Am I a hoarder? Of course not! So why have I kept that short length of pretty ribbon? . . . That small ball of turquoise yarn? . . . That set of pretty pearl buttons? Well, you never know, they might come in useful.
Faced with the fact that I could no longer actually get into my Craft Room, I decided to do something about it, starting with the half a dozen large “really useful boxes” that contain my yarn plus the box holding all my knitting needles. O.M.G! Straight needles, circular needles, aluminium needles, plastic needles and wooden needles from the ultra thin to the decidedly chunky. What am I going to knit on size 1mm needles? Or, for that matter, size 20mm needles? Yet if I throw them out, might I not regret it? Might I want to start a project that needed them?
To start with, I carefully picked out one pair of straight needles in each size to save and rolled them in a cloth knitting needle wrap. Then I sorted all the double pointed needles and rolled them in a second wrap. After placing all the circular needles in a recycled ice-cream container, I stowed them all in my new chest-of-drawers. Phew!
The remaining needles? Well, all single needles are going into the bin and I shall try to donate the pairs. Not all Charity Shops accept knitting needles – something to do with the pointed needles being a potential weapon. That reminds me: a few years ago, I read that a hospital somewhere in the UK had banned patients from knitting because of possible accidents. And after the clamp down on carrying sharp objects onto planes, it is not possible to just sit and knit to while away the long hours during air travel. How sad to think that a gentle, relaxing and productive hobby such as knitting is nowadays regarded as so dangerous. Mind you, circular needles could make a great garrotte!
As I carefully stored my needles I was planning my next project. One of the main strategies I use to cope with my narcolepsy is to keep my fingers occupied with a piece of knitting. I definitely do not do well just sitting ZZZZZZZZZZZ! A very easy project is knittting “wristwarmers”. A wrist warmer is essentially a rectangle that is stitched into a tube, leaving a gap for the thumb.
Now for the yarn. I am never going to use the assorted cotton yarns in two of the large boxes. I know that, but I cannot bring myself to chuck them out. Help! Is there anyone, any organisation that would take them?

What is in the third box?
Ahaha! Sari silk ribbons. They are so colourful and pretty and although I no longer knit with them, I do use them to tie round and decorate wrapped gifts. And they provide interesting lines of texture in “twiddle muffs”. I shall keep the prettiest colours . . .
Now for the fourth box. Lovely thick creamy Aran yarn. How LONG have I had that? I knitted an Aran cushion cover back in the last entry. Okay, it has to go.
Have been fiddling and faddling for the last fortnight, slowly sorting my yarns into “keep” and “donate”. Next it is the turn of the box of embroidery silks. . .
Meanwhile I have used just a tiny bit of my stash to “dress” tiny three inch wooden figures for a local art project. Fun and satisfying.

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