judge a book by its cover

Last January Knitty City held a book launch for Kate Jacob's new book The Friday Night Knitting Club. They promoted the event by promising free copies of the book, free knitting kits, and free refreshments. Keyword: free. Hordes of knitters gathered round, crowding the store past capacity. Knitty City gave out
gift bags for those of us willing to leave immediately. My friend and I each got a bag containing a scarf pattern and two balls of Tahki Yarns: Cloud (colour 4). Kind of ugly, eh? So ugly, in fact, that I ended up with all four balls as my friend claimed that she could never knit anything with it. I don't know, I thought. It could have potential. I told her that I would take the yarn and knit her a birthday present. She didn't seem that excited but after I suggested a bunch of random objects, she consented to take a pair of armwarmers. I don't think she believed I'd actually do it.

My friend's birthday was over a week ago. I had six months to make them but of course I procrastinated. And while I left enough time to knit them up, this yarn is not only ugly, but a bitch to work with on account of the sudden transitions from fat and fuzzy to really thin.

I had to really struggle to get even tension throughout and after starting over several times, I finally finished one arm using a k2p2 rib. I guess it didn't turn out that bad? Though I think I will be able to finish the pair using only one ball of yarn, leaving me with three more. I feel burdened by the free yarn!