Breaking Out (FO: handspun mittens)

No baby yet, but I had a nice stretch of pre-labor last night, and today I'm 38 weeks, 6 days. Woo hoo! Today I had what I hope was my last prenatal visit to the midwife. Everything looks good. Next stop: acupuncturist, to see what we can do to get my body ready to roll. Medical induction isn't really likely to be an option for me because I had a C-section before, and they don't like to produce extra-intense uterine contractions in women with uterine scars. Fine with me: the mortality rate in cases of uterine rupture is high for me and higher for the baby, so I'll stick with the 1-in-200 (or better, depending on whom you ask) rupture rate with no medical induction. But that means if I don't go by 42 weeks or pretty darned close, it's another C-section for me. So let's go, kid. Time to break out of there. I know you're ready!

Here are a couple more photos of knitted stuff. I recently finished these mittens for me, which are made from my first wheel-spun yarn:



You may recognize the yarn from an earlier post: It's 2/3 brown Corriedale, 1/3 white Lincoln fleece. I like the way it knitted up. These mittens aren't as windproof as my fleece gloves from REI, but they're not bad, being quite firmly knitted, and the sizing is great. I used the mitten pattern from Ann Budd's The Knitter's Handy Book of Patterns. I've also made mittens for DD from this book. I can't say enough good things about it, especially if you're knitting from handspun or otherwise wanting to flout the yarn recommendations in patterns more often than you're wanting to follow them. You just knit up a gauge swatch on a size needle that makes a fabric you enjoy, then use the multi-gauge, multi-size tables to produce the garment you want. I've also done a hat for DD from this book, substituting a fluffy brioche stitch pattern from a Barbara Walker treasury, and it worked great. I hardly ever knit from patterns that require a specific gauge anymore. Ann Budd, Jacqueline Fee, and Elizabeth Zimmermann have helped me build the courage to innovate, redesign, tweak, and otherwise break out of the blind-follower knitting role.

Oh, and Priscilla Gibson-Roberts. Will I ever knit socks again without adapting them to her techniques? Not so sure about that. My current project is a pair of plain stockinette socks in Trekking XXL. I'll probably do K2, P2 ribbing for the leg. Definitely TV/waiting room knitting:



They never look like much at this stage, but ah, the fit when they're done! I love 'em.

Oh, and these are my first project on my new KnitPicks metal sock needles. I got tired of shredding my bamboo DPNs -- because I'm such a tight knitter on socks, and especially when knitting yarns with cotton in them -- and I've been on a DPN (versus magic loop/2 circular needles) kick for speed and probably nostalgia reasons. So these seemed like the right next step. I got a set of 5 DPNs in each of six sizes (0, 1, 1+, 2, 2+, 3, where each is 0.25 mm bigger diameter than the one before) for Christmas from my dad. I'm doing these on the 1+ needles. I swatched on 1s, and going to 1+ felt like knitting with tree trunks after that, which was nice -- I'm trying to resist knitting at a gauge of more than 10 stitches per inch!

The KnitPicks needles are very pointy, which makes me a little prone to poking holes in myself with them as I knit. But I figure that poking myself that hard has to be a bad habit, so every time I knit something with KP needles, I go a little farther toward breaking the habit. I love how slick and fast they are, how warm they feel (just like Addis), and how little they cost. I'm looking forward to trying the Harmony wood version of the DPNs (thanks, Dad!) on a future project and seeing if they hold up to my death-grip tension better than the Takumi bamboo needles I've destroyed before.