BellaOnline Forums Hobbies and Crafts Spinning I'm de-stashing!

In the interests of better organisation, I decided it was time to sort out the bits and pieces I have stashed away and see which fleece should be used first.Imagine my surprise when I realised that I have spent the last 2 years spinning very productively and that the fleece I thought I still had is actually yarn, and I keep finding more of it!
I realise I now have a really good excuse for re-stocking, , but what do I do with my yarn mountain!
hehe!
Cheers, Caroline, in Australia where lots of sheep are losing their coats before summer!!

Don't let all that yarn sit around with no purpose in life. Start knitting or crocheting.

Destashing. Since we plan to be moving soon, I should be destashing. Moving is the perfect time to do this, right?
Except I have a hard time parting with anything - it might be just what I need the day after it's gone! So how do you decide what to move out of your stash?

Have you got time to knock up a peg loom rug before you move? This just EATS fleece and is so quick to make, saves having to part with any fleece!

Kate

Great idea! Thanks
I do have some rugs planned but hadn't thought of weaving on a peg loom.

I'm not sure if this is available in the States yet, but I have just bought a book on RH weaving called Creative Weaving and that has some terrific ideas for creating fabulous cloth and using up all those bits and pieces of yarn left over from other projects, and too precious to throw out. Its basically all done with plain weave. Some of them can be done on a tapestry loom, and there is at least one project for a cardboard loom, and another for a peg loom. Its just made for destashing, (or else an excuse to increase ones stash?)!

One thing I do not have is a RH loom. I've been eyeballing them lately but I think my DH would have a fit if I came home with yet another loom! He'd have good reason - I have a 10 shaft Glimakra, a 24 shaft dobby, a 4 shaft Le Clerc, and at 10 ground, 30 pattern shaft Glimakra drawloom. Plus an 8 shaft table loom for workshops.

It's not the lack of equipment, it's the lack of time for weaving right now that stops me from using up yarns by weaving something.....all my looms but one have been moved to our new home but since our old home hasn't sold yet my access to the looms is sporadic and most of my time is eaten up by packing, unpacking, and cleaning for lookie-lous these days. One group of lookers got scared off by the pile of fleeces (which I had neatly packed in body bags) in the living room waiting their turn to be hauled to the new place.

Body bags, available at the army surplus stores here, make excellent bags for storing fleeces as they can be hung from the rafters in the garage or in a closet or other odd space. It's also nice to know that they were not needed for their intended purpose.

I can just imagine their faces....... ! I shouldn't laugh really, but its like a chef friend of mine who had an ex-hearse: he had a coffin built to store food and cooking things in when he did catering jobs, and loved parking it in the McDonalds car park!
I have just been to my local library and found a book on embroidery, not the conventional style, but the more very modern arty stuff (similar to the experimental fabric making of the 70s) - and it looks like something I can use on my loom if I adapt the stitches to weaving. It should give a rich tapestry effect and I can have fun at the same time!
I'm trying to be good and not spin, but I have over 2 Kgs of Optim just begging to be played with! This self-control thing sucks!
To add insult to injury, its perfect dyeing weather!
Cheers, Caroline, who is going through withdrawal.

I'm struggling through knitting an afghan in horrible acrylic yarn that I just hate. Promised someone I'd do it so do it I must. It's a very heavily patterned thing too but I'm finally past the halfway point. What I really want to be doing is spinning wool.

There is a book on embroidery weaves, called The Embroidery Weaves.
It's a fairly old book so don't know if it's still available or not. But it does give instructions for manipulating a supplementary to give the appearance of embroidery.

I've heard of it, but haven't seen it around. I parted with most of my weaving books when I parted with my floor loom but I did keep my Mary Black New Key to Weaving, so I must check that out. I have also just picked up on ebay a book on how to use 3 rigid heddles at once; the end result is pretty much like 4 shaft weaving so I'm told. All I have to do is wait for it to arrive!
In the meantime I'm still working on this cushion cover - its testing out my RH loom, which I'm in the process of building. I was hoping to find an alternative to a ratchet and pawl method of tensioning, as from past experience I find these very hard to manipulate, and extremely painful to use; my current system isn't it, but I'm getting there.