Froggy Paddle

Over the summer I became well acquainted with the frog pond. Getting to know the frog pond is inevitable for any knitter who spends much time engaging in the clickety-clack. It happens. You find a mistake way back in the project or you end up not liking the yarn you chose to go with a pattern or, or, or... I could go on forever but I won't. When I sentence a project to the frog pond, I usually toss it in a basket or a bag on in the enormous trunk at the end of my bed where the best of my stash resides. Once tossed, the guilty party languishes until such a time when I decide I want the yarn for something else or I'm just tired of looking at the pathetic mess and in a moment of mercy I release the trapped yarn back into balls ready to be knit into something wonderful (I hope). I then meantime, the unwanted project is left to froggy paddle on its own.

I've never had a doomed project survive the froggy paddle before--that is until this weekend. That's when I decided I needed to clean a little and empty some of the many baskets of yarn that were sitting around gathering dust. Some of this yarn is new and waiting for projects while the rest are UFOs. All needed to be stored in the stash trunk or somewhere where there would be less dust to impair my ability to breathe and knit at the same time. So I'm sorting and filling big Zip-lock bags and making a really big mess when I come across a fuzzy mass of tomato red with a circular needle dangling off the end. "Um, dust bunnies," I say to myself, "mega dust bunnies." This project had been sitting a beautiful artisan-made white oak basket on a shelf behind my recliner for what, maybe 6 months? I remember tossing the project to the frog pond, but it had more to do with the "boring, I'll never finish, and besides it's not my color" factor than anything wrong with the project. I also recall there being something about "this yarn is too nice and too expensive to be wasted on an ordinary Old Shale scarf" going through my mind.

What ever was I thinking??? The yarn IS beautiful and it was on the pricey side (isn't everything labeled Colinette?), but it's also the perfect yarn for a simple lace pattern like Old Shale. I plucked that fuzzy red mass up out of the basket, shook it out, sneezed and admired it! Come to Momma little froggy, you have been saved! I started knitting on the "Little Scarf that Could" using the size 6 Addi-Turbos that had been left in the project. The space-dyed colors of Colinette Parisienne are a treat to the eyes, but the stuff is murder to knit using a blunt needle-tip. Of course, the KnitPicks Options and Addi-Lace needles didn't exist back when I cast-on for this scarf. My LYS is closed on Sundays and Mondays so I would just have to wait and suffer through.

I woke up with a wicked migraine this morning and I've felt like #&@! all day. Despite the fact that I hadn't showered and i looked like He!!, I crawled in my car and drove across the street to see Sandy at the Yarn Haven. I picked up a US6/32" Addi-Lace needle and came home. Now I can knit on without losing my mind! Yeah, right... I jumped right in and knit a 4-row repeat, timing myself to see if I could knit faster with the improved needles. I probably was knitting faster, but that was before I realized that my stitch count was off on row 3. Upon further inspection, I was horrified to realize I had knit what was supposed to have been a purl row about 5 rows back. The lace needles help out with tinking too >:(

I have returned the Old Shale Scarf to it's former location on my WIP list. And I have decided that sometimes it good to let the froggy swim in the pond for awhile. You never know, you might just change your mind *again* and fish that froggy right back out again. Knit On!