Dealing with UFOs

For those of you who don't hang out in crafty forums or read craft magazines, you may be unaware of the term UFOs to refer to UnFinished Objects. These are projects that, for one reason or another, you've set aside without finishing.  There are all kinds of reasons for this. Some are more 'abandoned' projects, the ones where you've made such a huge error you think 'I cannot salvage this', or you get half way through and realise that you in fact hate the colours or the pattern. Others are ones you still like, you still want to complete, but you've lost the momentum, probably stolen by other, newer, projects. (There may be crafters out there who start a new project, work on it diligently, and finish it, BEFORE they start a new project, but I am not one of them. I usually blame it on being a Gemini.) With the focus we are trying to bring to ethical crafting, it has become obvious that I'll need to bring this approach to my UFOs and not leave effort and resources sunk into unfinished stuff. 

As part of a challenge in another part of my life (on the amazing Nerd Fitness), I'm devoting three hours a week at the moment to working on UFOs. It has really made me sort through all these half-finished projects lying around and work out what I'm going to do with them. My UFOs tend to fall into 3 categories:

• 'Actually WIPs' - i.e. a work in progress.  These are the 'lost momentum' projects that I mentioned above. Once I pull it out of the craft chest and put it somewhere my gaze will fall on it when I'm deciding which project to work on while watching an episode of Grand Designs, I'll keep going. And eventually finish!  The current example of this is the daffodil cross stitch pictured to the right. This has now entered my rotation of current projects and I've even decided who will get this as a gift when I've finished it. 
• 'Something went wrong!' - a project where something messed up or wasn't right, and I shoved it into the 'too hard basket', as my year 12 maths teacher used to say.  This includes yarn fails.
• 'Do I still want this?' - a project that I started but now look at wondering 'what was I thinking?'.  This can have some overlap with 'something went wrong!', as that is often the reason for a significant enough delay that my tastes changed so much.

Some examples of 'something went wrong!' UFOs, to give you an idea of how I've been working through these, and some of the negotiations going on inside my head.

The doves. These were a free kit from the front of a magazine. The idea is you stitch a small design on Aida, then sandwich it between two provided felt dove shapes. Unfortunately, after I'd stitched the four designs I liked, I realised that the pre-cut holes were too small. Muttering about 'stupid magazine' and not wanting to go to any trouble, I left them for 'later'. In this rethink, I realised I still liked them, so I cut the holes bigger. Really, it took about ten minutes all up to alter them enough so that they would work, so I must have been in a very lazy state of mind when I abandoned them the first time round.
The magazine's suggestion was to sew them flat onto a long ribbon to use as a garland. I stuffed them and gave them some shape, and I think I'll add some ribbon later and use them as elaborate tags for hard to wrap presents such as wine bottles.

 

The toddler jacket. This was a project from a book, and is yet another yarn fail. At least this one I have a chance of salvaging it, as I'm thinking of doing the collar again, this time in the colours I have left, using the grey from the unravelled collar to sew it up, and then edging it in the yellow. It might look a bit garish, but it will be finished. Obviously I also need to weave in lots of ends. I just couldn't see myself not completing this if it was at all possible - there is so much work in this already. The toddler for whom it was originally intended is now a bit older than this, but my friends keep having children, so when I finally finish someone will be the right age. Actually, given that it might look a bit strange, I might have to keep it for my not-yet-existent child.

The Victorian Christmas stocking. I started stitching this when I was about 13, for a doll I loved. Then I messed up the stalk. It is disturbing to think that this means this UFO has been shipped from England to Australia, moved with me when I left home, etc. 

I went back to this intending to unpick the mistakes and keep stitching (you can see the fluffy bits where I've started to unpick) but then I realised that as I no longer felt any pressing need for that doll to have a Christmas stocking, finishing it might not be worth the amount of time and material in the part I'd already done. I could use it as a tree decoration, but... the fabric is a 32ct I think, and I was working with 2 strands over 1 thread to give a full, tapestry effect. It isn't responding well to the attempts to unpick - there is one thread that has pulled a little already.

I think this will, unhappily, remain a UFO.