At the risk of sounding a trifle obsessed my focus today is all about getting ready for Stash Dash - which starts tomorrow! I may have mentioned it once or twice before.

Success in Stash Dash (whatever your goal is) depends upon maximising your knitting time, and at the risk of stating the bleeding obvious you need to spend as much of your free time knitting and avoiding having to tink back or stop to hunt for supplies.

 With this in mind I am putting together a few project bags which have all of my essential supplies needed for socks and shawls - stitch markers, tape measures, waste yarn etc. I don’t know about you but in my house I can easily lose 10 minutes searching for a tapestry needle. And that crucial 10 minutes knitting time can be much better spent putting in an afterthought heel.

I know that not everyone shares my obsession but this year with time tighter than ever I have put together a few top tips to help me reach my 10K goal - I will report back later on how successful they are:

1. Round up all essential supplies and set up a “sock bag” and a “shawl bag” where my current projects can live while they are being worked on.

2. Do a quick inventory of larger projects and check what stage they are at. Do they need trying on or a decision made about length/fit/gauge - now is the time to decide so that you don’t waste valuable knitting time later on in a state of chronic indecision (no prizes for guessing how I know this).

3. Do you need to order more needles? I’m not joking - nothing is worse than getting to the crucial stage of a project and realising that you need a different size or that something is lost or broken.

4. Plan to curb screen time. This is a big one for me but I need to get my screen time under control if I’m going to make the most of my free time. I’ve downloaded an app called QualityTime to help me monitor how much time I spend online on my phone and I fully expect to be slightly shocked. If I manage to cut my screen time by even a quarter - that’s time that can be more gainfully employed.

5. Gather up local takeaway menus and put them on the fridge. I’m not planning to feed the kids pizza every night (although the thought did cross my mind) but a few easy meals and minimal kitchen time will mean that I can spend some of the precious early evening hours (before I’m too tired to function) getting some solid knitting time under my belt.

If you have any tips for squeezing more knitting time into the day I’d love to hear them. Every little helps, as they say.