Don't leave home without it.

Your notions kit, that is.

 

Why does travel, even short jaunts bring epiphanies? We were headed to a family party, a day trip.  I decided to bring a bigger knitting bag. We get in the car and leave on time.  When we settle in to the first leg of the journey I go looking for stitch markers. Then it hits me, I don't have notions kit in this bag. I always have a notions kit. How is it possible that there is no notions kit in this bag? I feel like I'm traveling without a compass. 

 Joe offered to turn around but I think he was just kidding. He still gets points for offering. I took deep relaxing breaths.  Do I panic or approach this with the problem solving attitude of my friend, Alba. For goodness sake, she didn't let not having knitting needles get in the way, how could I complain about my lack of notions.

I decided I could live without the stitch markers.  It was just to aid in counting a large number of stitches I was casting on.  The next "obstacle", I needed scissors to cut the extra yarn from long tail cast on. Luckily I have a Swiss Army type knife with a scissor on my key chain. Crisis averted.

Thankfully, from then on the Knitting G-ds were kind to me.

Moral of the story: when I load a bag with a project, I will make sure at a minimum, I put a small crisis pack of notions in the bag.

What would go in this crisis bag you might ask?

• Stitch Markers
• Scissor (puppysnips, collapsible scissor, or yarn cutter).
• Tapestry needle a/k/a chibi
• Tape measure
• Crochet hook (fix-a-stitch)

There are several ways to carry this out.

 

Nancy's Knit Knacks, perfect notions case.

 

   

The Knit Kit 

Or the tried and true small zippered case. 

Obviously, I have several of each.  I'm going to track them down and create a shelf of ready to go mini notions kit.  Don't leave home without it.

What's in your notions kit?

As a complete aside, yesterday I was looking for the turnkey tool for the battery case on my fitbit.  I knew I had seen it somewhere.  It wasn't in any of my usual places for an item like this.  While writing this post, I found the tool in a ceramic bowl, with my stitch markers.  Of course, why wouldn't it be in there?