UFO Sightings

I’ve been looking around my place recently, really looking, spotting details that I have allowed to drift into the murky background of everyday living. Perhaps it passing the one-year-here mark (a rarity for us indeed, who have been moving about every 12 months for ages); since we’ve not needed to do the usual pack/cull, some sort of reorganization should happen nonetheless. Perhaps it’s the chill in the air, triggering that good ol’ nesting instinct. Perhaps it is the need to squirrel away as much fibre as possible, having just realized that autumn = harvesttide = county fairs = fleeces!for!sale! Who knows what it is, really?

In any case, I’ve been de-cluttering the living room (and there’s a lot of living that goes on there, from Dru’s studying to my spinning, dinner-eating to tv-watching, and everything in between), and even I have to admit that knitstuff and spinstuff contribute to a great amount of living room clutter. Of course, de-cluttering anywhere means that you have to find the place where the things are actually supposed to live, which can lead to needing to de-clutter somewhere else… (I’m sure you see where this is going).

So that the spinning fibre has a neat place to stay out in the living room (where the wheel & spindles are), all yarn needs to return to the office (where the stash is). So that the new-spun yarns can join the stash, some UFOs need to find new places to be. Some are friendly things, easy to deal with. Others, not so much…

Worst Things First
UFO #1: The Cabled Shrug. aka the Cabled Fug. aka my Acrylic Nightmare.

Also aka Someone Else’s Problem, as of last night. I just hate this thing. The concept’s still not bad (it’s a highly modified version of the Blackberry shrug: stockinette rightside-out, with a large generic Celtic cable instead of beastly bobbles), but the execution, well, just needs to be executed (in the Marie Antoinette sense!). The back and front panels are too big, with the original sleeve ribbing being huge. The one reknit sleeve cuff’s ok, but unraveling them is a bitch, which is why the other cuff is just tangled yarny mess.

And then I ran out of needles (how can you lose a 9mm circular??) and yarn, so the edging is knit too tight (on 6mms), and even if it weren’t too tight there is not enough of it. However, this is already a salvaging project — the yarn was gifted to me several years back now by the MIL along with a poncho pattern I’d really liked, yet the yarn wasn’t even enough to make 1/2 the poncho — and since it’s not-great Mary Maxim bulky acrylic yarn in a colour I don’t particularly love, there’s no way I’m buying more. I don’t even care enough about this yarn to frog the thing, but if anyone wants it (either as a wonky, lady’s L/XL shrug, or as yarn), then my dear, you are welcome to it!

Best of the Rest
UFO#2: Endpaper Mitts

Ok, so I’ve done nothing at all with these since I photographed them to enter into Ravelry quite some time back. But now I know they’re there, and it’s looking like it’ll be a chilly fall: hopefully this is one UFO that, now sighted, will not drop off the radar again.

UFO #3:Thrummed Llama Mittens

Poor llama mitts. All they want is to be snuggled, and to help keep someone warm. Unfortunately, until I get more llama roving to thrum them with, they’re just going to have to stay UFOs, because why bother thrumming at all if you have to be stingy with the fibre? (I also just realized, right as I typed this, that this means I have a legitimate reason for shopping for llama roving. Oh deary me…)

Transformers!
UFO #4: Twinkletoes

These things have been knit, ripped, re-knit in a better gauge, ripped again when I ran out of yarn midway through slipper #2 (not enough for knitted ties), and re-knit again. (Funny enough, I actually enjoyed the knitting part.) Then they got relegated to the UFO pile when a) I couldn’t be bothered picking up the stitches for the ribbing edging, and b) Christmas passed, and the person they were originally intended for was gifted with something else instead. But a few episodes of ROME s.II, stitches were picked up, ties were crocheted (me! crochet!!), and now I have a cute pair of slippers. La la la, ballet slippers for me! (No, I have not pirouetted in them. yet. There may have been some slight prancing, however.)

From UFO to FO, just like that!

I’d better be careful, or else all this nesting might just develop into a bad case of finishitis! There are still some WIPs, of course, but I think I’ve got my UFOs well documented now. Have you been sighting any UFOs around your place recently?

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