Hubby Now Has a Cane

Yesterday we had to go out to the VA clinic as hubby had an appointment with the prosthetic department.  They issued him a cane due to the weakness and pain he has in his right leg (old wound from Vietnam).

They showed him how to use it and watched him walk with it for a bit before letting us go on our way.

I did ask about getting a handicapped parking permit for him as it will make it easier for him to get to and from buildings, such as the VA or grocery store or even a restaurant.  Was told that the DMV has the necessary forms that he will fill out part of and then his doctor will take care of the rest.

He’s learning that he now has to do things one handed, which in some cases will require more than one trip to accomplish a task.  This will make his independence a little more challenging but I am all about him keeping as much independence as possible.

So here’s to learning new ways of moving and maintaining independence.

 

Lined Flip Top Mittens – Fingerless Gloves

Oldest was working out at a local high school yesterday in very cold weather, at least for this part of Florida.  He called me after he finished, complaining of the cold.  During our conversation he told me he had lost the fingerless linings to his mittens.    I offered to make him some flip top mittens with fingerless gloves as the lining.  He loved that idea.

As I began to knit the ribbed cuff of these mittens, it crossed my mind that I did not want to knit 4 cuffs!   So I got to thinking, “how do I knit the flip top mitten and the fingerless glove inside of each other?”  There had to be a way to do this.

I remember seeing a video on YouTube about knitting socks, one inside of the other, on double points.  So I went on a hunt for this video.  Turns out there are 5, but I only needed a little information–  how to knit the two pieces yet keep them separate.  Once I found that, I was good to go.   That is until I actually got to the point where I wanted to join in the yarn for the liner and attach it only at that point.

All I had to do was knit with the outer yarn and the inner yarn at the same time for one round only.  From that point on,  I followed the instructions set forth in the video to knit the two pieces at the same time.

This is my progress so far.

So the mittens will have a single layer cuff and double layer hand/finger body.

I’ll post more pics as I progress on this project.

ETA: I had to add a 5th needle just for the thumb gusset.  That one needle had way too many stitches on it and I was dropping them.  Got tired of retrieving them. The safety pin shows the location of the thumb gusset.

 

So far:

The fingers are done.  The gold/orange waste yarn is where the opening will be.  Once the top is done, I will go back and remove that yarn and have live stitches to work with when knitting a neat ribbed section for the opening.  Then the last thing to do will be the thumb.

Well, LOL! Maybe not the last thing.  I will have to make a second mitt.