what does the yarn want to be?

Three years ago, or something like that, I embarked on my second-ever sweater project. The first three sweaters I ever made were weird Frankensteins, ignoring this super important thing called "gauge." It took me three sweaters to figure that one out. So this particular sweater, which was a thermal, which is a ubiquitous pattern, and which nearly everyone seems to have attempted at some point, didn't really come out so well. It was boxy and unflattering, and bunched up in weird places. So after fully completing it, I ripped it all the way out and decided to start over. I never really got back into it.


The only actually in-focus picture I have of this. If only I could stop my past self right here, but I know I had the sleeves finished elsewhere.

I think the reasons for my lack of interest were pretty obvious, yet I chose to ignore them. I didn't like the color of the yarn - mainly, although I think the color name was "Dolphin," and I'm a sucker for colors named for aquatic animals. I also didn't, and still don't, live in a climate where a thick silk/wool sweater is comfortable or necessary. And, most importantly of all, while in every other facet of life I am pragmatic and prefer simple, unadorned articles of clothing, this is NOT true of the things I knit. I like to go wild with lace and cables and colorwork, and leave the plain thermals to American Apparel (who has provided me with some seriously cozy though rarely-worn thermals for like $20.)

So, Saturday night, after binging on tea, I pulled this out of the closet and took it all apart. Then I spent the next day researching sweater patterns, and finding nothing that piqued my interest.

I had an architecture professor once who suggested we think, "what does the brick want to be?" My ceramics instructor recently said, "let the clay be what it wants to be." I'm seeing a trend here. What does this thermal really want to be? How can I re-dye this yarn so that it's something I will want to work with, and that the finished product is something I will want to wear?



So I decided to take this one step at a time, and tackle the dyeing first. Sunday I reskeined it the yarn, tied it off in quadrants, threw it in a pot to soak overnight, and just now, like half an hour ago, pulled brand new yarn out of a giant pot on my stove. And as soon as I did that, I knew what it was going to be. Magic!



It's going to be Abalone. Embarrassingly, I just got done telling a knitting friend earlier that "stockinette sucks," but when yarn speaks, you can't argue.