Taking Stock

One of the best parts of moving (only in retrospect can I deem this as a positive) is the inevitability of taking stock of all those nasty WIP knits that we so easily find ways of ignoring (hiding from ourselves). In organizing all the stuff that needed to move from one Brooklyn walk-up to another, I tried hard not to shudder as the pile of unfinished knits continued to grow exponentially. One room gets cleaned and 3 more stow-aways rear their ugly heads. Repeat for every room of the apartment.

Sure, despair and hopelessness are the first feelings to descend, but leave it to the great momentum you achieve while moving to blow past those feelings of defeat and move right on to the moving-on.

A frog-fest ensued and I have to say I feel absolutely liberated and excited again about good yarns that had gone long forgotten. The biggest mountain to scale was my old friend Demi.

taken july 2006. ugh.

On first consideration, it seemed like there were too many sinuous cables and twisted stitches to ever justify ripping something so beautiful, but in the spirit of being brutally honest with myself about what would and would not be worn... I knew what had to happen.

After trying on the body several times (there was only one sleeve left to complete the thing!), I knew what had to be done.

Too thick. Too warm. Too constricting. These are the things I repeated to myself as the wool carnage ensued. And, my friends, Demi is no more.

Don't be upset - because the best part of the story is yet to come! Almost immediately after the final stitch had been dissolved, I fell in love with the yarn all over again (it wasn't difficult). And it just so happens that I was in desperate need of a new sweater project. Do you see where this is going? Well lets just say that the Yorkshire Tweed and I are taking a second honeymoon, and I haven't looked back since.


Despite having the busiest schedule I can remember in years, I'm getting a surprising amount of knitting done. Evening knitting has been adopted as the most effective way of relaxing in a short period of time.

What am I trying to say today? I guess that a little frogging goes a long way - and there's no better time of year to do it. Liberate (yourself) some of that gorgeous yarn that has been too-long imprisoned in a doomed project (we all have them) and I promise you'll be justified. I still can't believe I've been sitting on 10 balls of this discontinued wonder-tweed for almost 2 years with no finished sweater to call my own. That's all about to change.

And as for Big Blue, we're rounding the home stretch.



As it turns out, sweaters are everywhere and that's what Fall should be about. Back to my wool-crazed euphoria. Happy Knitting.