Knitting up a Storm!

Saturday night, I worked some more on the Vineland Mittens. However, silly me didn't bother making a gauge swatch because I KNOW I knit very loosely. I had checked with the pattern designer, and she knits tight....so, I made the "educated" guess that I should use a needle size one size smaller than what she was using.

WRONG! I discovered that although the mitten would be tolerably snug, it would be way too short! UGH! I also made the unexpected discovery that while I may knit very loosely, when I do colorwork, I have a tendency to knit tight. I also found that the rows that were solid colors were "thinner" than the rows with multiple colors and it causes a bit of "buckling". The correction for that issue is to just carry the second color along with the main color on the solid rows.

Bottom line...I need to rip the mitten out and re-do it using a larger needle. I'm going to try it on 5's. Lesson learned: there really IS a reason for doing a gauge swatch...no matter how well you think you "know" your knitting!

I went to Carol's on Sunday to knit with a few friends and brought along my "work-in-progress" so they could check out my progress. The mitten really is lovely...just a bit too small. We all had a good laugh...and thankfully, no one rubbed in the necessity of a gauge swatch!

While I was at Carol's, we also started stringing "loopers" together to form "yarn" for Janet to weave her bathroom rug. "Loopers" are basically a by-product of machine knitted socks and is similar to the loops used by kids when making pot holders with the toy weaving looms. Janet's rug is going to be a gorgeous blend of blues - Carol did such a wonderful job dyeing the "loopers"! The remainder of the afternoon was spent knitting on my Lorna's Laces socks. I finished through the heel gusset - wahoo! Almost done!

Today, a few of us got together at Kathleen's for knitting and lunch. Again, we sat around knitting and chatting...having a fabulous time. I continued working on my Lorna's Laces socks and find that I'm now almost finished with the sock! No second sock syndrome for me!

When I brought out my "in progress" mittens, Jayme gave me a fabulous tip to make the thumb handling much easier. She recommended making the row above the scrap yarn a solid color along the thumb slit as it would be much easier to visualize what I was doing. Now I'm all psyched to try it again...this time, with a gauge swatch of some sort!


I also got to check out Kathleen's loom while I was there. It's a wonderful loom. It resides in it's proper place - front and center in her living room!





Kathleen has been working on wash cloths and has been playing with various patterns and textures from the same warp. I really like the patterning of the blue and white.