Tidy mind, tidy stitches - Day 3 of the Knit Crochet Blog week

Day Three: 30th March. Tidy mind, tidy stitches.

How do you keep your yarn wrangling organised? It seems like an easy to answer question at first, but in fact organisation exists on many levels. Maybe you are truly not organised at all, in which case I am personally daring you to try and photograph your stash in whatever locations you can find the individual skeins. However, if you are organised, blog about an aspect of that organisation process, whether that be a particularly neat and tidy knitting bag, a decorative display of your crochet hooks, your organised stash or your project and stash pages on Ravelry.

Yeah, anyone who knows me, knows that organization is not my strong suit.  Case in point, my mother, who is visiting, just took my african violets to water as I had completely forgotten to take care of them this week.  Now, I did just post a little post the other day about organizing my craft space.  You can see my before and after photos there.

I love to think of my disorganization as being organized in its own way, but after I cleaned up my work space, I was kind of shocked to realize that I really had no idea what yarns I had anymore.  I had the wools in with the cottons, silks with bulky blends.  Unfinished projects with bags of roving.  Ridiculous!

So I now have a loose organizational system at work.  We'll see how well it works in action as time goes on, but for now, I at least have an idea of what I have and where it is.  So I basically have organized my yarn by type at this point, or use for that matter.   All the boxes are stored under the eaves in my little attic work room like this (Can you tell I need more boxes for the fabric?).

Here's yarn box 1:

These are my designated yarns.  Yarns I have purchased for particular projects or that are really special but I haven't decided what to use them for.  The beige yarn is for a circular cardigan that was featured in Vogue Knits one months over a year ago.  The lavendar and chocolate is a Debby Bliss silk that I had to have and have yet to use.  Oh, my homespuns are kept here too, cause they're super special too!

Yarn Box 2:

My plant based fibers!  Organic cottons (and not so organic), bamboos, hemps.  Try combining the hemp and cotton for an awesome exfoliating yet soft washcloth!

Yarn Box 3:

My wools.  My merinos, sock yarns, blends, ohhh so silky wonderful wools.  These are the ones I use for wool. Not for felting, these are the specialty ones or just plain blends like the Lion Brand Quick and Easy on top.  My Malabrigos are in here for quick access (love them).  I love this box.  The mix of fibers and textures are great to bury your arms in!

And box number 4:

This is the workhorse box.  The Cascade 220's and other basic wools great for felting or color work.  Easy to access and I love the colors in this one!

There are other boxes, but these are my favorites.  I love pulling them out and just luxuriating in the wealth of having all this yarn to choose from!