Why Destashing Is Stressful!

I’ve figured out why I don’t like to de-stash. For one thing, it involves using yarns that have outlived their “O.M.G I Need To Knit With This Right Now”-full ness.

But, I think mainly, it’s like using up an emergency cache of batteries, or the last Q-tip, your last dollar in your checking accout, or even the last piece of chocolate. What if you need it later. What if you find the perfect pattern and you know you have the perfect yarn and just can’t find it, because you’ve already used it, but it was already eliminated from your memory banks because it was stashed? What if??

“As if” is more like it. I can remember stuff that isn’t life threatening. It’s stuff that I need to use everyday (like the fact that I rode my motorcycle to the grocery store, and am wandering around in the parking lot with a cart full of groceries looking for my truck, ask me about “creative bungie-ing”) that I can’t seem to keep track of. I remember full well that I have 397 different colors of green in my stash (I went through a really weird “green” phase), but I can’t remember that the really cool new knitting clutch that I want to try out is green. “Where are my keys”? That one’s not even in the ballpark.

So, back to stashing. Stashing is kind of like a life force all it’s own. You save it up for a rainy day, and then when the rainy day hits, you’re all good. De-stashing is like spending. I suppose some might find it gratifying to finally find a use for all of those greens, I stress over it. Yeah, it saves me money, but what if, in the end, I end up spending more because I’ve already used the stuff I spent money on the first place to save money?

It’s very stressful!

Generally I like knitting patterns where I feel like you can use whatever yarn you have (because my stash is big enough and I want to use it, thanks) and make a successful project. This is one of those times when a special yarn makes the process that much easier.

The Floral Bouquet Shawl from Xandy Peters uses a specific extended color pooling yarn from Feisty Fibers, which allows you to place the bobble flowers with increasing frequency as you knit the project.

It starts with a solid color yarn, then the two color yarn is added in, and you make a bobble whenever you encounter the color pops. This would be hard to replicate with other yarn that doesn’t have the extended color pooling built in.

The background of the shawl is ribbed, making the project reversible.

The shawl uses fingering/sock yarn and comes out to be an asymmetrical triangle that’s 54 inches/137 cm long and 36 inches/ 90 cm deep and 60 inches/150 cm across the top edge.

Xandy says the pattern is for intermediate to advanced knitters. Knowing how to work traditional bobbles would probably help, but there’s a great video tutorial for how to work the floral bobbles so you can practice on other yarn or even incorporate the bobbles into other projects.

The bobbles are five-petaled flowers but they also kind of look like starfish to me, which could be fun on a child’s cardigan or other pattern. They’d also be fun on the leg of a sock or around the brim of a hat for extra whimsy.

The pattern includes photo and video tutorials, and written and charted instructions. It also includes tips on what to look for if you choose to use different yarn for the project, and instructions on how to dye your own yarn to use in the project.

If you want to give it a try, you can find the pattern on Ravelry.

[Photo: Xandy Peters]

Have you read?