The Computer Ate My Yarn

I'm not kidding:

I was knitting at my computer desk while surfing the interwebz when I heard a *slurp* and looked down to see a piece of yarn attached to the project I was working on sticking out of the back of my computer.

I may need to clarify a couple of things here.  One, there's a huge open space in the back of my computer due to the fact that I have a slim-sized motherboard in a full-sized chassis.  Two, one of the case fans is right next to that lovely hole.  Three, my computer is currently sitting next to my chair because I don't want to shove it in the corner it belongs until I get the switch I need to complete my setup (and of course I haven't bought the switch yet).

So I guess it was a matter of time before it ate my yarn.

Luckily for me, it only ate the piece left over from the start of my project and the top of the chassis comes right off.  So I was able to cut the yarn off the project and open the computer up to unwrap the yarn from the back fan:

 Now I know to keep my yarn away from the damn thing. Oye.

Here We Go Again

For one of the few projects I'm currently working on, I'm making a baby sweater for one of my cousins.  Par for the course; I usually have at least one cousin who has a baby per year.  Gives me an excuse to make baby stuff again.

However, this time I decided that I should use some of the baby yarn I currently have in my stash, the majority of which is three mostly full skeins of some baby acrylic I bought for a blanket, all in different colors.  That shouldn't be a problem; if I use one of the other colors as an accent color I should have plenty of yarn for a sweater and...

Yep, I'm almost out of yarn.  And I still have another sleeve and the trim to do.  And the only reason I don't have less than that is that I realized that I was running low on yarn about four rows away from starting the striping sequence you see at the bottom of the sweater there, and therefore deciding to start it early and then make up the length using the other color.

That may not be enough, though.  I may have to rip out at least part of the other sleeve, and do some more hacking of the pattern to get them to match.  But right now I'm just carrying on as normal, hoping that the ball doesn't run out.

On the other hand, there are good endings to some things:

While I can't say she wore the shawl for that long, my sister did put it on at her wedding and show it off to some of the guests.  Good enough.

The Scrap Project Paradox and The Law Of More Yarn Required

After finishing the lovely but long and complex shawl, I was trying to be good and go back to the stupid scrap project I've been working on for far too long (try two and a half years):

To remind everyone (though I've mentioned this project before), this is a simple log cabin squares put into a small blanket project that I started to get rid of all the Simply Soft I had laying around.  I've been working on it on and off, but during the Olympics I made a effort to get all the squares done and sewn up, which I accomplished.  I, however, only started the border before dropping it to do the shawl.  Priorities, priorities.

Anyway, this, of course, has gone the way of every scrap project, which is it fell for the Law of More Yarn Required.  The Law of More Yarn Required states that if you do something trying to use up random not full skeins of yarn, such as undertaking a scrap project, you will need more yarn to complete it than you have in your stash.  It isn't the worse thing in the world if you use all that extra yarn, but this goes hand-in-hand with the Scrap Project Paradox, which is any scrap project doesn't actually use up your scrap yarn.  It may change the dynamic or amount of such, but it never will use up all the scrap yarn.  You will always have some left.

Trying to avoid that for my scrap project, when I started the border I planned out the design so that I would use more of the yarn I had more of while still maintaining some semblance of a design.  I would not fall for this rule...and yeah:

I made the black sections way too big, and ran out of black yarn on the last side I had to do (I'm also log-cabining the border). Ten more rows of black I don't have the yarn for, nowhere, not even in my stash (for obvious reasons the half-skein of black wool I still have would not work, unfortunately).  So now I need more yarn for the scrap project I was doing to get rid of yarn. Sigh.

Not that I wasn't falling for this law even without the black yarn shortage (though, to be far, less yarn than I started with):

Best laid plans of mice and men and all that.  Next time I may do the whole thing properly; that is, weight the damn yarn and see how much area I can cover with it.  Maybe then I'll actually defeat the Law and the Paradox...or at least I can dream, right?