Guilt Trip - Stash Enhancement

I do believe I have mentioned before that I have too much wool. Even for someone who knits almost every day, as I do, I have too much wool. Not too much wool in the sense of Wool BLE (which, for those of you who don't know, is knitters shorthand for Beyond Life Expectancy) but still too much in the sense of I don't know when I think I will find the time to knit it all up.

 

The sensible answer to this 'problem' (and believe me I know plenty of people who wouldn't categorise this as a problem at all) is obvious. I knit every day, right? So every day I am using up some wool, right? So, if I don't buy any more wool, but knit at the same rate, then one day all my wool will be gone, right?

 

Wrong.

 

Wrong in many ways but mainly wrong because there is no way you can stop a knitter buying wool. It is easier to give up smoking, than it is to give up buying wool. (Ask me how I know)

 

I try. I do try. And I used to be quite successful. Orkney isn't the best place in the world to buy anything much in the wool line, other than fairly standard big company stuff. And except for the occasional garment for my grandson, fairly standard big company stuff is no longer what I knit with. And in the days when I didn't do much internet shopping that was fine. Stash enhancement was a slow, almost imperceptible, process.

 

Then I discovered Ravelry. And got over my qualms about shopping on line.

 

We will draw a veil. I may have gone ever so slightly mad.

 

But then my sensible self kicked in  and it all slacked off. Nowadays I really only buy wool when I'm away, on the grounds that it's stuff I can't get at home. I also don't buy wool if I don't have something in mind to do with it, which I find is good for focused buying.

 

We were away recently, taking Son No 2 back to college - for his last term too, scary stuff. We spent a lovely day exploring the East Neuk o' Fife and I was very pleased to find the woolly brew; a lovely yarn shop in Pittenweem. Pittenweem also had a very lovely café called something like The Cocoa Tree. If you're ever in Pittenweem go to The Cocoa Tree. It's yummy.

 

Anyway in The Woolly Brew I bought some wool, to wit (as they used to say) this -

 

 

and this

 

and this

 

 

Obviously this is Not Wool. This is coffee and cake at The Cocoa Tree.

 

I'm not feeling too guilty about this little buying spree because the cream chunky wool is now almost a finished waistcoat/sleeveless cardigan thing for me  and half the brightly coloured ball on the bottom right of the second picture is a sock for the OH. I don't know whether I have previously mentioned his propensity for bright, hand knitted socks. If I haven't - well I have now. And he picked all three of those balls of sock wool himself. And made me buy them. And the stitch markers aren't even for me. So really, honestly, most of that has hardly hit the stash at all.