thumb gusset

You wouldn't believe how much

time I have spent on this glove:

Since our friends left on Saturday morning I have started and restarted the pattern. I neglected people, animals and washing (clothes, not me!) and got quite hunched and stiff over it. Then suddenly yesterday afternoon it all fell into place and I was away. I'm not doing a gusset because I had spent so long on the thing already and couldn't get my brain to start working out how to fit one in. I don't really approve of gloves without thumb gussets, but the glove is reasonably wide and should fit someone with a normal or narrow palm.

It surprised me that it was more tricky trying to make a pleasing arrangement of colours and patterns using border patterns than it was with stars. I was going to use several different patterns but in the end was content with repeats. The colours are a little brighter in real life - it's a very dull morning here in London and difficult to get a good shot.

I'm off work this week and am hoping to get to Stash on Wednesday to see the knitters of Putney and am then planning to be at Liberty's on Thursday. So I should be able to catch up with people and all the delicious projects they're working on!

progress and plans

I've finished a pair of children's gloves for my craft stall (except for ends of course):

I deliberately kept the bands of colour quite simple. The light green is possibly too bright, but overall they're nice little gloves.

Now I'm at the delightful stage of looking at pattern books and yarn and trying to decide what to do for the next pair. I'm going to swatch these colours, hoping for a misty blue effect. Rather than a star I'm going to do three border patterns. I think I may do corrugated ribbing this time. Maybe fingerless? We'll see!

Total so far:

2 pairs child's striped mittens
1 pair nearly finished ditto
1 pair knitted but not finished adult fair isle gloves
1 pair ditto for child

Mounds of mittens

Jill sent me a link to a story about mittens.

Follow the link to read about the Latvian mittens being knit for the NATO Summit in Riga next month: Riga Summit

Fair Isle gloves

I finished the stripey mittens at LIbety's on Thursday and on the way home experimented with a two-colour cast-on for the next pair. I'm not sure that I've got it right yet - must look in my Scandinavian knitting books for the best method.

Meantime, I have been cooking up some fair isle gloves. I have collected lots of colours of Shetland 2-ply in the last couple of years and I do enjoy trying out different combinations. I also have several skeins (some frogged from a child's jumper I never finished about 15 years ago) of Rowan Donegal Lambswool 4-ply in a plain grey and I've decided to use it up in gloves for the Christmas Fair. My first attempt wasn't quite right and got the thumbs down at Liberty's:

The background colours (purples) are too stripey and there isn't enough contrast between the dark yellow and the rather warm purples. I cut the ribbing off, rejoined the grey and had another go.

I think this is much better (though I suspect not to everyone's taste). The yellow star shows up more clearly because I used more of the mid-yellow and less of the deep gold. I also changed the two centre purples. The mid-tone one is much cooler than before and a bit lighter; the centre one is warmer and darker. So the background colours grade more smoothly from light to dark and from cool to warm. I've kept the centre single row of orange as a contrast. I find it hard NOT to use orange:

This is one of a pair I knitted last year and wore a lot. I know they're a bit eccentric, but I like them!

Finally, here's the palm of the grey fair isle gloves, because I always like the effect of this pattern. If you look closely you'll see that I didn't repeat exactly the same number of rows after the centre. Hey ho, I don't think it'll matter.

Stripey mittens

I'm loving knitting these. The variegated yarn is Mountain Colors Mountain Goat. It's a mohair blend - very smooth to knit with. The cream is just an odd ball from stash. I think it's pure wool. Here's a close-up.

I've got a day off today. I'll go into town and see exhibition, I think. Not sure which one yet!

They're gonna put me in the movies

And just like Ringo Starr, all I've got to do is 'act naturally'.

I had a brief encounter on the train home from work today. I sat opposite a rather dishy young man with a beard. He had several shopping bags and a camera tripod. He took up a lot of room but in a charming sort of way. I took out my current mitten and set off. It's another two-colour striped mitten. I knit with both hands when I'm doing two-colour work and I suppose the whole set-up does look a bit unusual. Anyway, he followed my progress closely for a while and then asked, 'Is that a cuff?' I gave him marks for that and replied that it was. He then asked if it was for a 'tiny baby sweater', which was quite perceptive I suppose. I explained it was for a mitten. We chatted briefly about knitting.

Silence for a short while. 'Would you mind if I filmed you?' he then asked. Feeling rather British (and therefore very self-conscious) I said he could. He explained that he is a filmmaker and is interested in the work of Schlesinger, e.g. Midnight Cowboy. Apparently Schlesinger would notice people doing things and later incorporate them in his films, for example a woman he saw with a mouse running over her hands repeatedly. The young man was fascinated by my knitting because it was so repetitive - he called it mesmerising. He wanted to know if it was mechanical or creative - his analogy was whether it was like cranking a handle or playing the piano.

Shortly after he got off the train. Very interesting little interlude!

Striped mitten

Thank you Jill and Dawn for craft stall suggestions. If anyone else has ideas, do please pass them on!

Finished my first mitten last night. I used the Striped Mitten pattern from Favorite Mittens by Robin Hansen. I thoroughly recommend this book. The patterns are very detailed and they are all for mittens that are tried and tested, from various states in North America (showing strong European traditions). This still needs a wash and block (or probably a steam press).

I'm using up leftovers and long-stashed odd balls. This is made with some very soft lambswool tweed that I made a jumper out of about 20 years ago, with some variegated worsted weight wool that I bought off eBay a couple of years ago and never used. I've got about 200g of that, so it's going to feature on quite a few mittens, I think!

The pattern has very clear instructions for doing a neat thumb gusset. True to this blog's name I like thumb gussets!

Do you see how the stripes all branch out from the first stripe, rather like a tree?

Busy autumn ahead

Shortly after joing the Warm Hands Knitalong (see new button below) I agreed to run a craft stall at a forthcoming church fundraising fair in November. So now I have an ambitious plan to knit LOTS of mittens. I think children's mittens, in particular, would be quite attractive on a craft stall. I won't be doing complicated designs, but will probably do some stripes and simple fair isle or scandinavian patterns. I will use up stash yarn, too.

I've made good progress on the Lift and Separate cardigan - have finished both fronts and one sleeve, have finished the back but need to redo the shoulders, and have started the second sleeve. So I will allow myself to start mittens - especially as carry along knitting.

If anyone has good ideas for craft stalls, please do share them - not necessarily knitting, because I will be calling on other people to help make things.