Yarn Confessions
Readers, you might have missed me for the past few days. I know I’ve missed you (and so has Aunt Pythia).
Well, full disclosure on what’s been happening is in order: I’ve been organizing my yarn collection.
Yes, it’s true, I have a deeply alarming amount of yarn, which has hitherto been gathered in smallish bags tucked all over the house, in every nook, cranny, and corner.
Well, with the help of my good friend Elena, who is starting a side business to help people organize their homes (ask me for an amazing reference!), I have officially tamed the yarn beast.
Just to give you a sense of the sprawl, here are just the “odds and ends” yarns in the blue or purple spectrum:
Pretty much every ball here represents a project I have long finished. I always buy a bit too much yarn and then keep the extra. Yes, that’s my foot and boob shelf.
Of course, I have odds and ends in other colors too:
For whatever reason I keep buying lots of green yarn. I have like 5 green sweaters in my closet.
Of course, not all my yarn is in the “odds and ends” category. I have whole bags of unopened yarn I got on sale during one of my winter excursions to Webs, the biggest and best yarn store in the world (you can tell it’s a big deal because it owns the “yarn.com” url). Here’s an example:
I also love orange, as a color, but nothing orange ever looks good on me.
Anyhoo, the entire collection is here, feel free to take a look. I am beyond shame and embarrassment at this point, because at some point, when all my yarn was splayed across my entire living room and dining room, I realized how amazingly beautiful it all is and how much I’ve gotten out of my hobby over the years.
Also, I think I might actually have more yarn than the average yarn shop, so there’s that option as well, if I’m ever really broke. Plus, now that my yarn is so nicely organized and tidy, I’d even be able to show it to people.
So there you have it, yarn confessions. Life is too short to be ashamed of your passion.
mathbabe 
I swear there is a connection between yarn and Math. My son knits all the time and explains knot theory to me in yarn.
LikeLike
Hahaha ok let’s go with that. But really I don’t think I need an excuse.
If I were looking for one, I’d say that knitting gives me the ability to point to something and say, I did that. Math is generally not so productive.
LikeLike
you: orange=me:green.
LikeLike
Gorgeous. Must be time to make me something!
LikeLike
Yes! Scarf?
LikeLike
I think I want to die, and come back as a cat in YOUR house!
LikeLike
Right, it’s not that you have too much yarn, you just have too few cats.
LikeLike
Guys, terrible plan. I’m a dog person.
LikeLike
Whoooa, you’re a DOG person!?… some of us are gonna have to seriously re-think how much credence we give your thoughts in the future. 😉
LikeLike
Apologies! I love all animals equally, just dogs more equally.
LikeLike
I love this so much! And I still have a few odds and ends left from the three full garbage bags I took off your hands back in the day 🙂
LikeLike
Haha shhhhhhhhh
LikeLike
I love getting out all of my yarn periodically! It’s good to remember what beautiful things I already have, bring back memories (I bet you can recall knitting most if not all of those leftovers), and suddenly want to knit all the things again! Also that way I can weed out anything I’m not still in love with.
Happy wool sorting!
LikeLike
Oh now I must know your Ravelry username. Mathbabe?
LikeLike
cathyoneil very boring.
LikeLike
I recently started listening to Slate Money podcast while I knit. I’m delighted to learn that you knit, too.
LikeLike
Nice!
LikeLike
Webs is the best yarn store evar! Be still my heart! My misspent youth! I should probably figure out where all of my half-finished yarn projects are hiding in my apartment. I approve of everything in this post.
LikeLike
Well, hello! Very nice! Some gorgeous stuff! I started knitting again (after 20+ years) last winter, fulfilling my plan to knit during the long Alaskan cold & dark times. Then I acquired a dropspindle. Then a spinning wheel. And so it goes. We’re also fond of cats, but our 19 Siberian huskies aren’t, so this comes out as another vote for the dog side.
I hope you don’t mind if I spin this off in a different direction… The other day, I had yet another of these annoying “where are all the women in STEM/tech?” discussions. I couldn’t stand it any longer, so I blurted out “I know where they are!” My interlocutor went “So, where?” Me: “They’ve all become knitwear designers! Or teach spinning!” And it’s true, if you look at the people who are successfully selling knitting patterns or writing books about knitting and spinning, a whole lot of them have bifurcated from IT, programming, QA, or various academic occupations. Not that “that’s where the women are”, seriously, of course. A whole bunch are in some of the less glamorous and flashy but possibly more work/life-balance-friendly places. For example, I work with some US DoE National Labs in earth science/climate science data, and their software development teams have a much higher proportion of women than the typical SV startup. (No big secret why…)
LikeLike