Un-Knitting
If you want to destroy my sweater
(whoa-oh-oh)
hold this thread as I walk away.
Watch it unravel
I'll soon be naked.
Lying on the floor,
I've come undone!
(Can anyone guess the song and the group who sings it?)
I got some yarn once, and knit up a sweater according to a Rowan pattern I'd copied from a friend. The knitting was nice, but the seaming was crap. I didn't even finish all the finishing until a year ago when I was hugely preggers and thought "Now wouldn't it be nice to have a new (as in, not yet worn) if I ever get back to my original size?" At the time, a whopping 42 pounds heavier than I was nine months before, it felt like an impossibility, but I finished the sweater all the same. A few months later when I squeezed myself into it, I discovered two things:
1. It is not wise to make a close-fitting sweater out of scratchy yarn.
2. It is not wise to make a stockinette stitch sweater with a tighter gauge than the yarn calls for and expect it to drape nicely...not that it matters when it's so itchy one can't stand to wear it for more than 2 minutes in the first place.
So last night, I dragged it out of the closet and took it apart. Here it is heaped unceremoniously on the [dirty] kitchen floor:
Then, I frogged...and frogged...and frogged. I used the back of a rocking chair to wind the yarn:
When I removed it from the chair, BOINGGGGGGGGG! The yarn looked like I had just shaved a poodle. I was so amused by its sproingy, kinky appearance, I spent a little time determining its natural habitat.
It didn't get along with the spider plant:
It didn't seem at home on the piano:
A wig it was not:
But when it snuggled up with the sbarf, the pile of poodle yarn was right at home:
(Why, no, I don't have a life. Why do you ask?)
I soaked the oodles of noodly poodle yarn (I've been dying to write that for ages) in some water and no-rinse wool-wash, then hung it from the shower curtain rail all night. It's still drying in front of the window, where I transferred it so Stu could take a non-woolly shower this morning. It's not completely un-kinked, but I think once it's dry and wound into balls, this yarn will definitely be knit-able again.
And that's the story of my un-knitting. I did not feel one ounce of remorse as I frogged this sweater. Often, I like the process of knitting more than the finished product, and for me, the process of taking it apart was actually kind of fun. For one thing, it's a helluva lot quicker to rip something out than knit it up in the first place. Instant gratification, what?
This yarn is destined for Steph. I've knit it once and have no interest in knitting it again. She liked the vest I finished recently, and she's my cousin and all, so her prize for nothing in particular is a copy of the pattern and this no-longer-noodly-poodly yarn so she can make herself one.
(whoa-oh-oh)
hold this thread as I walk away.
Watch it unravel
I'll soon be naked.
Lying on the floor,
I've come undone!
(Can anyone guess the song and the group who sings it?)
I got some yarn once, and knit up a sweater according to a Rowan pattern I'd copied from a friend. The knitting was nice, but the seaming was crap. I didn't even finish all the finishing until a year ago when I was hugely preggers and thought "Now wouldn't it be nice to have a new (as in, not yet worn) if I ever get back to my original size?" At the time, a whopping 42 pounds heavier than I was nine months before, it felt like an impossibility, but I finished the sweater all the same. A few months later when I squeezed myself into it, I discovered two things:
1. It is not wise to make a close-fitting sweater out of scratchy yarn.
2. It is not wise to make a stockinette stitch sweater with a tighter gauge than the yarn calls for and expect it to drape nicely...not that it matters when it's so itchy one can't stand to wear it for more than 2 minutes in the first place.
So last night, I dragged it out of the closet and took it apart. Here it is heaped unceremoniously on the [dirty] kitchen floor:
Then, I frogged...and frogged...and frogged. I used the back of a rocking chair to wind the yarn:
When I removed it from the chair, BOINGGGGGGGGG! The yarn looked like I had just shaved a poodle. I was so amused by its sproingy, kinky appearance, I spent a little time determining its natural habitat.
It didn't get along with the spider plant:
It didn't seem at home on the piano:
A wig it was not:
But when it snuggled up with the sbarf, the pile of poodle yarn was right at home:
(Why, no, I don't have a life. Why do you ask?)
I soaked the oodles of noodly poodle yarn (I've been dying to write that for ages) in some water and no-rinse wool-wash, then hung it from the shower curtain rail all night. It's still drying in front of the window, where I transferred it so Stu could take a non-woolly shower this morning. It's not completely un-kinked, but I think once it's dry and wound into balls, this yarn will definitely be knit-able again.
And that's the story of my un-knitting. I did not feel one ounce of remorse as I frogged this sweater. Often, I like the process of knitting more than the finished product, and for me, the process of taking it apart was actually kind of fun. For one thing, it's a helluva lot quicker to rip something out than knit it up in the first place. Instant gratification, what?
This yarn is destined for Steph. I've knit it once and have no interest in knitting it again. She liked the vest I finished recently, and she's my cousin and all, so her prize for nothing in particular is a copy of the pattern and this no-longer-noodly-poodly yarn so she can make herself one.
Comments
...or are you kidding?
:)
i knew you knew it. i'm just reallyreallyreally gullible