Wednesday's Yarns - Boiled Wool Fingerless Gloves and "Almost A Miracle"

      I'm almost done with my first Boiled Wool Fingerless Glove for my son.  Hopefully, I can get the other done within two weeks and send it to him.  He'll get it wet and shrink it in the dryer, his preferred method of shrinking.  He'll be rewetting it and drying it till it's the right size.  It took 3 times in the dryer last year with his Boiled Fisherman's Mittens.  I've used mainly this pattern Men's Fingerless Gloves which is based on a WW II pattern called Trigger Gloves.  Both called for #3 needles and I am using #6 and worsted yarn Patons Classic Wool to get a larger version of the Fingerless Mitts in hopes that it will shrink down right.  One source said wool shrinks about %40 vertically and %25 horizontally.  I'm counting on a %30 shrinkage of fingers and did about one inch more than was needed for each finger (my son sent photos of his fingers next to a ruler).  I'll keep you updated, probably in February on the results.

     Daily I listen to "John Adams" by David McCullough on Audible while I knit, type this blog and do about everything.  I find it fascinating.  And it will be keeping me company for a while longer!  I am only %55 through even with continually listening.  But never a dull moment and it inspired me to pursue other books on the American Revolution because Adams literally leaves the scene of war for Europe for the duration of the war and long afterward.  So it's like being in a suspense novel and the author leaves you hanging.

  To find more American Revolution books I used the site: The 100 Best American Revolutionary Books of All Time.  To find more about the war itself I choose  "Almost a Miracle: The American Victory in the War of Independence" by John Ferling.  I first had downloaded a sample for free which includes about 150 pages and got hooked right away.  It starts really in a very up close and exciting way comparing two leaders, British and Colonial and their adventures in a battle of Pell's Point in 1776 and what happens to them.  Immediately you love one and hate the other.  Your rooting for the one and are cringing for the other.  Well done, the war is immediately drawn closer to you.  I ordered the book used, through an Amazon seller (Goodwill) and got it within 4 days!  It's a thick tomb 704 pages and 2 1/2 lbs.  I clip it with a huge monster hair clip and a Leather Book Weight, either on a table or perched on a pillow on my lap while I read and knit.  With a few other American Revolution books I'm reading at the same time I'm feeling like I'm getting a good grasp of the times.

Interview of the author: "Almost a Miracle" John Ferling talked about his book "Almost A Miracle: The American Victory in the War of Independence", published by Oxford University Press 2007

Goodreads review: "Almost a Miracle: The American Victory in the War of Independence"

Oliver "helping"

  

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