Yarn Dilemma

One upcoming problem is yarn. I crochet blankets for homeless people and pets, and have routinely been on the constant lookout for sales. But I’d been taking classes consistently for the last six years, so my yarn stash grew faster than normal (whatever normal is). Since I graduated this last year, I’ve already made and donated several blankets. In the initial November clearing, I got rid of 3 large kitchen bags of blankets that I donated to a woman who works with homeless people. Since December I’ve made at least 6 small pet blankets, and I’m working on more. When we don’t want to undertake big sorting on weekday evenings, I’m feverishly using as much yarn as I can, as if that’ll solve everything. My point is that it’s not entirely a “someday” issue. Oh, I’d like to do something with that “someday.” While I don’t keep an active inventory of my yarn, I did get and use nearly 60 skeins of Red Heart worsted yarn during my recent college years. So I’m just saying, it’s not simply sitting there.

So the main problem is storage. It’s not really a “spark joy” issue because I do get yarn I like, and even then, I’m only using it to make something – and then I’m not keeping the end product. I guess the joy is in making things for those who really need it. There are a few skeins of luxuriously soft yarn I want to keep for myself, but I’d say over 80-90% of it is for blanket donations. The sad solution is to use the space saver bags a friend gave me and try to squash the life out of it and tetris it into every nook and crany so I can keep (and use) as much of it as possible. Thus I’ve been trying to crochet like crazy, even though realistically that’s only sparing a few small skeins from this suffocating fate. The only other option is to use those bags for my stuffed animal collection, and that’s even more appalling of an idea. Yes, Marie Kondo, you are right, it’s not worth getting bulk sales if you can’t afford to keep your items. But as much as I spent on it, I’m not going to get rid of or even donate hoards of yarn at this point. Even though I’m not keeping it, I did selfishly buy color and textures I like (or generally tolerate), and I’m not giving that up. We tried getting yarn and yard sales and thrift stores, but it’s generally at risk of icky dust, must, smells, and unknown stickiness that sucks all the joy right out of using it. If I come across some of that while organizing the yarn, I’m happy to donate that back to the thrift store. Unfortunately I’m also disobeying Kondo by focusing on storage, and by imprisoning it in a yucky wrinkled ziplock situation.

If I sort yarn next, with the expectation of keeping most of it and wanting to organize it so I can actually find things, that will be time consuming. I can’t keep the storage unit that long – it’s ridiculously expensive. We only got it because we couldn’t go through everything in a week, and because it was slightly cheaper than getting a bigger dwelling. If yarn sorting isn’t the most time effective to tackle next, the next step will be stuffed animals. We’ll save that saga for another post.