?