It’s funny about mittens. They need thumbs. I am trying a new knitting technique, twined knitting, which creates a dense, thick, elastic fabric. So far I have used it with colorwork and haven’t explored all the textures you can create with it – yet.

I was so wrapped up in my twining and twisting and untwisting, I forgot to include a thumb in the second mitten.

I didn’t want to rip back and decided to insert an “afterthought” thumb so I searched for the technique on the Internet.

Almost all the results weren’t an afterthought at all. They required you to knit waste/scrap yarn as a placeholder where you wanted the thumb when you passed by the thumb the first time. There was my problem, I never thought about it the first time as I merrily knit and twined past the where it should have been.

I used the same technique, but instead of ripping out waste yarn, I placed the row above and below on needles and carefully snipped, from the center, the thumb stitches in between.

My main concern was the cut ends might be too short to weave in.

They were short, but not too short and I used a crochet hook to hide them. I can’t tell the difference.

Now they are drying by the fireplace before being sent off to a new bird lover’s home.

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