Wednesday, February 01, 2012

Yarn along- a knitters dilemma


                        So here's the story. A few months ago a woman offered to sell off her stash for cheap. I couldn't turn down that offer so I bought it and I've been trying to use that yarn in my projects. Well I started my second pillow for the couch, worked on it for a week or two, got more than half way through it. Only to run out of yarn.

I called around to three local yarn stores. None of them carry that type of yarn. Soooo, I think I have two choices here.
1. I could order it online. It seems a little silly to spend money on more yarn when the whole point was that it was bargin yarn.
2. Or I could unravel and make something else with it. A scarf? I just have to say, I have a really hard time unraveling a whole project. A row or two sure, but the whole thing? Shiver.

So while I'm deciding what to do, I started a new project. Of course. I'm learning a new stitch, the linen stitch which is very cool, esp. with the varigated yarn.

I'm reading three books right now, one for my book club, one for my online book club and one for fun.
The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery is for my book club. I'm about 100 pages into it and I'm still reserving judgement. It's translated from the French and it's beautiful but a little stilted so far.

My online book club is reading the Dark Is Rising series by Susan Cooper. We're on number three,
Greenwitch. and I'm enjoying it.

The third book is just for fun, Po Bronson's What Should I do with My Life? I like reading the stories of people who are in a crossroads in their lives and make big changes. My criticism is that the book focuses almost exclusively on people who work in business or law, and not enough on the people I'm interested in (non-profit workers and artists.) It still has a lot of interesting ideas.

Linking with Ginny for lots more yarn and books.

7 comments:

angie said...

ahhhh the Susan Cooper books, my hubby and I have been trying to decide if our son is ready to read them. I guess I need to go back, it's been a while. As for the pillow, is there another yarn in the stash that could match? You could get crazy and have a combo...

amanda {the habit of being} said...

i found the same thing with elegance of a hedgehog though i only gave it about 50pgs before putting it down. will be curious to see what you think as you read further!

steph said...

I actually loved the elegance of the hedgehog, but I "read" it as an audiobook, and loved the accents and intonations; not sure I would have stuck with it as a book read.

The rip-it dilemma. (I just dealt with that with a sweater.) Any chance you could add borders to either side of the pillow in something else? And then make the back even something different from that? So it looks as if this was done on purpose????

mama cindy said...

Pillows don't all have to be the same size. You could make this one skinnier. It seems to me that you had enough done for that. Add a different color backing like steph suggested. I know you were trying to cover pillows you already have, but you could make a filler for this smaller one. Then you could use different yarn to cover that pillow that will still be waiting for an updated look. For that one you could make stripes like I did for your knitting bag and then you will not have to worry about how much yarn you have of any one color.

Jennifer said...

Oh, isn't it always the way?! I'm afraid I have no sage advice to offer, but you certainly have all my sympathy.
JNCL
The Beauty of Eclecticism

Lori ann said...

i'm glad to hear your review (so far) on the hedgehog book, i've heard mixed opinions.
i hope you find the solution for your knit!

house full of jays said...

I picked up The Elegance of the Hedgehog at a thrist store but I haven't delved into it yet. I'm curious what you'll think.
Sorry about your stash dilemma....I've been stash knitting and it is kind of scary - I'm always worried I'm going to run out. I guess I'd say if you're going to love the completed project it might be worth trying to find more.