Sunday, December 16, 2007

Baby Bird, Come Back Home

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The right Bird in Hand Mitten is complete, and currently soaking in woolwash. I think I covered this in my earlier post about the mittens, but I'm using Cascade 220 on US #1 needles. I weighed the yarns after finishing the first mitten, and I used about 22 grams of the cream and about 39 grams of the blue--I didn't weigh the skeins before I started, so there could be some variation. It isn't super apparant in the photo, but the back of the mitten is a little lumpy--the palm is much smoother. I think that some of the lumpiness will block out, though, and even if it doesn't I'm not concerned.

After the hand was done (including some of the finishing because I wanted to see the picot edge), I was torn between knitting the thumb right away or casting on the left mitten immediately. I couldn't resist the pull of the bird:

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The thumb took longer to knit than it should have--I basically spent all morning on it, the knitting itself should have gone much faster. That little bird kept me going, though! The embriodery is a little bit fussy, but it's not too difficult. I used two and three plys of the yarn (instead of all four) for most of it to try to get a crisper look, but I don't think that it made a huge difference.

I have a lot of complaints about my gnarled, cramped fingers after knitting the Estonian Braid, but I can't argue with the results:

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I really love the way the first braid looks, right above the picot edge. It made it easier to sew up the picot edge, too--it was easy to see which row I was sewing to in relation to the braid. I'm not quite as enthusiastic about the other two braids--they look nice, and are an interesting design feature, but I could take them or leave them.

I've got a couple of other Christmas items to work on this week, but it's mostly boring stuff--weave in ends, wash / block, etc. Oh, and then there are Christmas cards, which I normally start in November, but haven't started yet. I suspect that the left Bird in Hand mitten will provide an execellent diversion from all of this!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

That is a LOVELY mitten. You must teach me to knit well enough to knit those! The bird is great!

emicat said...

w0w that looks beautiful! I love the bird on the thumb. I look forward to learning mittens down the road someday :)

Rebecca said...

VERY beautiful!

Ami said...

Lovely Mitten- you mittened fast!

tiennieknits said...

These are so beautiful!

I can't believe that you are knitting 220 on US #1s!!!

Cactusneedles said...

Those came out wonderful! Great job!

Stef said...

Your mitten looks great! I'm working on my own pair, but mine have none of that Estonian Braid happening. It took too much from my overall knitting joy.