SBQ for July 5th

Do you consider yourself a “floss miser?”

Hmmm, this is a hard question to answer. It really depends on the floss. I wouldn't imagine that I am a miser as much as a horder, if that makes sense. A long time ago, someone said to me, "You must have great stash." And I do have awesome thread stash. I have come to the decision that, out of my large credit card debt, fully half of it must have been from those shopping sprees for thread in the early parts of this century. And I hate using that thread. I know they will make more, but I still worry that they will stop making that particular color and I might need it one day when I can't afford new. I realize this is illogical thinking, but I can't help it. I hand-dyed some thread at CATS, and I was going to use it in a project, but I was afraid to do that, even though I have the dyes, because what if I never actually dyed thread again? It would be gone. This is very sad, I realize this.

But back to the original question . . . I guess you could say I am a miser with my Anchor floss but only because it's not that easy to come by. And it's expensive. So I tend to be careful with that. But DMC, even though I complain about 33 cents a skein, is still fairly cheap and I work 10 minutes from Michael's, so if the cat grabs a skein, it won't kill me. I still don't like wasting it, don't get me wrong, because I still put up with a lot of BS to earn the money to pay for it, but it's not necessarily life and death.

I did realize one other way I am miserly. With kit floss. My first counted cross stitch project was a beautiful chestnut Arabian stallion I dearly remember ruining an entire length of floss by letting it knot as I was pulling out a strand, and being 13 and stupid, I threw the length away. Summer that year, I realized I was short thread (precisely that amount I threw out, BTW) and had to go to the store and get more. And it didn't match. It was my 4-H project. Even though the ladies were nice about it, I knew that it wasn't right. That poor horse has sat on my wall with a mismatched spot on his chest since 1991. I bought the kit again off E-bay a couple years ago, I am seriously pondering fixing his chest with the thread, because I won't stitch him chestnut and it hurts me that his color isn't perfect. So I learned. I've found most kits have plenty of thread, but I don't want to make that mistake again.