Yarn in both hands

I just can't get enough of stranded knitting at the moment.
First up are more Selbuvotter mittens, these are made for a 4 year old.
I've used the outline of Annemor #2

However I changed the pattern on the top of the mitten.
I spent Sunday evening with a piece of graph paper and my Fair Isle book. Not bad for a first attempt!

These are knitted in the left over black sock yarn Ruth sent with my fantastic Rainbow socks and the remains of the ball of Opal Feelings from the fruit pastel socks. Now I have to decide whether to make them match or not and what to do with the thumb!

Last week the new Twist Collective was published and I instantly fell in love with (and bought the patterns for) Postwar Mittens and Harika Socks. Hmmm, I'm sensing a theme here!
I then went looking at the Kaffe Fasset Regia Landscape in my stash and decided the Earth colourway just didn't do it for me.
So, after my fashion lesson from Kerry on Saturday, I knew when I saw the Jungle colourway that it contained all of the Jewel colours of the season.
Two balls arrived yesterday from Modern Knitting.

It goes perfectly with the solid gray yarn that accompanied my Yarn Yard sock club yarn this month.

Finally, something that only requires one strand of yarn at a time. I finished the second Meret (Rav link) in time for Rachel's Birthday.

Knitted in RYC Cashsoft Aran, this one is more slouchy and has a half rolled and half ribbed brim. Apologies for the terrible photo - but that's what you get with a dirty mirror at 7.30am!

I can see everyone getting these for Christmas! I *may* have accidentally ordered some aran from New Lanark to make some more!

Mitten Fever

Earlier in the week, when the snow hit, I realised that my Cranford Mitts really weren't up to the job of winter gloves.
I acquired Sheila McGregor's "The Complete Book of Traditional Fair Isle Knitting" from a charity shop in St Andrews for £1.99 and spent a lot of the holiday gazing at the wonderful charts in the back.

I knew then I should dig out my copy of Selbuvotter by Terry Shea and make myself some Selbuvotter mittens. I spent two train journeys to work trying to decide which mittens I wanted to make... so much choice.... I narrowed my selection down to Annemor #16, NHM #3, NHM #4 and NHM #7. Somehow I managed to decide on NHM #3 - the leaves did it for me.

Traditional mittens are knit in White/cream with either black or red as the contrast colour. However I wanted something a little different. My new winter coat is brown with a light pink fleece lining. I knew that I had the perfect match in Yarn Yarn Bonny - conker yarn, a slightly varigated brown and a light pink which was the solid yarn which came with the August club yarn.

I cast on for the first mitten on Tuesday, and somehow managed to knit these on the bus and the train this week.

I've now finished mitten number one - it is a little shorter than I would have liked. However that is because I have completely missed out one part of the pattern, just after the cuff... it is only 7 rows, but it would have made all the difference.

However, it will be fine when tucked in my coat... and as Terry Shea states "The greatest discovery I made in studying the old mitens is how the old knitter were not necessarily any more talented than we are. They followed patterns, made mistakes, corrected them - or didn't. There stitches were occasionally too loose or too tight. There thumb bases have holes in them. The lines between fingers don't match up.
What they did seem to do better than we do is accept mistakes that they made."

Well I'm accepting my mistake - along with another one in the hand pattern and a bit of a messy pick up for the thumb.... and I'm off to cast on for number two.
Even the inside looks pretty!

After that, out will come my fair isle charts and I'm going to design my own..... I can hardly wait!
P.s Jane and Kate have also been knitting mittens this week. It's catching. Have you cast on for some yet?