One more gift to go before Christmas.  (You know- Thursday).  I cast last night with the required needle size, after getting a dead-on gauge swatch.  I finished the cuff, tried it on and whoa- it was huge!  Looking back, I should have possibly waited a bit longer before ripping, as maybe off the needles it would have worked out, but as it was I couldn’t risk time I didn’t have to knit something that wouldn’t fit.  I frogged the cuff and restarted on a smaller needle.

The new cuff was perfect.  I kept going, and since I have a tracing of my sister-in-law’s hand, I was able to hold the knitting against the tracing to see that I would have to add extra repeats before the waste yarn for the afterthought thumb.  I finished the rest of the mitten, closed the top, then tried it on myself.

Too small.  As in, my fingers were cramped like toes in triangle-pointed high heels, and I couldn’t even straighten out my hand.  I traced my own hand in another color over my sister-in-law’s to see how our hands compare, and while they are the same length, hers is about 0.25-0.5″ wider.  If the mitten didn’t fit me…there was no way it would fit her.

I ripped back to before the shaping and added another repeat and a half.  I redid the shaping and closed the top.  I tried it on again.

It still felt tight.  At this point I knew I couldn’t mess around any longer.

This is where the mitten is now.  So much for a day’s knitting!  I kept the cuff from the smaller needle size, but have reinserted the larger needle size so I can work up the pattern with a little more breathing room.  I’m going to follow the same changes for the thumb hole, and try it on as I go to make sure the length is good.  I will then hopefully have a mitten that fits…so I can knit its mate.  You know, by Thursday afternoon, when we get together to exchange gifts.

No time to share photos of the other gift knits, but I delivered Jakob’s 3 teachers’ gifts this morning as it was his last day of daycare before the holidays, and I also finished my father-in-law’s socks last night.

And tonight Jakob is spending his first night in his new, big boy room!