The moose gloves are done. They’ve actually been done for a week, but we had to wait until the weekend for a proper photo shoot, but L wore them for the first time two weeks after his birthday and proclaimed them quite warm, but not wind proof. He is quite pleased with the moose.

These gloves were basically a year in the making – it was around this time last year that L first saw the pattern and I first said I would knit them for him if he bought me the book, which he did – and in a way they cap off a lot of what I’ve learned about knitting stranded colourwork, including a decent understanding of yarn dominance (that is, that the colour stranded along the bottom will pop the most), tension, and pattern modification. Although, that being said, of all the patterns I’ve knit out of this book so far, this is the one I altered the least.

This is my first proper finished project of 2013, and I think my year is off to an auspicious start. There’s something nice about knowing my first project was a gift, and that it involved trying something new (I’d never knit fingers before). It makes me quite excited to see where the rest of the year takes me.

Details
Pattern: The Moose at Sundown by Annemor Sundbo
Yarn: Harrisville Designs Shetland in Red and Charcoal
Needles: 2.75mm for the cuff and 3.25mm for everything else (I used a magic loop)
Modifications: Not too many, really. I knit these in a wooly fingering weight yarn instead of the sport weight the pattern called for, and also went up several needle sizes to achieve the right size (although, I probably could have gotten away with a 3mm needle for the hands, but oh well). The Harrisville Shetland was lovely to work with and I am seriously considering ordering a whole bunch more – it’s wooly and sticky, making it perfect for stranded colourwork with longish floats, but when washed it softens up and blooms, becoming more like a sport weight. I loved it.
Design-wise, I added seven rows of length to the hand (on the back of the hand: an additional plain row, three rows of alternating red/grey, like in the cuff chart, and then an additional three plain rows; on the palm I just continued in pattern). I also doubled the length of the ribbing and added an extra plain row between the cuff and the hand charts.
All the details are Ravelled here.

*If you’re wondering about the title for this post, it’s from this comic (not a moose, but it was still L’s reaction).