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Revisiting colour dominance

I knit the first mitten using the colour dominance thing I usually do, which involves holding the background yarn in my left hand. This is not conventional, but it works for me. there has been some discussion amongst the Richmond Knitters (and Deb specifically) about how to hold yarns when doing colour work. I found the videos under discussion here, but I probably should have watched the before  doing my misguided experiment.

The left mitten was knit first, as described above. For the second mitten I did a bit with the yarn in one hand (as I thought Deb said Arne and Carlos recommended, although now I've watched the videos I don't think that's what they are saying) and then, when I quickly realised that wasn't going to work, I put the main colour in my right hand, contrast colour in my left. And the resulting disaster is not an issue of colour dominance. As Arne and Carlos say - it's about tension, and my tension is terrible. the second mitten is noticeably smaller than the first. horrible.

Luckily, I recently learnt that tension issues CAN in mittens be fixed by blocked - aggressively, inside out, and now my hands will be warm in Scotland.

And if you are wondering who designed a mitten pattern with a seam only down one side, you're asking the wrong question. The question you could consider is, after all this time, and all this knitting, why can't Sharon read a chart? Still, warm hands and that's what matters, right?

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  1. I love how Deb has made her way onto both our blogs within a week, hahaha!

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