Monk’s Dream

Good morning! Just a short note today to introduce you to a cheery pair of brand-new mittens: Monk’s Dream

Like the other designs in Making Light, these mittens are one half of a garment-accessory pair, whose details and motifs echo those of a larger, sweater-sized project.

Monk’s Dream has the same 12 stitch motif I featured on Blue Monk . . .

. . . whose regular / irregular rhythms are great fun to knit.

There’s a corrugated rib cuff as well, with the same regular irregularity . . .

. .. and the same pleasing transition between the fabric’s edges and its centre.

I enjoy the satisfying angles created by this motif, and the progression . . .

. . . from cuff to mitten top.

Like Blue Monk, Monk’s Dream takes its name from a Theolonius Monk composition, with similar angular rhythms, and a similar regular / irregularity. For something a little different, here’s Carmen McCrae singing Monk’s Dream in 1990, with a superb lyric written by another jazz great, Jon Hendricks. This was one of the last recordings McCrae made before her death in 1994.

Monk, Hendricks, McCrae: three creative musicians who certainly followed their dream, and made “prints on the sands of time.”

You might like to know that while my hands and needles have whipped up all the knits you’ve seen so far in this collection, these gorgeous Monk’s Dream mittens were knitted by my wonderful colleague, Kate C. You’ll see more of KC next week, when she’ll make an appearance as the model for our next Making Light design. Enjoy your weekend!