Totally tubular

Tubular cast on issues resolved! Mittens chugging along! Hurray! At this rate you are going to witness every last stitch of these girls from start to finish.

First, on my too-tight ribbing and cast-on edge: I went snooping around Miss Eunny's site looking for clues on my tubular cast on issues and realized my mistake after reading her pattern for Endpaper Mitts. In the Italian cast-on tutorial I was using, four "set up" rows of k1, sl1 wyif were included before the ribbing was started. Eunny's pattern also includes "set up" rows with a similar pattern. I was doing the set-up rows six times - six rows of slipped and twisted, hand squeezing stitches! That's way too many if you want any flexibility in the resulting cast on edge. Oh, and I fixed my gauge problems.

Now I am rocking along! I'm so excited! The cast on is really pretty and the ribbing is looking great. The only slightly agonizing part is the contrasting color purl stitch in the ribbing. I knit continental, so throwing a purl and using the contrasting color makes for some interesting finger acrobatics. However, my moves are slowly becoming more elegant.

Also, check out Diana's beautiful mitts over at Streets and YOs.

PS: Click on the pictures and you can see every last detail.