Wednesday, February 14, 2018

Christmas is coming!

I know today is Valentine's day... but my thoughts are on Christmas.

My family loves to tease me about it, but I'm one of those people who starts on Christmas early. REALLY early!  Sometimes the week AFTER Christmas. I'm always thinking ahead, and if I'm out shopping in June and see something for my brother that's just perfect, and a great price, you can bet I'll buy it!

Believe me... shopping and crafting throughout the year makes the silly season a lot more enjoyable. It also makes it much more affordable.*

So when Love Knitting had a 70% off sale at the end of January, it's no surprise that was browsing with Christmas on my mind.
Actually, it's not just Christmas, but Father's Day, and and birthdays too! It's all aran weight striping yarn (with few solid for heels and toes), perfect for nice thick socks. Dad absolutely loves them, and they knit up nice and quick, so I would have been foolish to let the sale pass me by.

Sadly, the "print yarns" (the stripers with the exception of the greens) don't have nylon in them. But the solids do, and heels and toes are where you need nylon the most so they should be ok. Dad mostly wears his thick ones around the house anyway, so they get fairly light wear.

I won't be casting on for a while, but it's nice to know the yarn is ready for me when I do!

 
* The trick to this is to keep track. It's very easy to over-buy or misplace things if you're not careful. I collect everything in a large box, and I keep an excel sheet on my computer, where I track what I've got and for whom.  I check in every month or so, and come October, I make a list of who  I still need gifts for and try to finish things up before the end of November.

10 comments:

Araignee said...

OH, GOOD GOLLY.....look at all that yarn!

Anonymous said...

You have a planner's soul .... I like that in a person.

(DH was one of the Master Planners for the company he worked for. LOL)

The colors you chose are such happy colors. Happy knitting!

Delighted Hands said...

Great catch for the sale yarn! I love to stock the stash!

Vera said...

You are so organized!! I used to buy gifts year-round as well, but for some reason I sort of stopped doing that the other year...and it was a real PITA this last season!!

Samantha said...

*la la la la* you said the "C" word.

Great idea with the excel sheet. I'm going to have to do something like that. You seem to have the xmas stress down to a minimum ...

Tired Teacher said...

When I was still exchanging gifts with my extended family, I purchased gifts throughout the year which was definitely helpful in keeping within my gift budget.

Love all the yarn you purchased for gift socks!

kathy b said...

Great Purchase! I couldnt agree with you more. I enjoy gift giving and to do it reasonably is a fun game for me. I've purchased 3 gifts for Christmas for next year, deeply discounted. Great post

chrisknits said...

I am so not organized to do that. I would lose something even if I tried to keep it organized! There is always one present I forget to wrap.

The Well Fed Wheel said...

Yikes....now that's organization!

Eastside Cats said...

An Excel spreadsheet? Really?!? That's just too organized, but makes a lot of sense.
Happy Valentine's Day!