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A first peak at the still unblocked Rosebud mittens. The weather has been terrible for several days, and it has not motivated me to block the mittens. But I have finished knitting them, and the pattern is written down. So, as soon as the mittens are blocked, the weather has brightened up some and my mitten model is ready for a photo shooting, you’ll have more pictures AND a pattern for these mittens.
I have been a very slack knitter and blogger lately. I have read a lot of very comment asking blog entries, but still not given myself the time to comment. And the reason is here:
May I present Ludde, the Afghan hound puppy.
Ludde is today 13 weeks, but has not been by us even a week. He’s charming, interesting, already a real afghan in attitude, but at the same time he can’t hold him self back and behave like a puppy after less than five seconds of the afghan attitude. He’s leaking like a sieve, like all puppies. But I’m getting better on knowing him and reading his signs, and a lot of potential disasters when done inside the house, has been done outside. If you want to see pictures of adult Afghans, here is a link to pictures of his Dad Tack and his Mum Chica.
He’s eating raw food, which is a lot of grated vegetables and raw meat and bones. The freezer is filled with bones and meat. Strange addition to the pesto and ragu sauces and home made ice cream we used to fill it with.
Sometimes he seems to miss his old family. He lived with three adult Afghans (well, Roosa, the youngest, is only one year old, so technically not adult), two small children and their parents. Being at home with me is boring, and he is happiest when our four children come home from school. He is very playful, and his baby teeth are very sharp. He already knows that it’s generally bad idea to taste bonsai trees, and that the canaries are best left in the cage. He also seems to think goldfish are like the TV, one can look at them for a long time, as one can with the ducks in the pond outside. But most of the time he just sleeps.
Exploring the grounds and the closest area around our house takes time, and there are many leaves to turn around and inspects. He’s hilarious to look at, and a master of mimics.
I have spend way too much time reading books, food forums, afghan hound forums, sight hound forums and generally surfing the net. My younger afghan hound* died almost 15 years ago, and folks, things have changed. It’s almost like getting an afghan for the first time, only I know how much work there is with the coat and how much the afghan needs to move in order to stay sound. But how you treat the coat is different, what you feed the dog is different, and for sure, there will be a lot of other things that are different too. Fifteen years is a long time.
*I had two afghan hounds when I was a teenager, Ch Tuohi-Tikan Husaari (Husku, who also loved racing, even if he wasn’t very fast), and Tuohi-Tikan Liki (Maxi, with CACs from both Finland and Sweden when he suddenly became ill, and his show career was past time). Both lived until well over twelve years old, but spent their last years with my parents. Taking the old dogs with me when I moved to my study apartment was not an option
Looks like I’m on a finishing roll, already second finished project for this month, and we are still in the first week (ok, I admit, a pair of socks and a pair of mittens, and both knitted mostly last month, but still). Hanna’s German socks got actually finished a couple of days ago, but I didn’t get modelled pictures until today. She is very pleased with them, and I think they fit her long and narrow feet very well.
I have started to knit up a pair of Rosebud mittens. The pattern is written, but I'm knitting a pair in order to check in on the details, and to provide an other colour combination than the one I used for the first pair. Report will follow. I have also started a Print O'The Wave stole with some Wetterhoff yarn I have. I'm not really sure about that one, perhaps the yarn is too thin, but report on that project will also follow, as soon as I've got a little more knitted.
I’m ready for the cold days, or at least, my hands are. In my heart I hope for many warm and beautiful, clear autumn days to come, and I can very well do with a minimum of cold days. To be honest, whispering, I could even skip the snow, end of whisper.
The pattern of the Anemoi mittens is a delight to knit. I have said it before, and I have nothing against repeating myself: Eunny is a wizard when it comes to pattern making. And I like very much the asymmetry of the colour pattern. The Anemoi mittens were a fast knit, and a nice knit.
Project details:
Pattern: Anemoi mittens by Eunny Jang
Yarn: Vuorelma’ s Satakieli in grey (957) and white (001)
Needles: 2,5 mm dpns.
Alterations: I like mittens that have quite narrow ends, and thus I didn’t follow Eunny’s decreases, but decreased on every row, and when I had 14 stitches left, that are the border stitches, I transferred the stitches to the inside and made a three-needle-bind-off there over 2x7 stitches. I find it very hard to graft in two colours, but if any of you have a good description on how to do that, please let me know. Grafting is more beautiful than the three-needle-bind-off, so I’m all for learning something new.
