I recently got a message from the crocheter known as Babukatorium.

I had commented on several crochet mandala rings that she had designed and which I found delightful. In her response, she asked me the following question:

When I first read the message, I had been reading it on my phone. Outside of texts, I don’t normally like to write responses on my phone because the predictive text feature often says things I never intended to say. I find the process too frustrating, so while I found the questing interesting, I decided I would write my response when I got home and had my computer handy.

By the time I got home, I had forgotten that I wanted to respond to the message, and over the course of several days whenever the time was wrong, my mind would wander back to the question she had posed, and I would think, “I really need to write a response.”

One advantage of not responding immediately was that unanswered question was still in my consciousness, and as I have continued my battle with entropy and worked to bring order to my empire, an answer began to emerge.

I had been looking in my crochet empire which doubles as a guest room, and came across this “roll” of granny squares:

Originally made to be the “frame” for my not yet completed 2015/2016/2017 State Fair project:

the pieces had not worked as I had hoped they would, and I had been forced to abandon them — and that, I realized is my least favorite element of designing — the knowledge that I will do something that will not work, and I will be left with pieces that cannot be used.

Unless you find another project you can use them in.

With a roll of two-round granny squares and a bag filled with even more two-round granny squares and the monochrome textured crochet rose motifs, I got to work.

First I made this nine-patch seven-inch square:

Buoyed by the fact that nine squares had been transformed from purposelessness to purpose, I got to work coming up with a five-inch crochet square using the same crochet building blocks, and what I devised was this:

I liked it well enough, but thought it needed a little something, so in short order, I made this six-petal crochet flower:

Which covered the gap in the center and added a coordinating pop of color to the ever-so-modest slip stitch border.

Using the same technique, I made five more rehabbed crochet squares to go with the first:

As well as five more crochet flowers:

To add just the right decorative element to the squares:

Giving this previously purposeless squares a revised and purposeful life makes me feel a lot better about the time and resources that had previously felt squandered, and with many more bits and pieces around my house, I will work to transform them the only way I can: one stitch at a time.