All posts tagged mittens

Free Knitting Pattern- Little Zebra Mittens!

by ohdessa on August 15, 2010 in knitting pattern with 8 Comments

New blog! Ryan has been working on this for me, and it’s so exciting to see it up and running. To add to the excitement, I bring you a free pattern for Little Zebra Mittens! I dare you to find something more fun and crazy than zebra print. Or young children. These mittens bring the two together!

The mittens are knit in two different sizes using the same chart, varying needle size to get a larger or smaller mitten. There is a lot you can do with such a simple pattern; a glittery yarn would make some crazy sparkly mittens, or you could bring in an optional third color to knit the cuff, tip and thumb with. Like pink and purple glitter mittens! Or a cyan cuff, tip and thumb with a traditional black and white zebra print for a little retro feel. You could go crazy colors like cyan and red or green and orange, or more analogous like auburn and camel or cerulean and sapphire.

Little Zebra Mittens

Sizes
2-4 years
5in long by 3in wide
15 rows and 17 columns in a 2in square

4-6 years
6 ½in by 3¼in wide
14 rows and 13 columns in a 2in square

Supplies

  • a set of double pointed needles, size 3 for 2-4 year mittens or size 4 for 4-6 year mittens
  • 70y of worsted weight yarn in main color (Red in the mittens pictured in the post)
  • 50y of worsted weight yarn in contrasting color (White in the mittens pictured in the post)
  • optional – 25y of worsted weight yarn in a third colour for cuff, tip, and thumb of mitten
  • tapestry needle
  • scrap yarn for marking thumb

Abbreviations
k- Knit
ssk- slip, slip, knit
k2tog – Knit two stitches together

Pattern
Cast on 40 stitches with your main color. If you are doing the cuff, tip and thumb in a different color use that color.
Divide the stitches among three double pointed needles and join in round.
Work 8 rows in k1, p1 ribbing in the round. If you want a longer cuff, knit 8 additional rows.

Begin chart. Knit with your main color for the black squares and your contrasting color for the white squares.
Note increases in the first row, with 6 increases over the row,bringing the stitch count up to 46.
In row 16, there are two rectangles each outlining 7 stitches. These represent the right and left thumbs, one for each mitten. Knit the 7 marked stitches for the thumb onto a piece of scrap yarn. Then move these stitches back onto your working needle and knit them according to the chart.
Begin the decreases in row 36. Remember to switch back to your third color if you are doing the cuff, tip, and thumb a different color.

If you want a longer more rounded mitten tip, knit one round between each decrease round.

At the end of the chart you should have 26 stitches left. Divide them among 2 needles and use Kitchener Stitch to close the top of the mitten.
For the thumb, pick up the stitches on either side of the scrap yarn in row 14.
Pick up two additional stitches, one on each side of the waste yarn for a total of 16 stitches.
Remove scrap yarn and divide them among 3 needles.
Knit 12 rows in your main color, or the third color you used for the cuff and tip if you did them a different color.
Knit the next row as follows: ssk, k4, k2tog, ssk, k4, k2tog.
Knit the final thumb row as follows: ssk, k2, k2tog, ssk, k2, k2tog.
Divide the 8 remaining stitches among 2 needles and use Kitchener Stitch to close the thumb. Weave in all ends.

Follow these instructions for the second mitten, making sure to knit the scrap yarn for the thumb on the opposite side. Otherwise you are going to have to knit two more mittens so that you have wearable pairs!

Edited on November 2nd, 2010 to change thumb placement from row 14 to row 16 and clarify decreases.

New mittens in progress

by ohdessa on August 9, 2010 in knitting with No comments

I am half done a new pair of mittens. They are super warm and thick. I used Noro Kureyon in colour 253 for the main body. It’s the most boring Kureyon there is, but I wanted someting more than just plain white. I used Ístex Létt-Lopi for the black, because as I’ve said it’s a great solid colour complement for Kureyon. They are knit from the bottom up with a Latvian Braid on the cuff (what can I say, I am crazy for them right now) with 3 nautical stars up the front and classy striping on the palm. The thumb has a little buttonhole for easier texting. After knitting, I duplicate stitched some colour on the stars with some leftover Kureyon. I just need to finish the second one. I would have finished it this weekend, but I was knitting another secret project is crazy cute.

More mittens and yarn (and some exciting news)

by ohdessa on August 3, 2010 in knitting with No comments


I am working on some new mittens right now, a bulky worsted weight pair on size 6 needles. Thick and warm. I have all this Noro and Létt Lopi leftover from all sorts of things begging to be used up. I actually finished a mitten yesterday, but there were so many little things I wanted to change, I figured I would just start over. There are just so many mittens I want to make and not enough time. Expect some awesome mittens in the future. My favorite part of making mittens is coming up with a good repeating pattern for the palm. This one is more of a simple pin-stripey one. I bet there is some sort of bug related Norwegian name for it. Would they be considered ants? Or lice? Or something else altogether perhaps.

On our weekend day trip I managed to finish the lace edging on the shawl I am working on. It’s my first lace (and shawl) attempt. All that YOs and YO a million times knit-twenty-stitches-together-at-once stuff makes me nervous. Mostly all the loose yarn. I do love projects where there are complicated repeats over many rows. It’s like a challenge to remember all those rows.


I also picked up some new yarn. I got some Kroy Socks for some gloves I am going to make. This photo does not quite capture the colour (flax) as they come off a bit cool here, but it is the perfect worn grey colour with a bit of a yellow-y tinge. The grey I’d imagine fisherman’s mittens to be (as I live on the prairies far away from fishermen) Perfect for some men’s gloves. I also finally bought some roving so I can make thrummed mittens. I am going to dye it some fun colours before I start.

The most exciting news is that I am going to have a pattern in the Deep Fall issue of Knitty! It comes out in October, so you will have to wait until then to see it.

Selbu-itus (or one mitten-itus)

by ohdessa on July 26, 2010 in knitting with No comments

So as I mentioned in my last post, I was working on some gloves from Selbuvotter. I finished one, but it was smaller than I’d hope. It fits my hand though, so thats ok. I picked up some Palette in Bittersweet Heather and Salsa Heather to start a newer, bigger pair, Annemor #15. I also went up a needle size. I stupidly bought the Susan Bates needles because they were the longest the store had, even though I am sure the longest in the other brand was more than adequete. These needles suck! The joins are so rough and catchy and the cable is so stiff. I love the pattern though. These are going to be some nice mittens. I seriously want to knit every mitten and glove in the whole book, but will probably stop at one more (some moose mittens or gloves! In bright orange and yellow mohair blend!) I must say though that the sizing is really wonky. The last one I did was supposed to be a men’s medium, but the current ones I am doing are a men’s small but have more stitches on the same needles and with the same yarn. Oh well, these ones should fit their intended recipient. 

I have three and a quarter mittens (or gloves) that need friends. So that is what I am going to do over the next couple of weeks. I also picked up some more Noro Kureyon (in the most boring colourway – light beige and medium beige with a bit of light tan) to go with some Noro in my stash for some other mittens I am going to design/make. I am addicted to mittens. No more starting anything until I have three pairs! I do have a shawl (with lacey bits!) and sock pattern in my future, I just want to get all these mittens done first.

The boys are doing great. O has a tooth and is standing up holding on to things more. And I can’t just put him down, he just rolls and rolls all over the place getting into trouble. B knows his right from left way before I ever will. Is there such thing as directional dyslexia? I can’t think in direction. Even something as simple as flipping a pattern or figuring out where north is takes me a lot of thinking. The other day I swear I spent an hour trying to figure out how to place thumbs on a mitten, and trying to figure out which side would correlate to which hand (and I still got it wrong). 

B and I make cookies every Tuesday evening. Usually we make our special recipe M&M cookies. Seriously, they are the best M&M cookies ever. But this week, we are going to make cut-able rainbow chip cookies because I picked up these awesome cookie cutters from Superstore. I had been looking for larger alphabet cutters, because my fondant ones are not so good for cookies. Or even fondant really. So when I saw these I was so excited. And they were only $4.99. Tomorrow is going to be a fun cookie night. 

Memento Mori Mittens

by ohdessa on July 19, 2010 in knitting, knitting pattern with No comments

My new pattern, Memento Mori Mittens, is up! It’s a fun mitten to knit with a lot of detailing that starts right at the cuff all the way to the tip. And flowers everywhere! I spend a fair bit of time reading about various imagery and customs related to death when working on a series of photographs, and found it as a whole quite interesting.  I recently came across some working sketches I did and liked what was going on. I wanted to do something more with them, so of course I thought mittens! I decided to use a really colourful sock yarn (Marks & Kattens Fame Trend in Party  - #653) as the background colour to stress that these are not a sinister mitten. Skulls aren’t all doom and gloom! Even if the title does implore you to consider your own mortality. I really like the patterning on the palm. I wanted to echo the flower detail on the back of the hand, so I decided on simple flowers and started framing around them, which eventually turned into the pattern you see.


This pattern is a great way to use a beautiful soft sock yarn. Pair a bright or vagrieated yarn with a dark solid, or two contrasting colours together (even better if they are tonal-dyed!) for a mitten that really pops. Think golden yellow with grassy-green, icy blue and red-orange or inky black with bright purple. If you are wearing something everyday for half a year (at least up here), you want it to feel and look good.

You need about 200 meters of fingering weight yarn for the background colour, and about 100 meters of fingering weight for the design, size 2 (2.75mm) needles, a bit of waste yarn and a needle to weave in the ends. If you have not tried using the Magic Loop for mitten knitting before, I really suggest trying it, as I find my colourwork to be so much more even compared to when I use double-pointed needles. Techniques used in the pattern include stranded colourwork, knitting in the round, increasing and decreasing and my favorite mitten cuff decoration, the Latvian Braid (you can find a tutorial here if you need one).
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