Easy As 1-2-3…

4-5-6….127-128-129…462-463-464…

WHAT?

I’m a counter. I admit it. I enjoy counting things, and have all my life. The steps I take on my walk, the pieces of wood I’m loading into my wood stove, the ceiling tiles in my office. I usually forget these numbers as soon as they’ve been counted. It’s the act of counting that I find pleasing, not committing the numbers to memory.

This counting habit is rarely bothersome and often comes in quite handy. Like when counting the stitches in a knitting pattern.

Counting is not fun at this time of year, though. Why? At year end, I have to inventory everything for tax purposes. I have to count both my raw materials and my completed stock. For my fiber addiction, this isn’t overly onerous: cones of yarn and scarves count relatively quickly.

For the jewelry end of my business, it’s another story. Counting literally thousands of beads in hundreds of stones is amazingly boring and tedious.

Every year I make an improvement to my process, so the job is a little less ugly. In fact, dreading it is often worse than actually doing it.

This year I dragged the process out, doing it in 4 sections: jewelry raw materials; completed bracelets, necklaces, and earrings; yarn; finished scarves, shawls, and baby blankets. I didn’t finish that last piece until this week.

Whew…I won’t have to do that for another year.

Your turn: what do you put off until you MUST do it?