(Kind of) Organized, (Somewhat) Planned, and (Becoming) Inspired

I have come up with something of a plan for my whole "Knitting From Stash" campaign.  This morning, I spent a good chunk of time on Ravelry, looking through my stash, pairing yarns with patterns like so:

1. Sort by date added (puts most recently-added first).
2. View one weight (thickness) at a time, starting with Super Bulky (I had 5), working my way through to Lace (I had 8).
3. Find the oldest yarn in each category where I had at least one whole ball/skein of it.  Note how many yards total I had of that yarn.
4. Go to the Patterns page and click on the advanced search option.
5. Do a search with the following options (listed from top to bottom as they are listed on Ravelry):

• Has photo = Yes
• Craft = Knitting
• Availability = In my library
• Weight = [whatever that yarn's classification was]
• Yardage = customized range of 0 - [the amount I had of that yarn].  NOTE:  If I had an exceptionally large amount of a particular yarn, I didn't start the range at 0, but at a about half the amount I had.

Et voila!  If this returned too large a selection of patterns, I narrowed it down further, perhaps saying "not baby" or "not home, not pet, not toys/hobbies", etc.  If it gave too few results, I deselected "in my library".  When I found something I liked for the yarn in question, I added it to my queue, specifying the yarn I had in mind.  I did not, however put a "complete by" date...because I know better than to do that with as much as I have on my plate.  It feels good to have a (loose) plan.

Here is what I have come up with.  Al plans are, of course, subject to change, based on my whim.  In one or two areas, I queued something as a reminder to myself of the general type of item I want to knit with that yarn, but I actually plan to design something myself in that vein.

• Super-Bulky = Minu by Shannon Okey out of my two balls of Fiesta Yarn Tenero (Stitches West pajama party door prize)
• Bulky = Radiating Star Blanket by Alexis Layton out of my eight gazillion balls of GGH Aspen
• Aran = Basically a Cowl by Mia Edvardson out of the remaining Phildar Clio (bought in Quebec by Andrew back in 2006)
• Worsted = All Washed Up by Jill Arnusch out of a stray ball of Peaches & Creme dishcloth cotton in Peppermint
• DK = Maze by Celeste Culpepper out of my Allhemp6 in Avocado + some I have in Black
• Sport = Staghorn Vest by Wendy Bernard (plain, not cabled, version) out of Blue Sky Alpacas Sport Weight
• Fingering = Mezquita Shawl by Roxanne Yeun out of LuLu's Yarns Supersock Merino (which I overdyed in dye class b/c I didn't like how it looked knit up)
• Light Fingering = Unleaving by Lee Juvan out of the black alpaca from Peru that Sean gave me (Be quiet, Sean! We're not talking about poor, unloved, hibernating UFO's in this post, thankyouverymuch.) 
• Lace = Pi Shawl by Elizabeth Zimmermann out of my Mmmmalabrigo Lace

Now, the purpose of this is not accountability, but inspiration to have lots of interesting things to do with the yarn I already have.  If I end up doing other things with this yarn, fine.  At least now I have some idea of what to do in between my "work" projects.  Speaking of which, off I go....