It really is amazing how these windy scrolls¹ take shape before your eyes. I didn’t hesitate to jump into this project even though I had yet to try two stranded knitting.²
While knitting the body of the mitten I realized that I was holding the dominant yarn in the wrong hand. The little red v’s looked lost in the white stitches, so I switched the red yarn to my left hand. You can see where I made this change and how I didn’t do a very good job of keeping myself on track with the chart. My knitting lacks neatness in areas I think of as transitions: when I knit the decreases for the mitten top, when I pick up stitches around the thumb (which is a little short). This is something I hope to work on in future projects and in the second mitten.
Knitting with two hands proved to be comfortable and I don’t think I had any major problems with tension. The woman who taught me to knit a few years ago knit Continental style, but I quickly switched to English style. My Grandmother showed me how to knit this way when I was young and although I didn’t continue the craft at that time, there must have been some physical memory of how to hold the yarn and needles. If my Grandmother³ was here with me today, she’d say, let me see your floats.

Wishing you all health and happiness in the New Year!
1 Eunny Jang‘s Anemoi Mittens.
2 A note on how I approach areas of knitting that are new to me. I cast on and forge ahead even if it doesn’t look perfect or I make little mistakes along the way. If it is wrong I’ll rip, but if there is a tiny mistake and I know how I made it and can learn from it, I just keep on knitting. Honestly, if I ripped out every mistake I’d never finish a project. It’s important to finish something that’s new and get the full flow and experience of the process. Push yourself to new knitting heights, put it out there on your blog, the next one can be perfect.
3 She knit amazing Fair Isle Christmas stockings for everyone in our family, including a sock she knit before she died intended for the first grandchild. A second grandchild has recently joined us and needs a stocking. I’ve slowly started knitting for family members this year but I’m hesitant to branch out into the stockings. It’s totally crazy, but I don’t want them to think I’m trying to take over something that was hers. I’m sure they don’t feel this way. They’ve sent me her needles and patterns. They obviously want me to carry on the tradition and yet I hesitate to knit this item. Knitting this mitten was a good first step in trying the technique, now I just have to get over the feelings that come with knitting a sock.