More Stashes

I had a very busy morning recently getting things ready for the post office. 

At first I was frustrated by how time consuming it was becoming.   Finding the right sized brown paper from an old bag, and which box to use

and where was that other old packaging I stored away for re-use?

Then in a magic moment, I became calm.  The feel of the crisp brown paper as it folded, the sound of the blade slitting slowly and evenly, wrapping and creasing around the box to fit snug.  I tied the parcel with twine and wondered what tricks people had to put their finger on the half-knot, when there wasn’t someone there to do it.  Crossing the twine over itself, twist, neat even squares, round two directions of a box, dissected by the pattern of the string that is holding it secure.  I felt very satisfied making up a parcel the old fashioned way.  Something so lovely in the symmetry and basic materials.

There was, some time ago, an abundant harvest of kumquats

and so my mum gave me some that she had sliced up and sun-dried.
 

I liked the way they curled into the glass jars, preserved and pungent for a rainy day.

I do love my glass jars.

What rainy day?  How will it ever be consumed?  The act of non-waste, use at any cost – yes, I really did inherit it.  My parents are of that war-experienced generation and are great hoarders.  So this week I also inherited a stash of “woollens for felting”.

And silks.

 Some of it was beyond belief that anyone could hang on to something so broken.

 But those holes did have a certain intriguing pattern.

Well felting is a whole other technique I have to take on one day, so into a new stash it will go.  Stay tuned for the felting post!

Thrift: putting it to work

Sometimes I think I must’ve been born thrifty - I just can’t help myself.  And there are times when I wish I wasn’t, because it would save me a hell of a lot of time and effort.  

Food - Don't Waste It British Poster from Imperial War Museum

On the whole though, practising thrift does bring much satisfaction, providing everything turns out right.

So far I’ve enjoyed being resourceful with two charity squares.  The first square was knitted from a yarn that refused to co-operate. 

I was given some stash yarn “it’s pure wool but it’s no good:  look how easily it breaks!”  I thought I had nothing to lose by trying to get a square out of it.  I happily got some of the way when it started thinning out, so that the slightest tension would cause it to break.  Then I came to breaks in the yarn every 10-20cm.   I had to unpick to put the breaks at the beginning of a row so I could avoid knots.

Well I was determined that I would get a square out of this naughty yarn, I wasn’t going to see it wasted in the worm farm!  So persist I did.  And there were times when I was calmed by just enjoying the harmonious colours of the yarn resting on the needles.

 

It was worth it in the end because now I have one more charity square to donate.

The second troublesome thrifty square was crafted from the extra glove that didn’t work out.  How could I turn this into a 25cm square?  It was too small and rectangular, with wobbly edges and uneven tension.  I had made it worse by randomly crocheting on rows to use up leftover yarn, and to try and get it to size. 

 I could not switch off my thrifty mind which insisted on getting a use out of it.

So I decided to crochet around the outside till it grew to the right size.  (Later, I discovered that this is a common approach known as edging!)

 
I figured out I could gather up the ‘ease’ on the floppy side by decreasing the stitches, and decided to predetermine the same number of stitches per side by eyeballing with safety pins. 

 This didn’t work at all because the edge just didn’t fit, and it went all curly. 

It meant I had to unpick, and re-mark which stitches to work.  The safety pins were more time consuming than I thought, so instead I tacked around before taking the pins out.  In the end it didn’t work either, still too few stitches for a flat edging.

So my third idea was to use a smaller hook, do many more stitches, and this time COUNT!  The first round went ok, and I realised the importance of counting consistent stitches.  I used the safety pins again, but decided 4 stitches should go between each marker.  This way it could take up slack but with enough detail to go unnoticed.

What I forgot to do was the correct number round the corners.  So there was more unpicking and a fourth attempt.  It’s true that it would’ve been quicker to frog the whole thing and start again.  But I was gonna get a square out of this, dammit!

 

The square got done with much relief and satisfaction and I could say that in the end, I even liked the bastard.