Counting Therapuetic Benefits #5: Less eating

5)  Less eating overall.  It might be hard to prove, but I think that knitting decreases my calorie intake.  Example:  family went out for pizza.  I had one of my more complex knitting projects along.  So, after checking the table carefully for cleanliness, I took out my project and started knitting happily along while chatting with the family.  We always order cheesy bread-sticks with lots of marinara sauce, so it will come early.  So, when it did, I just kept on knitting, and let the family dive into the bread-sticks.  Normally, I would NEED to eat at least one to stave off hunger until the pizza arrives.  But, with knitting in hand, I was able to Say No and let someone else have my share.  You see, cheesy bread-sticks have a lot of, you guessed it, cheese and they're kindof "greassy".  In a very tasty way, mind you, just not in a calorie concious way.  But, as greassy fingers make for messy knitting, and parmesean cheese would have shown up on the project, I opted for knitting instead.  But, I'm there with the family.  Interacting.  Having a good time.  I had noticed when I didn't eat in these situations without my knitting, my family treats me as if I'm depriving myself of something that just shouldn't be missed.  I know that I tried not to, but I my stare at them all eating with a desparate look on my face.  Knitting short circuits those looks; my hands are moving, my face is smiling, what could possibly be pitiful about that?
Good pizza takes time to get right, and waiting while visiting with the family is the best part.  Right?  Well, it can be.  Not usually if you've got some ADD issues that make it difficult to sit still and focus on the family.  So, the knitting is useful for this too.  Instead of thinking "isn't this pizza ever going to get here?"  I can think to myself "wow, I'm making a lot of progress on this" and "at this rate, I could get this done in another week, easy."
Then, when the pizza does come, I'm not about to get sauce on the knitting!  So, it has to go back into the bag.  Any true knitter knows the "just 'till I get to the end of this row" symptoms.  Not too far into the pizza, I can virtually hear the knitting calling to me.  I NEED to do just one more row.  So, I finish off my serving of pizza, which has been about half of my usual intake, and clear my spot at the table.  The knitting comes back out again.  My DH bases his tipping partly on how many times his glass is refilled, or inversely how many times it goes empty.  But, three or four glasses of caffeinated soda this late in the evening would not be a benefit for me personally.  I've been so busy knitting and talking that I've hardly touched my soda, so no, I don't need a refill.  (Yeah!) 
So, in a Bridget Jones sort of tally for the end of the meal:  1 glass diet Dr. Pepper, 2 slices thin crust, 16 more rows done on the socks + family = one successful evening.

Knitting Therapy #4

Knitting at the movies. 
Going to the movies is a great family activity for many people.  It has been a treat for our family to go to the local theater together for a long time.  And, being a small town, we almost always see friends there too.  Seeing the movies together has always given us good discussion topics with each other.  I like to think that our willingness to show an interest in their entertainment has kept us closer to our children.  Where is it written that being a Parent inherently means that you cannot possibly share common interests with your Kids?  And no, I do not mean that Parents should Act like Kids or try to Be Kids......

When our kids were little, I usually had one sitting on my lap, or holding my hand or something that occupied my hands while we were there.  I'm thinking we probably went to the shorter movies back then too.  Somewhere along the line, I started becomming anxious at movies and had problems sitting still.  I began to dread everything about the movies; driving there, waiting in line, sitting through the previews, the time involved .......  Especially if we drove to "The City" to one of the big Multi-Plex Theaters.  I realized that I was coming up with excuses to not go with DH & the Kids.  OMG!  I was becoming that lady that we know that is proud of not having seen a movie in 20 years!

Then, I discovered that I can take my knitting with me to the movies.  It has to be a project geared toward knitting in the dark.  It requires the use of "silent" needles and techniques that don't involve big hand or arm movements.  Big yarn, bamboo needles, simple stitches, no pattern reading .........  With these givens, I can calmly ride for an hour, stand in line and wait in the theater for another hour and then relax through a three hour movie and watch all the way through the credits for the funny little extras that some tack onto the end.  AND an hour home.  Sometimes inculding a restaurant meal before or after.  So, anywhere from Two to Six hours of knitting time gained. 

Added bonus:  not eating nearly as many snacks or drinking as much expensive soda.  Calories and Dollars saved!  And, less caffeine late in the evening.  Why do movie theaters never have drinks with no caffeine and no sugar?

Knitting and Grief

To finish the story of my Grandmother's House and why I remember it when I'm knitting:

When the time came to sell Grandma's House, I was newly married.  I can't say that I have a lot of grief associated with this particular Grandmother, my Father's Mother.  Except the grief of not remembering her.  The feeling that she was in my life for a very short time and then she was gone.  The knowing that I have siblings and cousins that remember so much more about her, and I'm jealous of that.  Now, this many years later, even those cousins are gone or unwilling to talk about such ancient history.

We know that the first years of a child's life are when they learn to make attachments and form life-long bonds.  What about when those bonds are severed?  I keenly remember the feeling after my Father died that everyone I ever loved was dying.  I even had some magical thinking going on, my reasoning being that people were dying because I loved them.  Somehow, if it was known by "the powers that be" that I loved someone, they were destined to die because I did not deserve them in my life.

Since that time, as an adult, I have come to the realization that I was born into a family of older than average people.  While most Baby Boomers were born to young people right after the war, and most of my friends on the tail end of the Baby Boom were born to twenty-somethings, I had been born when my Father was 42.  Compound his age with his birth order and you get lots of elderly relatives.  My work on the Family Tree is leading me to a lot of very enlightening discoveries.  For some reason, I had always believed that because my father died when I was young, my relatives all died young.  Not necessarily true.  Many of them far outlived their peers.  I have to remind myself of this as I age.  The calendar and the clock are not ticking away my life just waiting for the moment I least expect it to rip me from my loved ones.  I'm looking forward to many long years of doing more genealogy research.

And what does this have to do with Knitting?  I've found that if I spend the days that mark the anniversaries of my loved one's deaths by Making Something, I can deal with their loss in a more positive way.  This year as I was remembering my Father, as I spent some time knitting, I purposely tried to remember that day that I spent at Grandma's House for the last time.  On that day, I was not yet an obsessive knitter, and couldn't have known what all the stuff in her stash represented.  I do remember boxes of newspaper and magazine clippings of patterns.  They could have been knitting or crochet or any number of other needlecrafts.  I remember wishing that I could save all of them from the burn-pile and the junk heap.  I don't remember any books on crafting.  Had they all been carted away in the intervening 20 some years? 

Had she ever been able to afford books or had they been available where she was likely to shop?  Or did she just never see the need for anything more than what was published in the paper.  Was she so cutting edge that she didn't believe in using Old information from books that were outdated as soon as published?  Probably not, I think that's a new idea ushered in by the Information Age.  The clippings do seem to show an interest in keeping current and making what's new.  Or maybe it was just a stage in her dementia....

There were boxes of crochet thread and embroidery floss and all kinds of buttons and zippers and notions.  Gadgets and tools that I did not know enough to identify were all mixed in.  Who knows if this is the state that Grandma had left them in, or if this was the result of years of rummaging by the family?  These were obviously the cast offs and the stuff that was not seen as valuable.  The treasured items had been carried away long ago.  Rust and dust and mildew and mice had all taken their toll.  I remember thinking some pretty judgemental thoughts about my older cousins that were too squeamish to reach into a box that might also contain spiders or mouse remains.  Now, I can temper my judgement with the knowledge that this was still the time before really good allergy meds, in a family overwhelmingly predisposed to severe allergies, in the peak of allergy season, in a dusty, moldy, environment.  Some of them were probably just focused on getting done with this chore without an emergency room visit for anaphylactic reaction.  I don't recall that the wasps were very welcoming either.  And if it was probably about 100 degrees outside, what would the attic heat factor be?

So, in my thoughts, I can now have a more positive memory of Grandma's House.  I'm free to imagine her any way I want.

Counting Therapuetic Benefits #3

I knit so I don't kill people.  Well, maybe not quite.  But knitting does calm me down if I'm upset at somebody.  Much like prayer or meditation, knitting is rythmic, repetative, and calming.  Tai Chi is really big slow movements that can be calming.  I think (the right kind of ) knitting can lower heart rate and blood pressure.  It's a life raft in stormy seas.  I even sometimes have the feeling of the aunts that taught me sitting right there with me.  Their patience soothing.  The Rose Milk scent on the air.  The love cradling my being.  For a hyper kid to sit still for even a moment was a miracle, and those women had the secret.  They made magic from sticks and hooks and strings.  And they listened to the woes of the day, the hurts of the playground.  In a short time, those hurts and woes didn't seem so big anymore.  Forgiveness felt better.  Rage seemed to be a waste of time when fingers could create magic.

Knit Therapy #2

2)  Knitting helps me sit still. 
As a child, I constantly heard the phrase "don't you wish you had that much energy" uttered by the adults around me.  It's funny how the things that are perfectly acceptable at one age are serious liabilities in another phase of life.  Sitting still at school was always difficult.  And, I'm a "knee-bouncer", "foot tapper":  not just when I'm nervous, or bored, or when I have to go to the bathroom.  Always, all the time.  The Dr. got me some meds for Restless Leg Syndrome after I did a sleep study.  So, I guess now I can hold still while I sleep.  My knee bouncing has been known to disturb other people.  Especially where the floor has a little give to it.  Or if I'm sitting on a bench like at a picnic table, or a church pew.  I've been asked to quit bouncing the whole table where people are trying to work, read, or write.  Sitting with my children that are also knee bouncers can make others think about earthquakes.  Hard soled shoes on wood or tile floors will sometimes get my attention before it goes on too long.  But, sometimes a co-worker has to say "What is that noise?" before I notice it.  Typing at a keyboard, watching tv, singing in the choir are not always enough to get control.  Driving and using a sewing machine foot feed seem like they should cancel out the foot tapping, but there's that other foot that is left out of the process that can just go right along tapping.
There's something about knitting, stitching, sewing, fine motor skill tasks that will let that part of my nervous system relax.  Before I was a knitter, I could sometimes doodle or sketch on a piece of paper, especially if I balanced it on a knee, to get myself to stop and be still.  There is a need to occasionally take a deep breath and analyze the posture for stress, consciously relaxing shoulders and arms, back and legs.  It's a whole body exercise.
We once did a whole Bible study on Stillness.  It was a skill that I have had to work hard at.  Knitting is one of my crutches.

Knitting to cope with grief

On the anniversary of my Father's passing, I was not up to writing about it. 
Or talking about it. 
To anyone. 

Believe it or not, he died a couple of weeks before my 15th birthday.  And that was 37 years ago.  And still, every year it's a difficult day.  It "gets easier"?  Maybe, maybe not.

Now, looking back on it, I know that I really should have had some counseling, and maybe a lot of help, way back then.  But, it wasn't "the thing to do".  If you ever find yourself or a loved one in a similar situation, I urge you to Seek Help.  It's out there.

But, following the counsel that I have had since then, I went through the day carefully.  I avoided stressors, immersed myself in all things positive, stayed around supportive people.  And I spent a lot of time with my knitting in my hands or at least on my lap.  And, probably because I've also been spending a lot of time on geneaology research, I thought about my Grandmother, my Father's Mother. 

I don't really remember her.  She died, I think, when I was about 2 years old.  She lived with my family for "a while" before that, but there are conflicting reports on if that meant 14 months or 14 years.  Grandma had owned a house in the little home town, and I did get to know her house.  I know that sounds odd.

Family Reunions were always a big deal for my Father's Family.  There were a lot of kids in his generation, and they mostly had several kids each.  And by the time that I was born, my Aunts and Uncles were Grandparents and some were Greatgrandparents themselves.  When I was little, I thought that's what they meant when they said someone "was from an Old Family".  So, every year, on the appointed day, well over a hundred of our family would congregate in this tiny little town that normally had only 50 residents.  The town struggled to keep a gas station open, much less a hotel.  And very few of the family members still lived in the town.  So, the eldest Aunt that lived the farthest away bought my Grandmother's House.  It was empty most of the year, but Aunt Grace and her family would stay there when they were in the area.  A great many of the things in the house stayed just as Grandma had left them when she last was there in about 1960.  A Victrolla that we all played nonstop whenever we were there.  Knowing what those are worth now makes me question the Aunt's sanity.  A steel frame bed with very squeeky springs.  Hand made everything you can think of:  quilts, afghans, pot holders, lace doilies and table cloths, aprons, anti-maskars, braided rugs, dresser scarves, rag dollies, chair cushions, couch pillows, hot pads, water bottle covers, toilet paper cover dolls.  And clothes that they let us play dress up with;  crochet slippers, hats of all kinds, house dresses, scarves, all vintage in the extreeme. 

Eventually the time came when Aunt Grace's family decided to sell the house.  It was about 25 years after Grandma had died.  We hadn't all gone to the house for several years because the family had outgrown it for the Reunion, it being held in the Masonic Lodge by that time.  But each family was invited by turns to come over and take an item or two from the house.  As an adult, not having been there for years, everything seemed so small.  And of course everything was so worn out and broken down.  Some of the furniture had pretty much disintegrated. 

But what struck me hard was the sudden realization, when it was far too late, that my Grandmother had been a Crafter.  And now I also know that she was somewhat of a hoarder too.  All those years the house had been empty, noone had really cared what was in the Attic.  The Family was hauling out boxes of patterns that she had cut out of newspapers and magazines.   Stored in an attic all those years had destroyed them to confetti and mouse nests. 

Counting Therapeutic Benefits #1

1)  Having a knitting project with me at all times gives me the confidence to go places without fearing that I'll be stuck with nothing to do.  Getting stuck waiting in line, or for an appointment, is a big deal for me.  Waiting 30 minutes to get a table at a restaurant is out of the question.  Even 10 minutes can seem like a lifetime.  If I have knitting, or a grand baby to play with, it's tolerable.  Some restaurants waiting areas are poorly lit, or are at the bar, where being able to see well is not a sure thing.  See knitting in the dark somewhere later in this list.

Personal Experience: Knitting as a way to deal with ADHD, OCD and other disorders.

Are any of you experienced in dealing with "disorders" like Depression, ADHD or OCD? 
I've been working at getting mine under control, whatever it is.
I'm going to try listing the benefits. 
Kind of a "count your blessings" exercise. 
This may take several days and many postings. 
I don't expect to get it right the first time. 
(And you have no idea how hard it is for me to let people possibly see something that isn't perfect and finished.)

Hospital Knitting ... again

Having a loved one in the hospital really brings out my knitting obsession.  But, I think it's a good thing.  It gets be to sit still.  Knitting lets me "reward" myself for conquering my fear of hospitals.  The almost impercetable swish of the needles and yarn lets me tune out the Hospital Noises and focus on my loved one and what she's saying, or not saying. 

Has anyone else noticed how loud the Hospitals are?  All those beeps and bells and alarms?  The nurses don't seem to notice them at all.  I finally asked one of the nurses, and was told that each sound has a "meaning".  And that not all of them need to be "answered".  Some are just signals to let you know that something has finished.  Like an IV has finished it's dose, and may or may not need to be changed sometime in the next hour or so... ? ?

So, is it kind of like baby cries/noises?  You learn to hear and recognize some of the noises as not requiring action.

Or the buzzer on the dryer?  Or the miscrowave?  The dryer dings to let you know that the laundry is dry, and could be taken out if you want to have wrinkle free shirts.  The microwave says the water is ready for your tea, but it can sit in there all day, quite safely, if you've already left for work. 

As opposed to the buzzer on the oven timer?  The oven must be attended to right now!  Pull out those cookies before they burn!  That Broiling Chicken could become Flaming Wings, setting off smoke detectors, smoke everywhere, maybe a house fire (eventually)......

There's even a beeper much like a back-up warning on a dump-truck that lets you know when a nurse is moving the little Computer-On-Wheels around from one room to another.

There's even a "blind warning device" at a cross walk intersection downtown.  It a short post that beeps (or chirps) every 5 seconds.  Presumably so a bling person knows there's an intersection and street traffic.  Maybe they can find the crossing light button by homing in on it?  Personally, it makes me want to avoid that part of downtown.

Getting Rest in a Hospital has always been one of the most contradictory terms to ever disturb me.
And that's saying something.

Swiffer knit therapy: No Fault Insurance for Hoarding Therapy

I just found this very cool stash-busting therapeutic knitting project at stitchtherapybrooklyn.blogspot.com on swiffer-knits by stopek.html .
The recommended yarn is "acrylic", and who of us doesn't have some acrylic yarn we regret buying stashed away somewhere?  I saw a mountain of it for $1 a pound at the thrift store today.

And "NO, I did NOT buy ANY".  (I knew you would ask.)

My early eBay shopping exploits are some of the classic doozies of splurges on things that looked good online, and ended up being something else entirely upon receipt.  My best example was a "soft blue" that was only "soft" in its color.  The acrylic was somewhere between sandpaper and barbed wire in texture.  "Phentex" was also a yarn that I had no experience with that did not live up to expectations.  Therefore, I have a lot of yarn that I can't get rid of and can't use.  But, to get out of the hoarding mess I'm in, I need to do something with it.

The flip side of this conundrum is the OCD issues that I have with knitting.  I believe it would be very therapeutic to knit without worry.  Without perfection.  Throwing caution to the wind.  There should be a freedom in using a swiffer cloth as a testing object and not caring if there’s a mistake while I’m learning a new stitch.  I cannot imagine, in even my warped little mind, anyone that would be judgmental of a cloth to be used to scrub the floor.  I realize that pot-holders and dishcloths are supposed to serve that function.  But, I have people that are very opinionated on what a “proper” pot-holder is, and how a dishcloth should be constructed.  I recently found out that my MIL wasn’t using the hot-pad I had spun, knit and felted expressly for the purpose of holding hot dishes on the table.  Her reasoning:  she didn’t think it was washable.  So much for giving her something she could use every day.

Anyway, swiffer-cloths may be my new laboratory.

Raising Hope - Dream Hoarders

  Have you seen Raising Hope?  The episode titled "Dream Hoarders".
  So much to learn there.  And, presented with just enough humor to take the mean edge off.
The Hoarders show has too much of reality.  Raising Hope actually gives one hope.  But, since I've learned a little more about the Hoarding Mindset, I doubt that the approach of just hauling off the whole garden shed overnight is an effective cure.  The rebound effect could be catastrophic.  And if Mom is a true Hoarder, she would have probably have not dealt as well as the charater on a commedy.
I did really like the last scene where the Kid/Daddy recognized that some Hoarding Behaviors aren't all that bad.

A moment of Clarity

My dear, dear family and DH don't often understand my Hoarding Issues.  And they often ask "Why?", and I've been having a thought on that today......
  Some of you may have grown up going to the library all the time.  I did not.  Our little neighborhood school libraries were a good try, but nothing like what I discovered later.
  Some of you may have had a library in your home, and subscriptions to magazines that came in the mail.  I did not.  Our "family library" was a 3' wide 4' tall bookcase.  One whole shelf was occupied by The World Book Encyclopedia.  I was a voracious reader and read through the whole thing one summer when I was about 12.  There was one dictionary, published before my birth, and one Bible, awarded to a parent for Sunday School attendance in 1934.  While I do think I read the dictionary, I'm pretty sure that I haven't read the whole Bible yet.
  When I started college, we were expected to know how to use an "index to periodicals".  I remember discovering the archived magazine section at the libraries.  They had ancient copies of the most fascinating publications; all bound into volumes by year.  It was like an archaeological find, only not so much dust.  Before then, I had no idea that there were so many magazines on such a wide variety of crafts and arts.  I think I "wasted" a great deal of a year or two of college lurking in the depths of those archives.  That was before my Hoarding got to be a problem.  Everything I would ever need to know was at the library, open almost 24 hours a day, a short walk from my dorm room.
   Now that I'm thinking about it, maybe those archives were a contributing factor to the problem.  As time went by, I learned that my little college library sold off great numbers of books and magazines at a book sale every year.  Their capacity for storage had been reached, and the oldest and least read had to make way for the new and the popular.  At 4 books for $1 or $5 per bag, how could anyone let these precious tomes get away?  As long as they were in the Library, it was possible to go there and see the patterns and read the articles if they were needed.  As they were sold off, they went to live in someone else's stash closet, or horrors! to that new recycling center in the mall parking lot. Then they would be "Gone".  As time went by, the big University Library and the Public Library in the University Town started getting rid of their stuff too, and I was always right there to buy and haul home as many boxes and bags of books as I could afford.  By the time we set up housekeeping, and I was home with little ones, even the small town local Library was getting rid of periodicals over 5 years old.  They were giving them away free!  They, too, had a Fund Raising Book Sale every summer.  It was for a good cause.  And I was giving them a good-ish home.  Right?
  Sometimes, I've discovered that I actually had 2 or even more copies of the exact same issue.  I even spent a great lot of money on magazines on eBay at the height of the problem. 
   In reality, they stacked up in places inhospitable to paper and decayed away in many gruesome ways.  They have taken up space that could have been put to better use.  Space that has been expensive to maintain, hard to acquire, never enough of.  They have required heating in the winter and venting in the summer.  They have been drowned by rising water and roof leaks.  They have been nibbled and gnawed by mice and moths and who knows what else. 
  These collections were read only occasionally.  When I did try to find a half remembered article or pattern, it could never be found in the chaos.  It became much easier to just make up a pattern than to find the one I was looking for.  And now, with the Internet and Ravelry, and all the company websites like Bernat and Lion Brand and Interweave, isn't it easier now than ever to find exactly the pattern or idea that I need?  Without the Paper Overload?
   This may be a breakthrough moment; wish I had a therapist to talk to about it.  Maybe it's time to let more of them go..........

Archived issues on CD's - viable alternative?

I just found out that Interweave Press has Archived issues on CD's for some of their publications.  They're not the most current releases, range from 2004 to 2009 for the ones I explored.
Have any of you explored these as a viable alternative to keeping the hard-copy magazines?
Many of the magaizines I had saved have met with sad endings recently, and have now gone on to the Great Recycling Bin.  The irrational feelings of loss associated with this kind of event have led me to seek out other ways to assure myself that these aren't completely gone and will be available in one form or another if I need them.  The evolution of the internet and web entities like Ravelry have helped me let go of a lot.  But, I'm worried that my comfort-zone stretching is getting to the limit right now.  I want to be IN the comfort zone for a little while before I stretch more and make more progress.

Getting to keep the Grandbaby overnight

The absolutely best reward for getting rid of the junk:
Getting to keep the Grandbaby overnight.
I don't think the kids would have Not ever let us babysit, but my DH was worried about it.
And I know that it's all out of love for everyone concerned.  Our house wasn't "unsafe" but it definately was not "baby proof".  And toddler safe is a way off still.
So, there are tradeoffs and rewards.  Yeah!

We have had people over to the house - twice !

Did I mention that we had company over twice ! 
Real Visitors ...
We even had my DMIL over for Christmas Eve gifting. 
And then we had about 15 people over for New Year's Eve.
My kids invited people too!
It was pretty cool to have space for everyone to sit, and the table space for everyone to eat a meal together.
I got to tell one of my best friends that she's "worth more to me than all of my crap." 
And it's so true.  Being able to have a friend drop by is worth so much.
And I was missing that for so long.
That's priceless isn't it?

The Progress is showing

I'm not sure how much actual progress I have made in the last 4 months, but my house is looking better.
DH and the other occupants have been working really hard on hauling stuff off, giving it away, donating, throwing out, burning, boxing up, and moving away.
I'm learning not to panic every time someone takes out the trash.  I haven't "rescued" anything from a trash bag in, well, several days at least.

Did the sleep study

Ok, I did the sleep study and about a dozen other tests over the course of about 2 weeks.

And, I've already started taking the tiny steps toward a change in diet.

I think I'm feeling better, but that might just be an "attitude of hope" thing.

I don't care if it is.  Whatever it is, I'll take it.

Don't actually see the Dr. with all the results for another week or so.

Seems to be wasting time, if you ask me.

Maybe I'm just obsessing on this now..........

OCD, yes I am, that's Me !

And yes, having my knitting with me at the sleep study did make things easier.

And when I was waiting at the Lab, and the Dr's office, and the Pharmacy,.....

There's a lot of waiting involved in all this testing.

Patience is a virtue..........

The graphic to the right is available on T-shirts, bags, coffee cups, etc.

at CafePress

Design is not by me, I just liked it.

No Caffeine

Don't know where else to blog about this, so you readers are the lucky ones.
Long story short:  I'm getting lots of medical testing done.  One of the tests is a "sleep study" to check for sleep apena.
Reading through the list of stuff to do for preparation:  not supposed to have ANY caffeine for 24 hours before the study.
First question:  does that mean for 24 hours before the study begins, which is this evening, say 9pm, so that would have been starting at 9pm last night?  Or does it mean for 24 hours before the study will end, at the unusual hour of 5:30 am tomorrow morning.  Why 5:30? 
There are so many questions here.

So, I go to a website to look up Caffeine

And the side bar add is:  Is Excessive Sleepiness Hurting You?  Take the Quiz >
And there's questions about how much coffee you drink in comparison to co-workers, do you have obligations that keep you up late or make you get up early, headaches, napping, dozing off.........
And then the anaylsis article that says the expected blanket "Americans aren't sleeping enough or well enough".
You should see your doctor for help with this problem.
This is supposed to be new information?
Sleep affects work performance?
Sleepiness can be dangerous while driving?
No Kidding!

Now my only question is:  what knitting project to take to a Sleep Study

Another Excel total of the Ravelry listed Stash

As of August 11, 2010
230 skeins of yarn
24,119 grams
51,032 yards

It didn't seem like that much when it was all scattered out.
Well, not exactly "out".
It was pretty much Stashed, Hidden, know what I mean?

Entering Yarn Stash into Ravelry

I've started entering my yarn stash at Ravelry.
It should let me see how much yarn I really have.
I'm also getting rid of any yarn that isn't "useable".
If I'm understand it right,
One of the problems with Hoarding is that it has become very difficult for me to judge what is "useful" and what is "trash".
Did I write that I've been seriously working on this since before ? 
Well, I'm not sure how long ago I really admitted that I had a Problem and started Trying to Fix It.
It seems like it's only been a couple of months, but maybe it's been almost a year?
How does time fly that fast?

Anyway, Ravelry has a Stash Database that will let me export to Excel.
And in Excel, one of my favorite programs by the way, I can total up how much yarn I've got.
If I've done this right, as of
August 10, 2010
122 Skeins
12,583 grams
27,260 yards

On the road toward not having a Hoarding Problem

Hi, I'm Ruby and I have a problem with Hoarding.
My yarn stash has been out of control for a while.
My house has been totally out of control for a long time, even before I was knitting a lot.
Well, not quite as out of control as on the TV show, ....
Before the knitting, it was quilting. 
And sewing. 
And making bears and dolls. 
And needle punch embroidery. 
And embroidery, crewel and needlepoint.
And candle making, ceramics, painting,
You get the idea.
I'm trying to get better before my family turns me in to the producers of the show.
If I am ever on TV, that's NOT what I want to be there for.
Maybe Knitty Gritty?