Nordic Knitting - From Turkeys to the New Year!

You may wonder what Turkeys and Native American cookies have to do with Nordic Knitting? And that is a very reasonable question. Since I am an academic, the end of the semester has interferred with documenting the ongoing projects in the Nordic Knitting Group at River Knits. Final lectures, tests and grades came in a big rush after Thanksgiving and I am just getting the post out from our end of November meeting, but here it is - better late than never.

We enjoyed Thanksgiving cookies with various personalities at our November meeting, the Monday before turkey day. They were a tasty treat and gave us the big sugar rush we needed to get going on those patterns and colors. The theme for this fall seems to be mittens and hats. Many of the mittens are coming from the Selbuvotter book, from a pattern of Nancy Bush's from the Piecework magazine, and from Dale of Norway flyers. Daletta, Falk, Heilo, Nature Spun Sport, and Baby Uhl are the favorite mitten yarns. Karen's (red), and Beth's mittens (teal and white) are beautiful on both sides and ready to wear. They report that they are very warm!

Mine aren't quite done yet as you can see. :<) I left them like this so that you could see how the thumbs are constructed (ha, ha).

Then, last night we had our New Year's - December meeting, skipping right over Christmas, Solstice, Hanukkah, and Kwanzaa. And Karen has started another pair - the Nancy Bush pattern, which uses a few less stitches than the Selbuvotter patterns, and so fits smaller hands better. She even had the great idea to use a slightly variegated yarn (Lucy Neatsby Celestial Merino) for the light stranded color, which goes beautifully with the lilac (below, right). Beth also started another pair last night. These mittens are addicting!

Toni and Dawn looked at patterns for mittens,
gloves, and doll sweaters last night, so we are looking forward to seeing progress with them in the New Year.

Later this week, I will show you the hats and socks that others in the group are working on in November and December. No large garments to report on until the New Year, but the beginnings of a really cool vest and a sweater were in evidence last night, so stay tuned. We made a lot of sweaters the last two years, so I guess it is time to warm the extremeties.

Meetings will continue in 2009 on the last Monday of each month at River Knits from 7-9 pm. As always, you can purchase items you need for knitting at the meetings, and everyone is invited who loves Nordic Knitting!! Nordically yours, Sheryl