Category Archives: mittens

WWYD?

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I really wanted to post this while I was away but my internet access was foiled.  I’ll post about my accomplishments in another post.  I know, you can’t wait.  🙂 

I’ve been working off and on knitting Ms Ida Chain Link mittens since the beginning of August.  I was seriously thinking of keeping them for myself.  In fact I was going to work on them while riding the train.  Did not happen. 

They are, unfortunately, too big.  Really, really big.  My entire hand including the thumb fits in there and they are way too long.  I even ripped part of the top back as I didn’t like how pointy they were. 

Ms Ida Chain Link mittens size: adult medium

 

They are not 100% complete.  No thumb and no flip top yet. 

Mr. Aitch suggested I try to shrink them.  Neither of the yarns are feltable so does that mean they won’t shrink?  Plus they are two different yarns.  One is Knit Picks City Tweed (55% Merino wool, 25% superfine alpaca, 20% Donegal tweed) and the other is Knit Picks Andean Silk ( 55% Super Fine Alpaca, 23% Silk, 22% Merino Wool).   I really don’t want to take the chance and ruin them. 

I see three options: 

  1. Rip them out and make a smaller size.  I made the adult medium.
  2. Finish them and find someone with larger hands to gift them.
  3. Put them away with the other WIPs I don’t know what to do with.

What would you do?

Music to my eyes

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I saw these on someone’s post the other day and I want to knit them.  Mr. Aitch was a band director and music teacher for long enough to retire from teaching with full benefits.

Longer than you would want to listen to beginner band students try to make a pleasant sound from a musical instrument.

Add ten more years.

And another ten years.

And ten more.

And a few more years.

Understand why he doesn’t want to hear me practice my bagpipes?

Anyway during his retirement, he decided to pick up a few “hobbies”.  One being smoking cigars.  Now he doesn’t smoke them in the house (end of a long marriage) but he does smoke them outside even in the winter.  I saw these cigar gloves on Knitty and these fingerless mitts and decided I. Had. To. Frankenknit**. Them. For. Him.  Maybe in time for Christmas.  Yeah, Christmas 2010.

The thing is:

  1. I don’t have any solid sock or DK yarn in my stash.
  2. I’m going to Philadelphia for a conference this week.
  3. There are a few lovely yarn shops a few blocks from my conference.
  4. I don’t have any solid sock or DK yarn in my stash.
  5. I can load up on snacks during the breaks so I don’t have to eat lunch or dinner.
  6. I may come home with some solid sock/DK yarn.
  7. I’m thinking  maybe a deep heathery blue or grey and black instead of white and black.  Something subtle but with enough contrast to see the design.  You know, something a man wouldn’t be embarrassed to wear even if it is only in the garage.

Update to follow.

BTW you don’t work with me, do you?

**Frankenknit – adapting two or more patterns into something that works for you.   Frankenstein = Frankenknit

She’s got a ticket to ride…

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I leave Monday morning for four days to a conference in Philadelphia.  I’m looking forward to both the journey and the destination.  I’m riding the train and should have twelve travel hours to knit.

So this morning I planned to decide what yarn, needles and projects to take with me.  What I did instead was look at my yarn stash.  I didn’t write down any of the acrylic yarns so I didn’t have as much as I thought I did.  And that’s a good thing.

I need to get over to Ravelry and update my stuff.

Two WIPs are going to be tinked or rather totally ripped out, yarn soaked and unkinked, and repurposed into something else.  I have two sweaters I started for my grandson that will not fit him now.   I’m not sure what to do with:

  1. One almost completed sock for Mr. Aitch and not enough yarn for sock #2.
  2. One orange and green (Yeah, the yarn was on sale) mitten missing the thumb and enough yarn to make the second one but do I really want to?
  3. One self-striping sock yarn wrist warmer but no info on how I made it so making the second one probably won’t happen.

I did decide to take Ms Ida long with me hoping I’ll finish them.  I’m also taking some cotton for a few more swiffer covers, some wool for the Curly Purly soakers, and some miscellaneous yarn for some seamless slippers.

I suppose I’ll need to pack some clothes, too.

Slow progress

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I’m a thrower when I knit.  I’ve tried to knit  continental but I have a hard time with it.  Practice makes perfect, however I don’t want to change knitting styles in the middle of a project as my tension/gauge changes.  

I’m more than half way into the left hand chart on Ms Ida Chain Link mittens and it’s slow going right now.  Thanks to the little mishap the other night, the bandage on my thumb is getting in the way of the yarn and the way I hold my needles.  The yarn gets snagged on it every other stitch.  

Plus I’ve tinked, frogged, unknit at least an entire mitten during the process.  Knit two rows, tink one.   

I can’t seem to keep my place or read the chart correctly.  I have the chart on my magnetic board with a magnet above the row I’m knitting so all I have to do is follow the bottom edge of the magnet.  I even put a little “x’ to the right of the row I finished and yet I keep knitting the previous row.  

Ms Ida and magnetic chart

 

I blurred the chart as it is copyrighted material.  

See the mess on the other mitten?  Since I didn’t like the pointiness of the top of the mitten, I shortened it by five or six rows.  I’m doing the kitchener stitch on the end and I just haven’t tightened up the stitches yet.