Buckle up folks! This month’s technique is one that I absolutely ADORE. I’m sure that I’ve bored you all to tears with this story already, but when I first learned about the tubular cast-on method I was so blown away by it that my excitement kept me awake that night. And not only was I feeling excited about it, but I also woke Jim up to tell him how excited I was by this new-to-me cast-on method. I think it’s safe to say that he didn’t share my enthusiasm at the time. In fact, this was one of the incidents that lead to him writing a column in Simply Knitting Magazine called Knitting Ruined My Wife. Hopefully he will dig out that column later in the month to share here. But I’ve got side tracked…

These are the Totally Tubular Mittens, designed by the awesome Sarah Hatton. I’ve been working with Sarah since those days in my early knitting life, when I was Technical Editor on The Knitter Magazine, and I so admire her designs. She has an incredible knack for using texture in interesting ways, and balancing the different aspects of a design to create something that’s more than the sum of its parts.

The Totally Tubular Mittens feature the tubular cast-on method at the cuff, and from that 1x1 rib grows a fun cuff pattern using faux cables. The stitch pattern continues up the back of the hand and along the thumbs, moving with the shaping of the thumb gusset. So clever!

I had a little helper at the photo shoot! I seem to attract cats wherever I go at the moment. Bingo was delighted to join me for a bit of fussing while we took these shots.

It might seem odd to knit mittens in May, when here in the northern hemisphere the weather is finally warming up, but they are the perfect portable project, and come the autumn, you’ll be feeling smug when you pull them out of the drawer just as the weather turns!

As always there is a stepwise photo tutorial to accompany the pattern, as well as a video tutorial over on our YouTube channel. If you would like to join Boost Your Knitting, you can sign up for £30.00 which includes worldwide shipping. The yarn for this month’s design is our own Something to Knit With Aran, which is a soft, squishy blend of 70% Peruvian Highland Wool and 30% Superfine Alpaca. You’ll need 2 x 50g skeins and we have a rainbow of colours from which to choose.

Finally, this month is the last in our Spring season, which means that our Summer Kits are now on sale. We put together yarn kits for each season so that you have all the supplies you need to make your learning journey a smooth one. Our kits are excellent value compared with purchasing the yarns separately, particularly compared to the extra cost of shipping for all three projects separately. The Summer Kit costs £60.00 (approx. $80 USD) plus shipping for three months of knitting fun! Since two of the three summer projects call for multiple colours, you can take the guess work out of selecting the perfect combinations of colours by choosing from the Designers' Choice, or Jen's Choice colourways. Lots of you enjoy the mystery aspect of the kits and projects, so we have a Spoilers thread in our Ravelry group, rather than showing the kit contents on the product page.

When you purchase our books and yarns, you support not just our business, but allow us to pay all of our contributors fairly. At Arnall-Culliford Knitwear we firmly believe that everyone should be paid properly for their work. Every purchase from our online shop allows us to continue to create video tutorials and run knitalongs, as well as working on new books etc. That said, as always, we are delighted to see ALL knitters joining in with our techniques-lead knitalongs. You can join simply by watching the YouTube tutorial, and then choosing any pattern and yarn combination that you like! We are thrilled to see the range and beauty of ALL your projects.

I’m off to look out for the first tubular cast-on projects to appear in the knitalong thread…

Have a great day, and whatever you’re knitting, I hope it’s as exciting as that first tubular cast on was for me!