Late last night, after working most of the afternoon and evening on the second of a pair of socks I was hoping to finish, I came to a slow series of realizations.
First – I was going to run out of yarn. They were top down socks, I was finished with the first sock, and I knew I would be out of yarn slightly before reaching the toe decreases on the second sock. So close!!! But so far. There was no way I was going to make it. What could I do other than frog the socks? I wasn’t willing to give up yet. I thought maybe I could undo the cast on at the top of the leg of both socks, frog back about a half an inch on each sock, put the stitches on needles and bind off the top and use the extra yarn for the toe of the second sock. I figured that could work, but in the end I decided that was too much work to warrant trying. Why would that be too much work?
Second – Because I didn’t like how the socks were turning out anyway. The first sock was a tad bit loose in one spot, down near the heel on the foot on just one side of the sock. It was a bit weird, but the sock mostly fit fine and I figured it would still fit in a shoe. No harm, no foul. But when I tried on the second sock to see if I could decrease for the toe with the yarn I had left I discovered the foot on the second sock was way too loose. My gauge must have changed between knitting the foot of the first sock and knitting the foot of the second sock. I was pretty certain this second sock would not fit in a shoe. How do I rectify this situation? I can go down a needle size, or maybe knit a smaller size?
Third – Either way, it means frogging the socks. This seemed like the only option left, but I wasn’t willing to make the decision to pull out hours and hours of knitting, work that kept me occupied on several plane rides to and from the West Coast last month, hours at home or at knitting group, on a whim. I decided to sleep on it. I woke up this morning ready to frog the socks, so I realized this was the way to go.
Fourth – I don’t like this pattern. I don’t want to slam the pattern here because it’s a personal thing. I have seen many beautiful FOs using this pattern, but in the end it just wasn’t for me. Time to look for a new pattern to go with this yarn!
Fifth – As I was scouring Ravelry to look for a new pattern for the yarn it hit me: I don’t like this yarn. It’s Noro, and although I like all of the colors in the yarn I didn’t like their order and the size of the bands. I couldn’t picture myself wearing anything in these colors in the way it was going to turn out.
So now here’s the big decision I have to make. Do I even bother frogging these socks to use the yarn for something else? Would I use it for a gift? If I don’t like the yarn for myself and can’t immediately think of someone who would like it, do I bother frogging, skeining, washing, and drying all of this yarn just to have it sit in my stash forever?
Right now I’m on the verge of tossing it in the trash and letting bygones be bygones. I have much nicer Malabrigo Sock all wound up and waiting to get used and I would much rather focus on that than on resurrecting yarn I don’t like. But what if some day I regret it and find the perfect pattern for the yarn? Perhaps instead I should tuck the nearly finished socks away, and in a year’s time if I still don’t like the yarn I can pitch it.
