Taking inventory of something as portable and losable as knitting needles results in a lot of digging about in old project bags, and drawers, and baskets and hidey holes. Taking inventory of a storage closet does some of the same. Sometimes you find things that are just a bit ... unnerving.
Take this for example.
That .. is the start of what I seem to remember was a purse of sorts for my then 8? year old daughter. As you can see, it's primarily made of beads, backed by yarn.
In a way, I'm proud of this never to be finished object. To set it up, I had to chart the design (which I think was a monogram), and then load the beads, one by one, IN ORDER, onto the yarn. There are hundreds of beads there, carefully placed in order. And they were working. (you can see the strung blue beads at the bottom of the picture -- also there, a rainbow of beads on red yarn -- I don't want to know what I planned to do with that).
Sadly, the child in question is now 23. As chic as beaded bags are, bags made of plastic shiny beads like these are no longer quite the thing for a soon-to-be college graduate.
I frogged the bag. I'm now left with a ball of yarn with hundreds of carefully strung plastic beads. I may be taking it all to the I.D.E.A. Store.
Thinking of the I.D.E.A. Store reminded me of another discovery (wholly unrelated to inventory). When you buy pillowcases these days, they come in little fabric bags (at least when you do it in places like Target anyway). Some of these little bags look an awful lot like project bags to me.
This particular project bag cost me $6.98 plus tax -- and I got two more pillow cases to use in my massage studio as a bonus. Oh, wait, no.... I got two pillowcases for my massage studio, and got this project bag as a bonus.
Back to the Inventory Discoveries.... As I rather anticipated, I found a lot of duplication in needles and hooks.
I understand why I have 8 size 13 crochet hooks, but who really needs ten (10) size G Crochet hooks? or twelve (12) sets of US 2 double points? I mean really.
Also, as anticipated, having assembled all those sets of five double points, I've got this pile of needles left over.
I know that some of the dpn sets are incomplete because I broke some. But I haven't broken THAT many. And I know I haven't broken any of the metal ones or the bamboo ones. So where are all the missing needles? I've checked all sorts of unlikely places (having exhausted the likely ones).
I don't have a clue. But what I do know is that I've posted most of my spare needles on KnitSwap for sale, and will happily send a current listing to anyone who is interested in buying needles cheap. The unmatched ones will likely find their way with the above mentioned now beaded cotton yarn - unless, of course I can fill in the missing spaces by reaching others who have spares. (I figure any set of 3 needs to be filled in; any set of 2 constitutes spares to fill in others' sets).
I also found one last project....more on that later.
The last discovery?
Boy it feels good to have all this stuff organized, and put away.
And my closet done.
And BOY it feels GOOD to be DONE WITH THIS project!!
Next up - the cedar chest.
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