Standard Holiday Warning: If you are a member of my family, I love you, but if you read any further do so knowing that you will ruin Christmas.

Last night, I finished the first of the foot tubes. I’m two days ahead of schedule on those, and it feels awesome. So much of my anxiety about my Christmas knitting was wrapped up in knitting these giant bed socks, but it turned out all I needed was a plan (two inches per day) and they became totally manageable.

Of course, because it’s the holidays and everything going right is boring, I’m starting to worry about my sister’s mittens. I picked out the pattern ages ago and cast on this week. They’re from the same book as Carmen’s mitts, so I had a general ideal of what to worry about going in. I recharted the pattern before starting (see, I’m learning), adding four stitches around and 12 rows to the length of the hand (I also lengthened the cuff). The problem, though, is that I think I’m using the wrong yarn. I’m actually pretty much convinced that I’m using the wrong yarn, but it’s so nice that I don’t want to admit it to myself.

For Carmen’s mittens I used Cascade 220 sport, which is 100% superwash merino and was quite nice to work with. For my sister, though, I chose The Fibre Company Road to China Light. It’s also a sport weight (although it looks quite like fingering), and it’s a blend of alpaca, silk, camel, and cashmere. Can you say soft? I mean, this yarn is so, so soft. So. Soft. It is beautiful to work with and, I think, would prove quite warm and yummy to wear. It is finer than the Cascade, though, so I went up a needle size to balance out the gauge. This thing is, I don’t think it’s enough. I’m worried this yarn isn’t as stretchy as the wool (it isn’t – duh, Angela, silk content) and so while my sister’s hands are a little smaller than mine, I rather suspect she’ll have equal trouble pushing them into this mitt. At least part of this is due to the very long floats required by the Dancing Grannies pattern. I’m keeping my floats extra-loose, but with less-than-stretchy yarn, there’s only so much you can do.

So this is where I have to make the tough choice: Push ahead and risk ending up with a finished mitten that’s definitely too small, and realize there isn’t enough time to replace it; push ahead and witness a knitting miracle in which the finished mitten is the perfect size and totally beloved by my sister; or suck it up – rip it out and start over with a different yarn (I have some Louet Gems sport weight in acceptable colours in my stash). What would you do? I’m leaning toward ripping, but first I’m going to try blocking what I have. It’ll still be on the needles, but maybe the yarn will grow enough to give me hope (yes, that’s right, I didn’t swatch. Ugh.) I have to decide this weekend, though. If I restart on Monday (or, better yet, Sunday night) I’ll still make it, but any later than that and it’ll be very tight.

At least the foot tubes are working out?