Reclaimation

I started my day off today by frogging the too-big test knit sweater that I shared glimpses of yesterday...

 

There you have it, all neatly wound into cakes, waiting to be reknit. I may cast on for Take Two later today.

I really don't frog finished garments very often. The test knit I did because it was handspun that I want to be able to wear, and I want to do justice to the designer's pattern. Plus, it's a fast enough project that it doesn't pain me to think of reknitting it as a lot of other projects might.

When I lost all that weight a couple years ago and found that most of my handknit sweaters no longer fit me, I  ended up giving most of them away. Kevin asked why I didn't just rip them out and reknit them. That was overwhelming to me in a way a non-knitterly guy could not begin to imagine! By and large, I am usually a project knitter. I like to see a finished project. And while I enjoy the process of working a new and/or challenging pattern, after I've done it once, I rarely feel compelled to want to knit it again. I'm ready to move on to something else. Plus, it's my contention that most yarns are really only exciting to work with the first time. Knitting something new with the same old yarn just isn't my cuppa tea. (That could be directly related to the fact that I've got a stash that definitely fits SABLE proportions.)

I did, however, hold on to a couple of items that I'd knit pre-weight loss, one of which was a ponchette made out of the bulky Noro Transitions yarn. I sized mine up when I made it because, well, there was a lot more of me at the time. I decided to keep it because I figured a ponchette really isn't a fitted garment, so maybe I could still wear it. The truth was, though, that even unfitted, it was huge on me. I could have slipped it over my shoulders and down over my entire body. But I loved the colors and textures in the yarn, so I hung onto it.

Today it dawned on me that I should just frog it and use the yarn for something else. Since I was in frogging mode this morning, I did just that, which yielded this...

The colors look more amazing in the ponchette picture linked above, and I love how there are some rather sizable tufts of angora in spots throughout. It is truly a lovely yarn, and that's saying something because I'm really not a fan of bulky weight yarn. But it is also Noro yarn, which means you get knots. And holy knots, Batman. That ball in the middle? There must have been about five sections where I'd spliced ends together! (They came apart in the frogging process, which begs the question of how I spliced them to begin with.)

Anyway, I'll eventually re-skein those balls, give them a soak and then wait for a new project to reveal itself. In the mean time, I've got Christmas gifts and a test (re)knit to work on.