Owl Mittens

I made these mittens as a part of a class at Stash Needle Art Lounge. I had done fair isle knitting before but I taught myself and I have been known to make some things up so I wanted to take a class to learn the right way. Low and behold, I did make some stuff up with my own creative fair isle technique. Before the class, I couldn't figure out how to wrap the main colour when working along patch of contrasting colour, so I would twist the yarns awkwardly which involved getting the two colour threads tangled most times, as my way to wrap the main colour. It seemed to work, but it defeats the purpose of fair isle two handed knitting, where your threads never get tangled. So I learned how to do that properly in the class (yay! no more tangled yarn cakes!) and I also learned how to do Kitchener Stitch properly! I found out that I also made up my own little way to do that. Trust me, the proper way looks a whole lot neater! Also a fun little tip I learned for when you join the first round on double pointed needles to avoid the little hole in joined-in joint.

Here's the tip:

1. Ok so you've cast on your stitches and distributed them around on your DPNs.
2. To join in the round, take the first stitch off the left hand needle and place it on the right.
3. Take the second stitch on the right hand needle over the first stitch on the right hand needle and place it on the left hand needle.
4. You have now joined the round by crossing over the stitches. And there's no little hole or jog on the seam edge! Wahoo!

I'm actually a little scared to post this because I already have 3 or 4 requests for a pair of these from people who have already seen them. I guess it is pretty hard to resist the cuteness!!

For information on yarn and the pattern you can see my ravelry project page. I've committed to actually recording my finished projects on Ravelry now because eventually I want to start test knitting so the project page of my Ravelry account will serve as a resume of sorts to showcase my soon-to-be-acquired-mad-knitting-skills.