Tuesday, July 29, 2008

Moth 911.

I do still knit and even at much greater frequency than I anticipated after Amelia was born. She's a great nurser and doesn't mind the slight jostling of my hands and arms while I go 'round and 'round on my circulars finishing up her stripey pants. I have one round left and then an I-cord and they're done. This has made me think about all of the other wonderful things that I want to knit (both for Amelia and others on my perpetual "to knit for" lists) or finish knitting. Have you ever had one of those BOOM! I'VE GOT IT! moments when you finally link up a yarn that's been in your stash forever with a project for which you just HAVE to wind the yarn right away and get started on it, even though you already have ten projects languishing on the needles? (Of course you have, my knitting readers anyway...)

It hit me today that Amelia MUST have another pair of stripey pants in the smaller 3-6 month size and VOILA! the perfect yarn from my stash appeared in my mind's eye. It was a gift from Heide during the Harry Potter Swap last summer in the coolest shades of minty green and lavender. They'll be self-striping stripey pants...perfect!

Until I went to my stash and pulled out the yarn. And remembered that I did almost swallow a moth in my kitchen the other night just from walking through it while yawning (what? yawning with an infant around?). And I did see a moth in my hall closet, suspiciously close to my half-a-sheep's-worth of roving. And I did see a moth fly in or out or around this stash box a few weeks ago, but decided to leave my head comfortably buried in the sand because I just couldn't stomach dealing with moths eating my yarn.

I can't avoid this though:
o...h......m...y......g...o...d

Do you see all of those little yarn ends hanging out there, clipped perfectly by a moth's mouth for no apparent reason other than to make me go totally crazy and want to exterminate my entire house? That's only on one side...there are more ends flying out there on the other side.

Okay, I told myself, let's remain calm here. In the words of The Great Harlot herself, I thought, let's ask the blog. The blog will know what to do.

So blog? What do I do?

1. What do I do about preventing this from happening again and (hopefully?) ridding myself of these irritating little pests for good? (I am using large plastic Rubbermaid-type bins to store the yarn...isn't that good enough?)

:::and:::
2. What do I do about my yarn that is potentially all in bits and pieces now? Can I just wind it off in pieces or do I have to be concerned about moth eggs (or whatever they do) embedded in my precious fibers? Is there a special bath I can give my yarn? Please tell me it's not a lost cause...I'm trying to remain calm but all I can see is dollar signs and lost project dreams going down the tubes when I go down that road.

Let's all breathe in a bit of sleeping baby to calm our nerves here. She's taken to sleeping like her Grama and Mom with one arm over her face lately. I would say something about her being cute as a bug in a rug or something like that, but I'm not very fond of insects right now.
Let's call this photo "No! Not Mommy's yarn! I want more stripey pants!" instead, shall we?

7 comments:

JoyceR said...

Grab big, black garbage bags and load in the yarn. Place the tightly closed bags in the sun - or better yet in the trunk of the car in the sun. Leave the bags in the sun for at least three days. That should cook the little bastards. For a small amount of yarn, put it in the freezer. I keep lavender sachets in my big plastic containers. That is supposed to help ward off the evil.

Chris said...

Oh no!!! Joyce nailed it - this is probably the perfect weather to get rid of the damn things... (Well, unless it was -20F...)

Ruth's Place said...

Oh No!! You've made me want to go and check my plastic tubs now!!

Heide said...

I've not had moths... I don't think so anyway. Crud, now I need to fumigate and search through my stash. Aaack! Amelia is already looking older. You have beautiful children.

Aunt Jenny said...

What Janice said...dang....been there..had THAT nightmare. It must be hot and dry enough in Utah for it not to be as bad here..so far no problem..but in coastal Calif I did have to do the moth fight. I keep lavender sachets in my bins too. Good luck...KILLLLLLL!!!!!

constructobot said...

I am for the freezer on this one- I had a similar recent horror face me in my sock yarn container- I crammed our freezer full and left it in for three days.

If you have a lot you worry about, I'd put it in a garbage bag out on your sun porch- nice and hot, no kids messing- and bake the evil frakkers

Unknown said...

Icky! Sorry to hear about the moth invasion! Let us know what you decide to do. I've just put all mine out in the sun as a precaution.