Needle Bliss

Tuesday's Mommies who Talk about Knitting meeting went great (no knitting, as usual, but much fun was had by all). Jenn put out quite the spread, despite having no running water due to a busted something-or-other, including some dynamite (as in your mouth will explode!) garlic dip that you can apparently only buy from some door-to-door service where you need to know a secret password or something. Man, I still can't get over that dip (I was expecting a soothing spinach dip and was completely unprepared) :)

I've almost finished knitting my secret project, so rest assured, we'll be returning to our regularly scheduled knitting content shortly. However, in the meantime, I thought I'd share this faboo gift I got from my brother-in-law and his girlfriend (recipient of the second Amanda Hat) for Christmas. Speaking of the Amanda Hat, Gina, aka SleepyEyes, has set up a gallery here).

But first, a little backstory. I was taught to knit by my paternal grandmother many, many moons ago, and when she died, I inherited her needles and UFOs (sadly, they remained UFOs, because the Bay doesn't make Baycrest Sayelle anymore). I've kept my needle stash in the same bag since then, and while that system may be great in terms of sentimental value, it isn't exactly practical. See, this storage system is quite inoffensive when you leave it well enough alone, but when you actually need something, it turns into this:

A giant heap of a mess (and Gad!! Do I need new flooring or WHAT? Don't look directly at the carpet!!!!! Avert your eyes now!!!!!!!). I've tried to upgrade the system by keeping a nifty inventory of my needles in an Excel file (you can do something similar through Ravelry), but really, there's no getting around the sorting and bumbling when you need to retrieve something from the stash.

Enter this wonderful gift. Yes, boys and girls, my brother-in-law bought me a knitting needle organizer on Etsy. OK, granted, he had a little help, via a gentle suggestion (read: a hyperlink) I casually (read: BUY ME THIS!!!) mentioned to Phil, but still, it's pretty awesome. Seriously, who knew that in a few short minutes, the needle stash could go from that to this (yes, that is in fact one of my daughter's Caillou hair elastics holding a set of DPNs together)?

I've moved most of my needles into this organizer, but I'm keeping my circulars in their original packages for now (I find it easier to locate exactly which size and length I need when I can just read it on the package). I've noticed, however, that one can also buy an organizer strictly for circulars. Hmmmm....