Saturday, September 20, 2008

Knitting Along

I'm still knitting these fingerless mitts.  One of the many beauties of this pattern is that it knits up fast with small amounts of yarn. Now that I've made a few pairs, I'm modifying the pattern by changing the number of cable rows, the direction of the cables, and of course the colors.

These little mitts are great for reading or typing in the winter when you want warm hands, but need to use your fingers. One of these pairs is for a former student of mine who's just started law school at the U. of Michigan. She's a great young woman, who spent 2 years in Zimbabwe in the Peace Corps and who also taught in Atlanta for the Teach America program.
This pattern is perfect for partial skeins of worsted weight wool. When I'm lucky I find odd skeins of Germantown wool at the thrift store. It's no longer being made, but is wonderful to knit with. It's a sturdy yarn with great stitch definition. Of course the thrift store price is usually a bonus as well. I also knit with wool tapestry yarns I find at the thrift store: they come in 40 and 100-yard skeins, enough for a glove or two.
Susan of Plays With Needles and I are both going to knit this sweater, which is in the Fall 08 issue of Vogue Knitting (currently on the newsstands). If anyone wants to knit along, we're recruiting participants. The 40" size requires about 1700 yards of bulky weight yarn and it looks like a straightforward and stylish pattern. I'm hoping to use some stash yarn and some of my recently recycled yarn. If you'd like to knit along, leave me a comment.

3 comments:

Susan Elliott said...

I don't have enough yarn in my stash so I had to order it yesterday...it will take at least two weeks to come in....I was so sad...I understand if you don't want to wait for me. I decided to do it in ivory. I'll keep you posted!

Granny Fran said...

What scrumptious colors you are using for your mitts! I haven't tried knitting for over 25 years, and I never was very good at it.

Debra Dixon said...

OK, I am in and so is my mom!

I went over to her house today and she had the latest issue of VK so I showed her the sweater and explained the challenge idea. She pulled out boxes of yarn and we have enough for 2 sweaters. She'll coach me along.

Are you going to set up a blog so we can check in? Also, did I read somewhere that we were starting the 6th of Oct? We are both going for mulit-colored sweaters.

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