Close Knitters

The weather is decidedly colder, so it’s mitten time. And with the holidays in sight, the gift knitting is starting to focus on smaller projects. Like mittens.

But not all mittens are as they appear.

Arlene is working on these for her grandson. A nice, cozy looking mitten, right?

It’s a flip top, so fingers can find keys or be generally useful.

And Phyllis finished this one

Yes, it’s a flip top, too. And a very specialized one.

This one has a hole in the thumb to make texting easier.

Not all mittens have tops

This fingerless mitt is the current project of another customer. She’s hoping to make a bunch by December 25.

Fingerless mitts get cast off when the knitter decides it’s big enough, usually covering the lower part of the fingers. The flip tops are the same, after it’s cast off pick up along the back of the mitt, cast on more stitches to go around, allow an extra inch in length, then finish the mitten.

The Happy Hour crew on Friday afternoons has been watching the progress of Phyllis’ red sweater.

Based on the Everyday Sweater in the Mason Dixon girls’ second book, Mason Dixon, Knitting Outside the Lines, it’s knit out of Cascade Sierra, at a gauge of 5.5 stitches to the inch. That’s a bit tighter than the suggested gauge for Sierra, so it’s a nice, dense fabric. The ribbing at the lower hem was a bit of a problem- the pattern calls for major increasing as you start the ribbing, so it will be heavy and not pull in. The goal is the look of ribbing, but no “enhancement” of the middle aged female figure that ribbing can give. The ribbing looked great, but when I cast off it rippled. So I tried again with fewer increases, it still rippled. A third time, less ripple, but still there. I figured I would do it without any increases, and hope that it wouldn’t pull in. As I started to rip out the ribbing I realized that off of the needle it lay flat. A eureka moment, the bind off was too tight! So I tried a different bind off- called a tubular bind off, it creates an edge that looks like the knit stitches in the ribbing continue across the bottom.

The Happy Hour ladies said, “How did you do that?”

The first step is to slip the stitches from the needle it was knit on to two separate needles, the knit stitches on one, the purls on the other.

Then weave them together, using Kitchener stitch.

This picture shows the tapestry needle doing Kitchener stitch, and completed edge.

It’s a nice stretchy edge, too, so I used it on the cuffs.

Other changes from the Mason Dixon pattern- instead of starting with the collar I did the collar last. It’s knit flat, so I could get the cable in, and make sure that it would lay flat against my neck.

Happy Hour is every Friday from 3 to 6, BYO Knitting!

Except Friday November 26, as the shop is closed for Thanksgiving weekend. We’re closed from Thursday through Saturday, reopen on Monday at 10.

We were wondering what was in these

The yarns from Feza are variegated, to put it mildly. The folks at Feza assemble a vast assortment of yarns, of all weights and textures, and wind them into skeins and balls. The latest versions are big balls, ready to knit from. The fluffy stuff attached is pre cut fringe, which lets you see the yarns inside the ball. We needed to see what it looked like, so Phyllis knit one up.

Look at the colors! Wow! This scarf will go with anything! It was great fun to see the colors evolve. It’s knit on size 17 needles, lengthwise, which means that each yarn is about one row of knitting.

We knew that the Feza yarns were fun, but this is a lot of fun!

Don’t forget, Happy Hour on Friday from 3 to 6. BYO knitting!