Olympic Gold: Northman Mittens

I finished my Northman Mittens on February 26, the final Friday of the Olympics. Which was actually my finish line, since I knew for a fact that I had exactly zero knitting time available that final weekend.

The mittens were worn almost constantly on our Virginia Adventure (two more days of Travel/Roaming Tigger to come). I can say with confidence that they are warm and comfortable. And to quote Mary Poppins, “practically perfect in every way!”



I took a ton of pictures of these mittens and had an incredibly difficult time narrowing down to a reasonable number for this blog post. Hence the mosaic. Full-sized photos are available on my Flickr stream.



Yes, I love all shades of blue, which is part of why I chose the colors I did for this project. The other reason? These mittens match my favorite winter coat perfectly, as you can see above.



These mittens have a thumb gusset, and the colorwork pattern flows perfectly around the increases



The Blue Sky Alpacas liner is already felting a little bit, but I don’t care. The liner is what takes this pair of mittens “over the top” and makes them just about perfect.



As with most projects that come in pairs, I figured out a few details on the first mitten and refined techniques on the second mitten. My right mitten was knit first, and the tips of both the palm and thumb on that first mitten have slight “issues” that nobody but me would recognize. And the liner is a little bigger and has a little extra fabric to smoosh around, but I can’t figure out why (same stitch counts and needles, etc. Weird.). But the left mitten? Perfection.

Oh, and because I love you guys? Here’s a photo of the guts, before I put in the liner. Almost forgot to take that photo!



I feel like I picked a project that was the perfect level of difficulty and needed the perfect amount of time for what I had available during the Olympics. It’s certainly a win for me!

Northman Mittens

Pattern: Northman Mittens by David Schulz
Yarn: Berroco Ultra Alpaca in Navy and Light Blue
Blue Sky Alpacas Sport Weight in Royal Blue
Yardage: One skein in each color of the Ultra Alpaca, two skeins of the Blue Sky
Needles: US 4/3.5mm for outer mittens. US 6/4.0mm for liners.
Entire project magic looped with KnitPicks Options circs.
Started: 12 February 2010
Finished: 26 February 2010
Mods: Not a one. The pattern is perfect.

Olympic Update: Day 12

I had exactly the kind of weekend that I needed, and I cranked on my mittens.


It looks like I’m done, doesn’t it? But I’m not. See how the mitten on the right is curling a little on the bottom and the one on the left isn’t? What you also can’t see in the photo is that the mitten on the left is narrower and a lot thicker than the one on the right. Why?


One liner finished, one to go! Friday is pretty much my only knitting time for the remainder of the Olympics, but I’m hopeful that I can finish in time. But I’m not going to finish with a lot of time to spare.

So yeah, I picked my project wisely. Challenge to finish, but not crazy-making. Thanks for the reassurance on project selection, and if you are participating in the Knitting Olympics, I hope your project is going as well as mine!

On a different note, thanks for your kind words about my friend Carol. I think all of last week's posts were skipped by most feed readers, so I was hoping at least that one would "catch."

O Canada

First of all, my WiP Wednesday post seems to have been skipped by several friendly neighborhood feed readers. Including the one I use. So if you want to see what my Northman Mittens looked like two days ago, go here and check it out.

Meanwhile, you guys know that Roxanne at Zen Yarn Garden is my very favorite yarn pusher. Since she lives in the host country of the current Olympics, I figured showing you a little more of her yarn would be a good mid-Games post.

After I got my December Cashmere a la Carte shipment and saw the spoiler photos of the “cool” color, I decided I could find a little room in the yarn budget for the other color in this yarn.


Once again, it’s Roxanne’s “Serenity Worsted” base, which is 80% superwash merino, 10% cashmere ant 10% nylon. It’s a double skein, 400 yards.


Again, cashmere content, so very yummy. Colorway name is Ice Blue. No clue what I’m going to make with it. But again, something that will go next to the skin.


I got some good work done on the mittens at Hurricane Knitters on Wednesday night, and yesterday (Thursday) was a total wash. Since taking these pictures, I’ve gotten to where the decreases are scheduled to begin. But I’m second-guessing whether or not that will make an appropriately-sized mitten. (ETA: Lifelines are good. I’ll forge along and see what happens)

So at the mid-point of Day 7 of the Games, here’s where I stand:



I’m really behind. I’m going to lose Wednesday night, Thursday night and all of next weekend (the last two days of the Games) If I can get some good work done tonight and Sunday, I’ll probably be OK. I’m also wondering if, although I’m getting gauge, I’m knitting too small. GAH.

Well, back to the grindstone. Have a great weekend!

Day 5: Olympic Update

I had an amazingly busy three-day weekend (Fri-Sun), and am starting to feel human again.

I did cast on my Northman Mittens (thanks for the pep-talk, everyone. I really appreciate it!) as the Olympic Cauldron was lit in Vancouver, then I essentially didn’t touch them again until Monday night. They’re going great, and I am so much happier with these mittens than I was with my Postwar Mittens. It’s not even close.

I split for the thumb on the right mitten last night. Here’s the palm:


And here’s the back:


I had a "Yikes! The cuff is rolling!" moment last night. Then I remembered that the lining will correct that issue. Yay, lining!

In other news, this is the 13th consecutive day of shoveling here at chez DPUTiger. My entire neighborhood is looking like an Icicle Factory. Here’s my house:


See that gigantic bank of icicles on the right-hand side? Between the big window for the TV room and the little window for the bathroom? The big boy in the middle has been touching the ground for three days now. Here’s a close-up:


And on that note, it’s time to bust out the snowblower. Again. I’d use the plywood, but it’s too hard to get the shoveled snow up-and-over the snow bank on the edge of the driveways. (Yes. Plural driveways. I'm doing mine and SuperNeighbor's) So I use the snowblower and wind up wearing as much as I clear, but it’s still better than shoveling. My wrists and lower back are fed up with the shoveling, but I'm feeling OK.

I love winter. I love snow. I am SO over the white stuff right now. Ugh.

Ready? Set? Second-Guess!

Full disclosure: A previous version of this post "aired" over on the Bloomin Yarns blog yesterday. They get confidence. You get self-doubt.

We are roughly 48 hours from watching the Olympic Cauldron lighting ceremony in Vancouver for the XXI Olympic Winter Games. Have you picked your Knitting Olympics project?

I thought I had picked my project. So here's all of my information, and we'll get to the mental breakdown later.

I tried and tried to use pattern author David Schulz's photos (with his permission) in this post, but just couldn't figure it out. Please click the links on the following links to see the awesome that will (maybe? probably?) be my Olympics project!

Meet the Northman Mittens.

They are colorwork mittens that are fully lined. My hope is that when I complete this pair during the 16 days of the Olympics, I will not only have an awesome pair of fully lined mittens in yummy yarn, but I will have boosted my colorwork confidence by enough of a margin to try to tackle a Dale of Norway sweater.

I have completed several colorwork projects at this point, which is why I didn’t feel that another simple colorwork project was an appropriate Olympic project. I wasn’t particularly happy with my Postwar Mittens, but after knitting a pair of Christmas Stockings and my Hybrid Hat, I’m feeling a lot more confident in my fair isle skills. And I’d love to have a perfect pair of handknit colorwork mittens.

The lining on these mittens means two things: First, these will hopefully be a wonderful pair of warm mittens. There’s a lot of alpaca in this project! And secondly, I’m essentially knitting four mittens (two pairs) during the Games.

Oh, yeah! What yarns did I pick for this little adventure?


For the outer mitten, I’m using two colors of Ultra Alpaca. I plan to use the navy blue as the background/predominant color with the light blue for the stars. The electric blue is Blue Sky Alpacas 100% Alpaca Sport Weight and will be used for the lining.


I wound the yarn at Knit Night last Thursday (pre-Snowpocalypse) and did a swatch. I got gauge for my size (7 sts/inch) on a US 4 needle/3.5mm needle, so I’ll be magic looping this project starting on Friday night.


I love the swatch. It's gonna be an awesome pair of mittens.

My personal choice is to skip the Ravelympics and participate in the Yarn Harlot’s Knitting Olympics. And that's where my mini-breakdown comes in to play.

I've been attacked by a major case of second-guessing. Am I being ambitious enough, or is this a cop-out project? I've done colorwork mittens before, so even though this is essentially two pairs of mittens, is it a Big enough project? Is it "epic" enough? Hell, I finished my last pair of mittens in two days.

I have yarn and pattern for a spring cabled sweater (Rowan Pima Cotton/Pavillion -- Rav link) in my basement, but I'm hesitant to do a sweater with sleeves because I'm still shrinking and am unsure of my "finished" size, but I could switch to that project at the last minute. But is that too much to bite off? I still have a Hubster with a broken collarbone who requires shuttle service. I'm (probably) about to take on a thrice-weekly writing assignment. I want to be able to live my life around my Olympics project and still sleep and not overwhelm myself and all that good stuff. But is a pair of mittens Olympic Enough?

Maybe I should think of this in a slightly different way. Maybe I'm the utility player on the fourth line of the Olympic hockey team. I still made the team. I still go to all the practices and suit up for the Games, but I'm getting 5-10 minutes of ice time a night because I'm young and this is my first Olympics, and when we roll around to the Sochi Games in 2014, I'll be the first-line All-Star working on an Epic Sweater instead of mittens.

Am I crazy? Did I just get cold feet when it came time to officially sign up for the Yarn Harlot's Knitting Olympics? Please, people. Talk me down off of this ledge!