This sweater.  This sweater was never as cute on as it should have been.  Maybe it was the kangaroo pouch, maybe it was the too-high-v-neck.  Maybe it was just me.  It’s been in my closet for about 3 or 4 years.  I would put it on, possibly wear it for a little while, and then realize it looked terrible and rip it off, tossing it back into the closet in disgust.

When I did that this year, it suddenly occurred to me:  I have never liked this sweater.  I will continue to not like this sweater.  The closet is not working any magic on this sweater year after year.  I should get rid of this sweater.

Why it took me so long to come to this rather obvious conclusion, I don’t know.

Instead of donating it so that someone else could have the same experience, I decided to unravel it and re-use the yarn.  I love the colors, and it’s a nice wool-cotton blend that is washable.  Also:  I love tedious projects that I can become obsessed with.

I started with the sweater, of course.  I completely forgot to snap a photo of the complete sweater ahead of time, in my all-consuming desire to kill the sweater and make it into something pretty.  So, just imagine a top-stitched kangaroo pouch on the lower front:

I then broke the sweater down into it’s pieces.  This is the most tedious part of the project–squinting at the seams in the brightest light available, and trying to snip just the yarn that is holding the pieces together, rather than the yarn that is part of the sweater itself.

Here it is after that process:

Then you just sit back, grab a snuggly blanket, pop on your favorite movies or season of a show (my choice: the final season of “The Office”), grab some wine and start unraveling.

This took me a few evenings (and a few glasses of wine).

In the end, I have a bunch of new balls of yarn to play with–which I’ll most likely make into a few scarves.

No sweater is safe in my house right now.  I’m already eye-ing them all and wondering……wouldn’t that sweater be a lot more fun unraveled?

I did this process once before and made 2 scarves from the result.  One has sold, but one remains up in my shop:

You can find that scarf here:  https://www.etsy.com/listing/110604988/sale-knit-scarf-long-scarf-ribbed-scarf?ref=shop_home_active

And, because I have to share the joy of a song on a continuous loop in my head–this (of course) has been playing pretty much non-stop in my brain-region since I started the process: