#GroomYourStash

Last week, I participated in the Sheepspot 5-day stash grooming challenge.The idea was to gather and sort one's spinning stash in order to reveal what you have, what you want, and what you don't. We also learned about best storage practices, how to document what's stored, how to combine braids to make a bigger project, and how to "refurbish" fiber that might be compacted or otherwise not ideally prepared for spinning. Sasha crammed a lot of information into one week. If you're interested in this sort of thing, the resources are available on her website - but only through 4-12-20.

I didn't take that many photos during my stash tossing process, but here's one I staged to show how I sorted my fiber. We were to sort into three groups: stuff we love, stuff we're ambivalent about, and stuff we no longer lover. I actually didn't put anything into group three (maybe I should have been more strict?)... but I have a fair amount in group two. We're supposed to store the "ambivalent" fiber and revisit it in six months, at which time we either spin it or get rid of it.

As usual, I learned something about myself and my stash during this process. First, I thought I knew where all of my spinning stash was - but I WAS WRONG. I had a giant ziploc bag of miscellaneous fiber in an upstairs location that I had forgotten about. I knew about some things in that upstairs location (like that big bag of fiber on the chair on the right side of the above photo - that's a sweater quantity of something - and I also keep a bag of "practice fiber" up there) - but there were more things. Now my practice fiber is very clearly labelled:

You see a lot of small laundry baskets in the first photo above, and I want to assure you that that is NOT how I store my stash - the baskets were just helpful for sorting. I invested in a jumbo box of 2-gallon ziploc bags and repackaged anything that wasn't already sealed up. Then it went into bins that fit into the closet in my studio. I think this spot has very stable temperature and humidity, which is important.  Here's a peek into the closet now (the second-from-bottom shelf is all about gift wrap, and the top shelf is tax files and a small box of fabric, but the most of it is about knitting/spinning/weaving):

The closet, frankly, is very full. I know I'm not supposed to feel shame or guilt about my stash, but I kind of do. I had been keeping a giant trash bag of leftover yarns I no longer wanted and intended to donate them at Knitters' Day Out, but the event organizers surprised us last September by saying that there would be NO stash swap table. So my trash bag continued to sit in my closet. I decided to just throw it out and didn't subject myself to looking at it again.

Part of the reason that the closet is full is that my handspun yarn stash now lives here. Previously, it was piled enticingly in baskets in another room. I decided that wasn't smart (from a pest viewpoint) so now it's in ziplocs in bins.

I ordered some mini lavender soaps and cedar disks to spread throughout this bounty. These don't kill pests, but they confuse them.

I thought I didn't have much work to do in the "documentation" department, because this librarian is an avid user of Ravelry and cataloging fiber comes quite naturally to me. However, I found FOUR instances of fiber that were uncataloged! Those are now in Ravelry. Many had receipts in their bags, and they were purchased very early in my spinning life - like 2009 (I learned in 2008). The one I'm most excited about is this Cormo:

I also found a large (240 grams) amount of alpaca that I purchased at the local farmer's market in 2009. I really wish I'd remembered that, because I just bought some alpaca for the April challenge in The Sheepspotters' Society (I'll be focusing on protein fibers that are not wool). I am hazy on the early Ravelry years, but I think that you could only stash yarn in the beginning - not fiber. That's probably why it wasn't in there.

I have a LOT of batts that I made from Tamarind's fleece (purchased at MDSW'18). I need to spin those. I'm going to experiment with blending them with some colored material because I can only deal with so much brown yarn (let me know if you want brown handspun). I was registered for a class about how to use a blending board at MDSW'20, which of course has been cancelled. (So sad! It would have been my 20th consecutive year!) I had already purchased a blending board to use in the class. Clearly it's time to start playing with it.

My carpet beetle scare has me acting proactively in ALL areas of wool storage, including clothing storage. I've been hand washing every wool sweater and accessory over the past weeks and packaging them up to store for the winter. Today I cleaned out a set of cabinets where we store sweaters in the off season. I took everything out of them, wiped down the shelves (thankfully, NO signs of insects in there), sorted, and reorganized. In this process, I found yet another box of handspun yarns from my earliest spinning years. I'm not sure what to do with them. Maybe a felting project?

This whole process has taken quite a bit of time, but it's a good thing to focus on during these strange times. I've worked from home for 13 days now and I'm definitely feeling over it. On the up side, should we need to go out, we have these very stylish masks made by my mom!