Hi all you aspiring knitters!

With the actual mitten cast on to happen Sunday, I think we'll start off this project very slowly for those of you who have never knit. I want you to start by just knitting back and forth on 2 needles for a bit, to get used to doing the knit stitch. There's a neat site that shows great pictures for casting on and knitting...

OK...take 2 of your double pointed needles and your yarn. Measure off 12" of yarn, make a slip knot, and cast on 10 sts as per these EXCELLENT instructions:
http://www.wonderful-things.com/knit.htm
If you have any trouble doing this---e-mail Claudia or send a note to the list and I will respond there.

Hold the needle with the 10 sts on it in your left hand, and an empty needle in your right hand. Loop the connected yarn over and under the fingers of your left hand until you can grasp it and keep it still while you are working the two needles.

There are some fun rhymes out there for learning to knit. The knit stitch is basically a 4 step process where you:

Work this way across all 10 stitches. You have finished Row 1! Then stop...put the right needle (which now has 10 knit stitches on it) in your LEFT hand, and the newly emptied needle from your left hand into your RIGHT hand, and work across the 10 stitches again....this will be row 2.

Do this until your little square of knitting (called a swatch) measures about 3" from the needle. Now measure it ACROSS and write down the measurement in your new notebook. Post what it is here and we'll figure out your GAUGE, which is how many stitches fit into an inch of your knitting. This number will help you determine how big your mittens will come out.



This material ©1999 Claudia Krisniski
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