Conversations with myself

Starring my tempting side and my logical side

TS: So, winter is coming. . .

LS: Yes?

TS: It's supposed to be really cold this year. . .

LS: Yes?  Could we get on with it please?

TS: Well, it's been a few years since you've had a proper pair of gloves and I found this really neat pair in knitty

LS: Oh really? Lets take a look. . .

. . .wait, those are cables!


TS: yeeeeeeees?

LS: Didn't we decide we didn't like cabling after those socks we did back at the beginning of the year?

TS: Yes. . . .but these are so pretty!  Just look at them!

LS: Well. . .yes, I guess they are pretty.  But cables!  We hate doing cables!

TS: butbutbut, we learned to do them without a needle!  It's not that bad that way, remember?

LS: Well, I suppose, but-

TS: And gloves!  It'll be cold!  We can get nice yarn with that coupon from our birthday from the LYS and they'll be warm and pretty and-

LS: ALRIGHT! Alright, we can do the gloves!  Don't blame me if you end up hating it though.

So yeah, I started a pair of the oh-so-gorgeous Kingdom gloves last week.  Here's what I have so far:

. . .and here's the pile of kinky yarn from the, oh, half a glove or so that I frogged last night:

Can we talk about gauge here for a second?  Now, I admit that I tend to knit pretty tightly (probably as an artifact of the rather weird way in which I knit) but the recommended gauge and needle size here is kind of crazy.  The pattern calls for a gauge of 7.5 stitches to the inch in fingering weight yarn on a size 0 (2mm for any non-Americans out there reading this) needle.  This seems like absolute crazy talk to me, since I typically get 8 stitches to the inch on a size 2 (2.75mm), two full sizes larger.

Of course, being me, I didn't really bother to swatch before I bought the needle for this (I'm trying magic loop for the first time on these-the pattern calls for DPNs but I had a bit of a laddering fiasco on my last DPN project, so. . .).  Only after starting the cuff and getting to the end of the first chart did I realize that the size I was knitting wouldn't come near fitting around even my super-tiny wrists and think that checking the called-for gauge would be a good idea.  Since I liked the fabric I was getting and shouldn't be spending money on more needles didn't feel like buying another needle on which to magic loop, I decided to just knit a larger size, as I've done in the past.

So, I set out to knit the pattern as written for two sizes larger, and the cuff was perfect.  The hand, on the other hand, was. . .not, so much.  Of course, having a serious case of Knitter's Denial (otherwise known as "well, I'm sure it'll fit just fine after you block it!") I kept going, until I got to the end of the increases for the thumb gusset.  This thing barely fit on my hand-no way was it going to be comfortable once the thumb was separated out and everything was done.  So I frogged back to the cuff, and now I'm knitting three sizes larger than my actual hand.  I hope this fits, because if it's still too small I'm going to have to re-do the cuff this time too.

At least the cables are proving far less hateful this project around.

Yarn and pattern details can be found on my ravelry project page here