The Pain of Frogging

I have 6 projects for the book on the needles at the moment -- Magnolia Tea Cozy, the third of my set of 3 Charleston Gate pillows, Gilded Age Placemats, Tybee Island Beach Mat, Williamsburg "Braided" Rug, and the Great Smoky Mountain Afghan. I'm not counting the 15 or so personal projects which are languishing unfinished in project bins, despite my resolution to finish all of them before year end. But I have made a commitment not to cast on any more projects for the book until I finish the ones in progress. Which brings me to the title of this post.

I normally don't frog much (the painful art of having to take your project off the needles and "rip it, rip it, rip it" the yarn out). If I'm knitting someone else's design, I may decide after I start it that I'm not enjoying it, but I know pretty quickly if I'm not into it and I stop, rewind the yarn and get on with something else. Life's too short to knit something you don't like or with yarn you don't enjoy. But while I'm designing, there is so much frogging and starting over. The Great Smoky Mountain Afghan has caused the most re-knitting pain. The first time I ripped out, it was an issue of color transition that I wasn't really crazy about. So I ripped back about 1000 stitches. After I was about a quarter done with the entire afghan, I decided the design wasn't what I really wanted, so I ripped the whole thing out. All 6,000+ stitches. I felt a bit like crying. It made it much harder to cast on my 3rd version of the afghan. I briefly considered converting the design to a hat -- after all, ripping out a hat is hardly traumatic. But 6,000+ stitches is another story altogether. But "rip it, rip it, rip it" I did. The blanket is knit with a double-strand, so my husband had to hold and wind one strand while I did the other. It was an obscene amount of frogging.

So I bit the bullet and made myself cast on version 3. And the yarn I'm knitting with is all wavy from having been previosly frogged. It's a constant reminder that I was already past this point a month ago. And in case I forget that, I can see the hundreds of yards of wavy yarn still in the project bucket. Yep, I'm in frogging hell.

Just to make matters more fun, last week the cable on my interchangeable needles broke in mid row -- a row with over 400 stitches in it. As I watched my live, loose stitches cascade off my lap and onto the floor, I had a few choice words that I won't share with you now. I gingerly scooped up the mess, gently placed it on the kitchen counter, threaded up a tapestry needle with a very long piece of contrasting yarn, and starting running a line through the loose stitches. By some miracle, I was able to save every single stitch. And I drove straight to the store and bought a 40" bamboo cicular needle with a heavy one-piece cord. It's starting to feel like this design is cursed....

I was so stressed, I knew it was time to bake. Comfort food was required, despite the 90+ degree heat, so I stopped at the grocery store for supplies and fired up the oven for a little experimental cooking. So from the near-disaster of my Great Smoky Mountain Afghan came the culinary miracle that is my Tillamook White Cheddar Mac 'n Cheese. Honestly, it was the best macaroni and cheese I've ever eaten. My husband agreed. But you'll have to wait for "Seaside Knitting" for the recipe! But I'll make it up to you by including my recipe for Chocolate Toffee Pecan Pie in Deep South Knitting. That pie is so good it'll bring tears to your eyes.

We mailed out information to yarn shops in the states covered in the book and the response has been huge. We're in the process of choosing shops to be featured and patterns to include, and we're really excited about the patterns. I'm headed to Savannah in 2 weeks to do a travel blog for our site, Planet Purl, and to do an initial draft of the Deep South Knitting chapter on Georgia, so we're right on schedule.

It's not too late to submit you shop/pattern for the book. Click on the link "For Shops" at the top of this blog for the online application.

I can't decide whether to bake or knit right now, so I think I'll pour a glass of wine, fill the tub with hot water and think about it until it's time for bed!