When do I just give up on this yarn?

I really wanted to make this adorable little capelet/cropped cardigan thing that I found randomly clicking through knitting blogs. I even happened to have two leftover balls of Rowan Polar (the now discontinued yarn that this pattern originally used) that I bought along time ago for a different, and also ultimately failed, shrug/cardigan thing. She only uses 1 1/2 so I thought I'd be able to motor along just fine and wind up with a cute little thing without spending any money.

Now, I should have known better. I've knitted long enough to buy into the superstition of the craft. I originally bought this yarn for the Hot Lava cardigan but I ran out and some wonky things had happened along the way that I don't even remember now so I decided to rip it. Of course when I did that it stuck to itself and got kinky and weird so I threw it in a basket without even winding it. Then I found the kitty pi and figured some frogged yarn that had practically felted itself already would be perfect. I knit it up, felted and blocked it, but I quickly realized that the increases that I had ad libbed to try and accommodate my two cats were deeply flawed. And to this day no amount of catnip will get either of my kitties into the pi. They hate it. Since you can't frog a felted project that left me with just two skeins. I was going to make a hat, but I don't really like wearing hats all that much so I never got the mojo for it.

Then I saw that little capelet and thought it would be perfect. The major problem here is that while my neck is skinny like the blogger who designed it, we have vastly different proportions below the neck. I knit it to just below the underarms and I've only got a few yards left. I think it'd take at least another skein if not more to get this thing to cover my boobs. And even then I don't think the shape would wind up very flattering. I could make a smaller version and foist it on my friend's 8-year old daughter. But even if I managed to crank it out in her size without screwing up, I'd be paranoid about giving her bad luck via this yarn that been involved in so many failed projects.

So when do I give into my suspicion that anything I try with this yarn is doomed? Maybe I'll just knit a big stockinette rectangle for a felted bag. Hard to mess that up.

B, do you like how I keep writing posts like anyone might be reading when really it's only you?