Fun Lessons on the Knitting Front

These are my baby's new mittens. Yep. I know. It's spring. Winter is months away.

However, I wanted to tackle some color work mittens. My mother-in-law is wonderful about handing me knitting books. Over Easter she gave me a sock book that had lots of patterns she liked, but would never knit. (It's "Socks, Socks, Socks" edited by Elaine Rowley.) A year ago she gave me a mitten pattern book with all sorts of wonderful color work patterns ("The Mitten Book" by Inger & Ingrid Gottfridsson).

When I first got "The Mitten Book" I was spinning a pale blue roving and paused long enough to knit a sample. I was amazed that I could do two color knitting. I'm much more comfortable with one color and cables. I was also impressed that my singles worked for this kind of knitting.

Time passed. Babies were born. Houses were bought and sold. More yarn was spun. I chose this triangle pattern (called "Night and Day") because it has a small repeat--only 6 stitches--and it has no long floats. And it worked! Look at me! I can do two color knitting!! I am excited!

And I now have an entire book of mitten patterns, and many, many sock patterns to use while I improve and perfect my colorwork techniques!

The best part about this knitting story is that a year or two ago I looked at the Socks book and thought, "I'll never be able to knit those. Look at all the different colors they use." Never say never.