December 15 - Splash of colour

My needles have not been idle. I have used rest yarns to make small socks and mittens. This is a new pattern where I used my mother's idea of sufficiently long cuffs for mittens, and tamed the rainbow coloured yarn with a dark blue.

The same mitten in red. This was taken in poor light in our kitchen a couple of days ago.

Here is the same yarn in daylight on fresh snow, this is the true colour. I added my Grandmother's mitten stitch pattern to the long cuffs from my mother's knitting and think this is the perfect, warmer than usual mitten.

New knitting finishes and a new way to make a pompom

I had some leftover yarns from knitting mittens and socks for two little girls, so I wanted to knit matching hats for them. I bought some pink yarn to make the purple hat prettier, and naturally little girls' hats will be lovelier if they have a pompom. I tested a new (to me anyway) way to make a big pompom. I have always cut two circles of cardboard and used a needle to wind the yarn through the centre hole and around the circle. For the newest pompom before this I used a plastic pompom maker that works just like the old cardboard version but is reusable and comes in three sizes. This time I needed a big pompom, and the new trick promised just that. First, you need an empty kitchen roll core cut in half or two toilet roll cores. No needle needed, just start winding your yarn around both rolls like this. It goes really fast!

 

When you think there is enough yarn for the pompom, cut your yarn. Take a longish piece of strong yarn and tie it between the roll cores around the pompom yarn. I made a slip knot.

Take your good big scissors and cut at opposite sides of the roll core pair through all layers of yarn.

 

Tighten the slip knot really tight and tie the ends of that yarn twice around the centre of the pompom and make a knot or two. Hold these long tails  and trim the pompom. Use the tails to fasten the pompom where you want it.

Here are the hats finished. The yellow hat has "my grandmother's mitten pattern", and for the purple hat I used a star pattern my mother once used for my hat. It was pink with white stars, and a wonderful white pompom that wasn't so heavy that it would pull your head back.

My mother was the little girls' great grandmother, and I hope these hats will bring the knitted love tradition of our family to the newest generation. My mother used to call her knitting "time bent to curves", referring to the form the yarn takes, but I'd like to add love to the time.