Tag: inglis mitts

project updates

DiannaLeave a comment

Since the whole idea of my queue check of sorts from a few weeks back was to hold myself accountable to my plan, I figured I’d post a follow up! I’ll start with the good news:

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I finished the Hugin and Munin mittens! As I mentioned in the earlier post, these only needed thumbs, so once I had time to sit down and chart them out, the knitting itself was pretty quick. I’m so pleased with how these turned out, and even more pleased that they’re finally done! The Rauma Finullgarn is so fantastic for mittens, and since these are knit at a fine gauge (on US 1 / 2.25mm needles) they’ll be very warm.

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I also powered through and finished my Inglis Mitts in time to wear them this year before it’s too cold! Already I’m wearing them without the top folded down a majority of the time, so they’re extra long. My project page now also incredibly has an absurd number of faves on Ravelry, since Sarah featured my mitts in a community eye candy post on the Ravelry blog (thanks Sarah!). And if you’ve been eyeing the Inglis Mitts but didn’t get the Edinburgh Yarn Fest magazine in which they were originally published, I’m really happy to be able to let you know that they’re now available as an individual pattern on Ravelry.

I’ve also made some progress on my Dunaway scarf, though I have yet to finish it. I think that’s probably top of the priority list now.

The neutral news: I haven’t touched my Sandneskofte since I last posted about it, but I still have plenty of time to finish it before the Oslo Knitting Festival, so I’m not too worried about that.

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The curve ball: many of you probably saw on Instagram that I did end up casting on something new after all. It was one of those times where you get an idea in your head and it just takes hold – I tried to push it to the back of my mind for later, but this was one was stubborn. I got an idea for a stripe sequence that would use up a bunch of worsted weight yarn in my stash and I couldn’t get it out of my head. After a couple of days of trying not to think about it, I gave in and decided to work up a little swatch to test the sequence of stripes to see if it would work out in real life the way it was working out in my head. And oh, it did. I wrote last time about how satisfying it is to find a happy marriage of stash yarn and pattern, and once I saw that this stripe sequence would work, imagining the sweater I could use it on was the easiest thing imaginable. And so I threw caution to the wind. I decided to join in on this year’s Fringe and friends KAL with my stripes, so I’m working my way through an improvised top-down pullover. To make it go quickly so as not to disrupt my existing project plans too much, I’ve worked the whole thing seamlessly in the round, with purl columns on the sides of the body in case I want to seam the sides. Stockinette in the round is my speediest knitting, and on US 8 / 5mm needles it is flying along. It’s ready for the sleeves, but I think I’ll knit those flat.

I’d like to wrap this up soon, but I think I should finish the Dunaway scarf first! And so that’s my planned weekend knitting. What will you be working on this weekend?

project planning

DiannaLeave a comment

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I’m a big fan of Karen Templer’s Queue Check posts over at Fringe, and if I’m honest it’s prompted me to assess the state of my own knitting queue with an eye towards prioritization and realistic expectations. (That sentence may be one of the least romantic things I’ve ever written about knitting on this blog, but I know some of you out there can relate – with perpetual startitis and too many projects on the needles at once.) Looking at my actual planned projects with a practical eye is one of those things that helps inspire me to knit the things I really want to knit, and that I really want to wear.

The other thing prompting me to think this way about my knitting has been coming to terms with the state of my yarn stash over the past year after moving into a 500 square foot apartment with my husband. There’s a lot of yarn that I’m frankly never going to get to, especially as I continue acquiring new and exciting Norwegian yarns that I want to explore and share. But I’d also really like to find the stuff in my stash that I can use to make the things I want, so I’m thinking about pattern choices, yarns, and project timelines much more critically than I used to. I know I will still occasionally throw caution to the wind and cast on something new that gets me excited – but it’s way more awesome when that happens because I’ve finally found the right pattern for that skein of laceweight yarn I bought several years ago (I’m looking at you, Loess). That kind of experience is great. So I’m moving toward an approach that allows room for that, but that also has some more structure than I typically employ now.

At the moment, I’ve got 13 projects on Ravelry listed as WIPs. While I know people with far more than that, I sometimes get jealous of the monogamous knitters who stick with one (or maybe two) projects at a time. Even though I’m already planning future projects, I know I’d like to work my way through finishing up some of these existing ones first. Some are close – a pair of mittens that only needs thumbs, for example, or small projects that come in pairs (mitts, socks) where the first of a pair just needs its mate. Some are larger, like the Sandneskofte I’m knitting in Buachaille (pictured above). I think at this point that I actually find the prioritizing pretty easy, but sticking to my plan is the hard part. So in the interest of trying to hold myself to some sort of plan as well as actually sharing some projects-in-progress on the blog, here’s a sort of State of the Knitting Address.

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Short term goals include finishing the thumbs on these Hugin and Munin mittens in Rauma Finullgarn. This should be the easiest thing in my WIP pile, but the catch is that I designed these myself (the ravens come from my university’s seal) and I haven’t actually charted the thumbs yet (oops). Once I sit down and decide on the charts, however, I should be able to knock these out super quick. And then I can wear them! Hooray! I definitely don’t want to go another winter with these as a nearly-done WIP.

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I’d also like to wrap up my Inglis Mitts in Ysolda’s Blend No. 1 relatively soon, because they’re going to be really useful in just a few short weeks. In fact, I expect September and October to be prime time for these mitts, and if I don’t have them done by then they won’t really be useful again until spring. No time to waste!

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Lastly, I’d like to wrap up the Dunaway scarf I’ve started for my husband in time for him to wear it before the weather gets really cold; and I’d like to finish my Sandneskofte (pictured at top) in time to wear to the Oslo Strikkefestival in November. Dunaway is lovely mindless knitting, perfect for TV and movie-watching, and the Sandneskofte is actually farther along than that photo shows (I’m at the point, in fact, where I need to decide whether or not I’d like to make it a V-neck). That makes these goals all feel relatively achievable in the next couple of months, even though they’re going to be busy. As long as I stick to the plan!

Is your queue out of control or do you like to stick with one project at a time? Do you have project management strategies when you want to knit all the things? I’d love to hear about it in the comments!