Well, first I'll start by confessing that the Bamboo yarn is new, and rather contrary to the spirit of stashbusting. Okay, so it's out and out the opposite of stashbusting. But it was at Joann's and I was so excited to see these cool new yarns (they also had Alpaca, Cashmere, organic cotton and...okay, I just blanked.). I had to buy a skein of the bamboo because it's just too soft to believe. You have to feel it. I NEEDED this in my stash. And I had a 40% off coupon that was burning a hole in my pocket. Everything else I was buying was on sale, so I couldn't use the coupon.
The second picture is the blanket I just started knitting for my brother-in-law for Christmas. I've been wanted to make a log cabin afghan and I've been wanting to use this yarn from my stash that I bought to make a sweater with and have since decided it's just a smidge too bulky for a child's sweater (after having made each of my daughter's a sweater out of it in other colors). I think it's going to end up being blue, yellow, white and black. He's color blind, so putting red or green in there would just be mean of me. Not that I wouldn't do it on other things, but the amount of time I put into knitting something is out of proportion to the amount of fun I'll have teasing him about being color blind.
So the stash-busting. I've been working mainly from my stash all summer. I've been trying to avoid calling it stash-busting because, well, that's a little too much pressure for me. I did that for Lent - no new craft supplies at all. And after Lent I went on a yarn-buying spree that has left me with a supply that currently allows me to stash bust. Nice, huh? I was at the craft store, was it yesterday? Maybe the day before. I can't exactly remember these things anymore. But while I was there, an employee was putting skein after skein of a lovely pale yellow yarn back on the shelves. An older woman asked her if that was what she'd just returned. It was. She returned it because she couldn't get gauge with it. What? I've never heard of such a thing. I mean, I've heard of gauge (although I don't get too hung up on it unless I'm making something wearable), but returning that which does not match gauge? Wow. I'm sure she has a fixed income, so I know that it makes sense to return the old before buying new, but I have a hard time using yarn to make something. There is some pressure implicit in the act of beginning a project - will it live up to the pattern, my vision, my gift-giving standards? This has often prevented me from doing anything at all. I'm what they call a failed perfectionist. I know that real life will not live up to my expectations, so I don't even attempt some things. Other things (like the awful lace hat I knit) I just embrace the imperfection. I don't know why the distinction. I"m sure further investigation would reveal something deep.
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