Taking a stab at a Latvian

... mitten, that is. Or at least one whose patterns are Latvian. I was inspired by the following sites:
http://www.liis.lv/majtur/darbmac/raksti.htm
http://www.rigasummit.lv/en/id/cats/nid/698/

The second link is courtesy of the Stranded Colorwork Challenge blog.

But the problem with all of those mittens for me is the slightly unnecessary pointiness of the tops and the fact that the bottoms are not smaller around the wrist. I personally like to have no place on my body where cold air can seep in during the winter, so I like a tighter wrist. So I spent a lot of time brainstorming and sketching:


Eventually becoming a little obsessive:


Here is the progress so far:


You can't necessarily tell from the picture, but it's not really a traditional Latvian mitten, aside from the patterns: I'm making the cuff 3/4 the size of the mitten body. I did a picot-edged hem, and thought it would be smart of me if I also ribbed the folded-under part of the hem. In retrospect I don't think this was such an amazing idea, as it doesn't lie quite right now, but it does have a nifty sort of sea-urchin shape to it as a result:


Of course, that will go away when I tack down the hem.