Excuse Me Ma’am, You dropped a stitch.

Every knitter has bad yarn choices in their stash. It may be something that was on clearance or just attracted their eye in that special way or it may have been just an uninformed choice of a new knitter. I’m a little appalled at how fast my pile of bad yarn choices has grown, but that seems like it might require more self-reflection than I’m willing to give this issue.

My goal this year is to purge my stash from those bad yarn choices – one way or another. And while one man’s trash is another man’s treasure, I am not at the point (yet) where I’m willing to just give them away.

Last night’s stash busting efforts were a little frantic. I’m not sure why, but all of a sudden, this innocent looking yarn began to bug me, and I knew that I had to get it out of my stash quickly.

On the surface, it’s not a bad yarn. However, it’s not a great yarn either. It’s an acrylic/wool mix and super soft, but it’s also one of those yarns that you just know is going to end up in your eyes and up your nose every time you wear it. I also only had two skeins of it, and I wasn’t willing to add to my problem by buying more just so that I could get rid of this. I don’t even know what I had in mind when I bought it. For all I know, it jumped into my basket and I unknowingly brought it home. Sometimes, it’s honestly that random.

I scoured Ravelry (Ravelry, oh how I love you) and several knitting books for ideas. I even resorted to considering crochet, but then I remembered that I only know one crochet stitch. Honestly though, I was that desperate to finish a project with this yarn.

I finally settled on a dropped stitch scarf (I need another scarf like I need a hole in my head). It met all of my needs, and most of all, it went quickly.

Now I’m off to make a matching hat from the other skein. To cover that hole in my head.

Dropped Stitch Scarf
Approx. 120 yards of bulky yarn *
Size 13 needle

Cast on 15 stitches (or any odd number)

Row 1: Knit
Row 2: Knit
Row 3: Knit
Row 4: Knit
Row 5: (K1, YO) to the end, ending in a K1
Row 6: Knit, dropping the YO stitches
Row 7: Knit
Row 8: Knit

Repeat Rows 5-8 until desired length, add two more K rows and bind off.

*Let’s be honest here – this was a stash busting project. Use whatever weight yarn and whatever size needle you want.

You can also do as many yarn overs as you want, although I tried doing three and it scared me a little how long the drops were. I could just see getting snagged by every single thing I walked by. But if using your scarf as a fishing net for small children and electric cars is your idea of a fun night on the town, then go for three!