Before and after - Mary's Naughty Mitts

So I finally finished Mary's mittens. How does she feel about them?

She loves them!

I learned quite a bit with this project.  Like stranded-knitting REALLY requires a relaxed, looser tension than I'm used to.  I'm a pretty tight knitter, and that doesn't work with this stuff.  Knit too tight, and there's zero stretch/give to the finished project, and you can cut off your circulation!

And because I had a little gap of time between finishing the first mitten and starting the second, and blocking the first mitten before starting the second, I got to see what a difference blocking can make!  Check this out - the mitt on the left is the just-finished second mitten (pre-blocking), and the one on the right is the first mitt (post-blocking for the main part of the mitt, but then the "finger cap" was added on afterwards, at Mary's request).

And here's the same two mittens after blocking.  Since the first mitt had already been blocked (but then had part ripped out, and a thumb-cap and finger-cap added on), I carefully only soaked/massaged the new parts while also doing the same for the full second mitt.  A bit awkward, but I think it worked out ok.

Are they perfect?  Nope!  Mary was able to tell that the second mitt was a little looser than the first one.  Even though I tried to get them to LOOK the same size after blocking them, you can still tell they're different when wearing them.  There's some little flaws here and there in the knitting, but that just shows they're homemade, right?

I do kinda wish I would've knit the patterns in reverse of what they are, so that when worn the deer couples were facing each other.  Oh well - I guess they're just embarrassed, or like their privacy?

Either way - Mary seems to love the naughty mitts!  ;-)