Diagnosis: Stashitis. Prognosis: Grim.

Stashitis: inflammation of the stash.

I might have too much yarn. Knitters who read this will know that there is no such thing. But non-knitters, such as my husband, are fond of pointing out that a person who acquires yarn faster than she can knit it, who runs out of storage space for said yarn, or who isn't even sure where all the yarn is, has a problem.

I call this problem stashitis. My stash is inflamed. It has swollen to the point of causing problems.

So, how does one treat stashitis? The surgical option, stashectomy, is just too painful to contemplate. Besides, it might be life-threatening. How can a knitter live without a stash? But the lifestyle treatment is very difficult indeed: a yarn diet. One must knit more yarn than she takes in, and continue to do so for months, even years, until the stash shrinks to a manageable level. This can have side effects.

Queueitis: inflammation of the queue.

As I try to come up with projects for all the yarn in my stash, I notice that my Ravelry queue is lengthening. I am spending valuable free time, potential knitting time, browsing for just the right pattern, and adding patterns to my queue and my library.

And how does one treat queueitis? Assuming for the moment that stashectomy is still not a consideration, there is only one treatment. Casting on. Start the queued projects. This leads inevitably to...

WIPitis: inflammation of the WIPs (works in progress).

Alas, I have a rule about WIPs. To prevent myself from developing WIPitis, which I recognize as a very real danger to me, I have a rule (okay, more like a guideline, but I really do generally stick to it) that I may not have more than two WIPs at a time. Once I have started two projects, I must finish one before I can start something new.

So, I have stashitis, which leads to queueitis, and I have the Two-WIPs-at-a-time rule to prevent WIPitis. Stashectomy is too painful to contemplate. I haven't got enough self-control to stick to a yarn diet. There is only one cure.

KNIT FASTER!

On knowing when to let go

I don't frog often. I tink a lot, and I correct a lot of mistakes in various other ways, but I rarely frog. I especially hate completely unraveling an entire project. So when I have a project that clearly won't work out and needs frogging, I have to prepare myself first. I go through a mourning period for the item I had imagined, but that will never take shape. I hope I'm not the only crafter who does this.

I recently frogged my Bex socks. The pattern, by Cookie A, is lovely, with complicated, symmetrical cables that form a diamond-like pattern with ribs of varying widths. Most of the cabling is not very difficult, although there is one complex cable I ran across.

But, for whatever reason, I just didn't enjoy knitting it. The cables are on every single row, which means the progress is especially slow. In the end, I decided the finished socks wouldn't justify the frustration I was experiencing.

So, after about 10 days' mourning, prayer, fasting and soul-searching (okay, I exaggerate, but there really was mourning and soul-searching involved), I declared the socks beyond hope of recovery. I unplugged the needles, removing them slowly and with a heavy heart. Then, I watched as, stitch by stitch, my hands unraveled my work and wound it back into balls of yarn. Unraveling the cast-on was like seeing my project take its last breath. It was sad, but I knew the yarn was in a better place, ready to become something else, something that would inspire joy.

I am at peace with it.