New Pattern: Poky Hedgehog Mittens!

I have a few patterns I'm going to be posting in the next few weeks; this is the first. They're all part of a new collection I've been working on. (While managing to keep up with schoolwork too, more or less!)


Aren't they cute? These little hedgehog mittens are knit with DK yarn at a gauge of 6 stitches and 8 rows/inch. I used Madelinetosh Tosh DK in "French Grey" and "Twig" to make them.


The pattern is $2.99 and available for download from Ravelry. It is four pages long and includes pictures and detailed instructions both for the mittens and for some of the less beginner-ish techniques involved (and I mean REALLY less beginner-ish; the only skills used besides knit and purl and knitting in the round with dpn's are m1 increases, ssk, k2tog, and picking up stitches).


Poky Hedgehog Mittens

Not dead.

Or, as one commenter hopefully speculated, married.

I've just gotten really busy, and also I lost my camera battery charger and was too cheap to buy a new one for $80. I eventually found a cheaper replacement, so now I can photograph these lovelies:


One FO, a Multnomah shawl in Fibre Company Road to China Light. I adore both this yarn and this pattern. The yarn is unbelievably soft and incredibly warm -- alpaca, camel and silk combine to make this like a little heater for my shoulders.

I am calling this my hubris shawl, because I had to rip it out and reknit it like 4 times, because I didn't bother to read the pattern very carefully.


I never thought I was a shawl person, but I love it, so I'm working on another, a Daybreak shawl in Sanguine Gryphon Bugga! Also an unbelievably gorgeous yarn, soft and kettle dyed. I'm not 100% sold on this color combination, but I'm waiting to see once there are more orange stripes.


And it's all orange and green/teal, all the time here, evidently, because I also made myself a pair of Endpaper mitts in two colors of Knitpicks Stroll yarn. They're already pilly after only a few weeks of use, but that's to be expected with this yarn, and it was super cheap.


Okay. I can't promise to blog with much more regularity, but I'll try. And at least now I can post pictures again!

Fall freebie: spiral mitts

I was so enamored of Knitty Gritty Thoughts' spiral cowl that I knit myself some matching mitts. I had exactly the same experience with the mitts that I had with the cowl: I thought I'd never wear fingerless gloves, that they would be impractical or not warm enough, and it turns out that I adore them and wear them and the cowl all the time!

I'm passing on the pattern to you. It's super easy and quick to knit. I had been knitting my cowl with two plies of Colourmart 4-ply weight cashmere (so a little lighter than fingering) held together, so I used them singly to knit these mitts. If you want to do something similar, you could use any luxurious fingering weight yarn to make the mitts, then hold it double to make a matching spiral cowl! I imagine that these would be lovely knit out of Malabrigo sock yarn, for example.

Spiral Mitts

Size: Ladies' small/medium ( 7" hand circumference) with 8 stitch/inch gauge; Ladies' large (8" hand circumference) with 7 stitch/inch gauge

Gauge: 8 stitches and 10 rows = 1 inch (small/medium); 7 stitches and 9 rows = 1 inch (large)

Yarn: 150-200 yards fingering-weight yarn (the more luxurious the better!)

Requirements: US 1 (2.25 mm) double-pointed needles or long circular for magic loop, two or three stitch markers, tapestry needle, waste yarn to use as stitch holder

Note: these mitts are knit top-down (from the fingers to the cuff). This means that you start by knitting the thumb and hand parts separately. It also means that you can tailor it to the amount of yarn you have by knitting the cuff longer or shorter as needed.

Directions:

First, make your thumb tube: CO 28 stitches and join to work in round, being careful not to twist. You can place a marker at the beginning of the round if you’d like. Work 4 rounds k1, p1, rib. Work in stockinette (all knit) until piece measures 1". Break yarn, leaving about a 2” tail, and place stitches on a piece of scrap yarn.

CO 56 stitches. Join to work in round, being careful not to twist. Work 5 rounds stockinette (knit). In next round, *k2tog, YO, rep. from * to end of round. Work 5 more rows stockinette. In next row, knit each stitch together with one loop from your cast-on to make a folded picot hem.

In next row, make one stitch (or increase by one stitch), then begin spiral eyelet pattern as follows: *k6, k2tog, YO, rep. from * to end of round. You should be able now just to spiral your way around the mitt ad infinitum. Work three full repeats of the spiral pattern (24 rounds), or until work measures 2” from folded-down hem.

In the next round, join your “thumb tube” to the mitts as follows: work 28 stitches in spiral eyelet pattern. Place a marker. Knit across all your live “thumb tube” stitches, working the first few stitches with working yarn and tail end of thumb stitches held together, and place another marker. Work remaining 29 stitches in spiral eyelet pattern.

In the next round, work to first marker in spiral eyelet pattern and slip marker. Slip-slip-knit (ssk) or work your favorite left-leaning decrease, knit to last 2 stitches before marker, k2tog, slip marker, and continue round in spiral eyelet pattern.

In the next round, work to first marker in spiral eyelet pattern, slip marker, knit to second marker, then finish round in spiral eyelet pattern.

Repeat the previous two rounds until there are two stitches between the markers. In the next round, work spiral eyelet pattern until one stitch before the first marker. Drop marker and k3tog, drop second marker and continue in spiral eyelet pattern.

Continue working in spiral eyelet pattern for 4 more full pattern repeats or until work measures 3” from bottom of thumb gore or 7” from folded-down hem. Work 6 rounds stockinette, decreasing by one stitch in the first row of stockinette. In the next round, *k2tog, YO, rep. from * to end of round. Work 5 more rounds stockinette. Break yarn, leaving a long tail. Fold hem and tack down live stitches with a tapestry needle to make picot cuff.

Weave in ends, block as you prefer and repeat with second mitt!

What I'm doing this weekend instead of going to Rhinebeck

Eating brussels sprouts.

(Isn't this thing cool? I got it at the farmer's market today. Who knew that they grew like this? It's heavy, too -- like a big caveman-club of healthiness.)

Knitting cashmere spiral mitts and listening to NPR.

Grading papers.

Reading for orals.

I'm sure that Rhinebeck will be more fun, but I just can't stomach it with both the work pileup and the upcoming move -- don't need more stash to pack!

Want another shot of those mitts? I thought so.

They're ribbed for her pleasure! I laboriously un-plied the double strand of 1/14 I had used for the spiral cowl (which I had originally twisted like that by colourmart), so these are exactly half the scale of the cowl. I love them! It was my first crack at top-down mittens -- I like it, and it does let you modify to fit the amount of yarn you have, but I'm not a huge fan of the thumb join part. These guys are so warm! Just trying them on for size or to snap a photo made my hands feel so warm and cuddly. I think they're going to get a lot of use.

NB: I cast on 56 stitches to make these, following the 8-stitch repeat of the spiral cowl's eyelet pattern after a picot edge. I added a 30-stitch-around thumb tube after 4 repeats, then decreased the thumb gore every other round until it was gone, then worked 5 more repeats of the spiral and cast off with a picot edge. I also tried picking up stitches and working a 3-needle BO instead of sewing down the final hem -- kind of a cool idea, and definitely a lot neater, but less stretchy, despite the fact that I used a needle 4 sizes larger for the bindoff.

As promised.

As I posted yesterday, I have a sock completed. As I look at this little number, it seems a little short -- but I am banking on my mom's having smaller feet than mine. She's visiting this weekend and I am hoping to have the pair done by then.


Meanwhile, this tasty treat arrived this morning from Knitpicks: some Shine Sport to make a fair-isle yoke sweater for my colleague's granddaughter, due in April. This seems like a lovely spring bunch of colors, don't you think?


Not a yarn bribe this time -- more of a yarn reward. It feels quite nice to get that Chaucer-paper monkey off my back.

... what's that you say? I have some mittens that I have not finished? You are right. With temperatures in the high 40s, it's hard to conceive of knitting mittens. But not to fear: cold weather will eventually return, as will my knitten-mitting mojo.

conclusions, beginnings, and a yarn bribe.

Things have been in a shameful state recently here chez Looking Glass. One semester ended, a new one began, and ALL kinds of work did not get done. That Chaucer paper about which I jauntily wrote a few weeks ago is still incomplete, and I've got a big stack of papers to grade that are so late that my students have started joking around about their status as historical documents. I've been whiny and neurotic and just generally a loser, and I'm downright peeved at myself.

Ergo, very little knitting to speak of. I have only knit about 2 more pattern repeats on my mitten, mostly during the episodes of Lost I've taken time out to watch. These will be awesome mittens if I can ever finish them before winter ends! Just trying them on for size, they are very warm.



Only two things are providing hope: my darling, funny boyfriend and a shipment of new Knitpicks Felici I bought myself as a yarn bribe. What gorgeous, jewel-like colors! But I can't knit it until that paper is in.


Now, Jennifer K., get your act together and finish your $@&%ing paper!!

January morasse

I was looking forward to turning to projects for myself in January, now that Christmas knitting was all done. But unfortunately, grad school pressures and other daily responsibilities have elbowed out most of my knitting time.


I have just one project I'm working on at the moment: some stranded knitting therapy in the form of another Latvian mitten adaptation. I have some lovely leftover sock yarn from my various socks and berets that was just begging to be combined in gorgeous jewel-toned patterns. It's mostly Dream in Color Smooshy in "Good Luck Jade" and Arucania Ranco in rust, with additional pattern bands of Dream in Color Smooshy in "Gothic Rose" and some scraps of Koigu KPPPM in shades of navy blue and only the yellow stripes from my leftover Knitpicks Felici in "Patina." I'm particularly pleased with the way the Good Luck Jade and rust colors work together; both are semi-solid or mildly variegated, and the combined effect is like an antique piece of fabric.


As with my previous Latvian-style mittens, these have patterns adapted from the mittens on the Riga Summit website. They have a non-traditional thumb gusset, just because I really don't like peasant thumbs; this one is adapted from the Komi mittens in Knitting Marvelous Mittens. Colorwork mittens go so quickly! I had this one knitted up to the thumb, then had to rip it back and make it bigger, and it's still almost finished a week later. Watching those bands of pattern stack up just makes you want to knit one more row... then one more...

It's been freakin' cold here in New York City, so I wish I had more free time to finish these up! Alas, Chaucer and the First Crusade and Literary Theory take priority in the next few weeks...

Be still, my heart

To those poor souls who actually follow this blog: sorry for the communication blackout there! I've become quite busy of late. Grad school of course is a time-vampire, and teaching is nothing to sneeze at. I've also been spending quite a bit of time with a certain gentleman friend -- about which I will say nothing more at the moment, except that as alternatives to knitting and blogging go, it's been a very pleasant one.

Meanwhile, there has been some knitting afoot. My friend just adopted a baby, and I've been furiously working ever since I found out about it, with these adorable results:



The socks and mittens are my own design; the hat is the "Norwegian Sweet Baby Cap". A simple but ingenious pattern that yields heart-grabbing results. All done on size 2 needles, Rowan Cashsoft 4 ply.

First FOs

Just in time to be quite late for Christmas, I finished a gift for a friend: some lovely Endpaper Mitts in Koigu and Gems Opal. This pattern was a pleasure to knit, and the results are both useful and pretty.


Other things finished in the last few days: one sweater cuff and nine pages of a really theoretically questionable paper...

December wrap-up

Knitting has been abysmally minimal this month altogether, for a variety of reasons (mostly laziness and schoolwork). But I didn't want December to end without at least one more post. Therefore, I present:

Progress on mystery sweater sleeve

Late start on holiday gift-knitting: endpaper mitts for my graduate student friend with a cold apartment and lots of papers to type

Another baby sweater for Andrew, using the yarn I frogged from the ill-fated car intarsia sweater. This is quite a bit more boring and conventional, but more useful and less problematic to knit.

Happy New Year, everyone, and good luck with all your knitting projects! I am looking forward to a month off from grad school -- a month I intend to fill with much more knitting.

Two lovely FOs!

I've been a little knitting machine this week, trying to finish up two baby sweaters to bring to the silent auction for my choir. I may have given myself repetitive strain injuries, but the results are pleasing. First, I put the finishing touches on a nautically-themed sweater that has been languishing without buttons in my apartment for about a month, and whipped up a matching hat:


Here's some detail on the fair isle pattern:

Those, by the way, are sailboats and goldfish, though very few people who saw it at the auction could figure that out. I think I might embroider some masts to the sailboats to clarify that they are not ice cream cones or mountains.

For those of you who get off on it, here's a shot of the stranding:


What's clear in this shot is the difference in weight between some of the yarns I used. Although I worried about it when I was knitting and it looks kind of funky here, I think that it is totally fine on the right side. Blocking did a lot to help with that, too.

The second finished object set is the Chronicles of Narnia-inspired girl's sweater, which came out nicely, if not really looking at all like the one in the movie:


And to complete this set, I churned out a pair of mittens. Toddler mittens always crack me up. They are so adorable it's almost unbearable, like a baby bulldog.


The details.

Nautical fair isle sweater and hat:

Patterns: top-down raglan baby sweater pattern, free with purchase from School Products, with my own fair isle addition, and my own made-up hat pattern
Size 5 Addi Turbo needles
Baby Merino from School Products, 2 skeins
Karabella Aurora 4 in turquoise, baby blue and bright yellow, 1 skein each
Karabella Aurora 8 in tan, scraps left over from sheep sweater

Chronicles of Narnia sweater:

Patterns: my own design, Kathy's Mittens from Knitting at Knoon
Sizes 5 and 7 Knitpicks Options needles
Filatura di Crosa Zara yarn in sage (3 skeins), raspberry, teal, and eggplant (1 skein each)
Karabella Aurora 8 in tan, scraps again

Sew I Knit's mitten!

I am officially the author of a pattern -- Sew I Knit has knit her own pair of my Latvian mittens! Click here to see the picture of her beautiful work.

Almost finished.

The pair is almost complete. Here's a progress shot to show what the pre-duplicate stitch mitten looks like. I think that the wrist pattern looks much more "ethnic" with the centers in white, but I am torn about the hand pattern; now that I see them side by side I might prefer the one without the red centers to the boxes. Clearly visible, too, is the effect that twelve million times of turning the mitten inside out and jamming your fingers in there to do the duplicate stitch, in terms of widening out the mitten hand; I am confident that blocking will fix this problem, as neither mitten has been blocked yet.

Latvian-inspired mitten pattern

Here's the pattern for my "Latvian" mitten:

Requirements:
size 4 double-pointed needles
Karabella Aurora 8 (94 yards/skein) or other worsted weight yarn: 2 skeins color A, 1 skein color B, 1 skein color C
Tapestry needle
waste yarn

Ladies' size small
Gauge: 26 stitches and 28 rows = 4 inches

CO 40 stitches in color A. Knit 1 row, then join yarn in the round. Knit 3 more rounds, then *K2tog, YO, rep. from * for one whole round. Knit 4 more rounds.
Switch to color B and begin pattern chart. Notice that some rows require you to increase or decrease by a stitch or two in order to fit the whole pattern repeat, and in switching from the wrist patterns to the main hand pattern you will increase by five stitches.

* note: the red centers of the main pattern's boxes, as well as the white centers of the cuff pattern's diamonds, can be done in duplicate stitch if preferred. If you choose to do so, just knit the boxes entirely in white and the diamonds entirely in black.

Dark outlines on the chart indicate where to place thumb gore for left and right mittens. Inside this outline, increase as charted for length charted. At final row of thumb gore, knit row, then place thumb stitches on a length of waste yarn. In the next round, knit to thumb stitches, cable cast on 3 stitches to make up for 3 original thumb gore stitches, then continue round.

Decrease for top of mitten as charted, using right-leaning (k2tog) decreases on right sides of mitten tops, and left-leaning (ssk) decreases on left sides of mitten tops. When four stitches are left on needles, break yarn, draw both colors through loops, pull through to wrong side of piece, and knot.

Pick up thumb stitches from waste yarn and pick up 11 stitches around hole left by thumb gore, continuing the stripe pattern. Join yarn and knit in the round until thumb reaches about 1/3 of the way up the thumb nail. Begin decreasing by four stitches in each round as charted. When six stitches remain on needles, break yarn, draw through loops, pull through to wrong side of thumb, and knot.

When mitten is finished, fold under and tack up picot hem. Weave in all ends and block mittens together to make sure they are the same size.

Latvian completed

The first of my Latvian-inspired mittens is finished! Here it is, pre-blocking, in a somewhat dimly-lit photo (stupid NYC drizzle three days in a row!).

Specifics:
Karabella Aurora 8 in black, off-white and bright red
Size 4 double-pointed needles
Design: my own, based on traditional Latvian patterns

The patterns are taken directly from some mittens on the Riga Summit site (linked in the posts below). There are some non-traditional cheats that I did do tailor the mitten to my tastes (and skills):

The cuff (which is unflatteringly showing the pattern jog on the right side) uses a traditional pair of patterns, but I made it narrower: 8 stitches smaller than the mitten body. This ends up being just tight enough to hold out the cold, but not so tight that it's hard to get on or looks like a weird sausage. With a body stitch count of 48 stitches per row, the cuff is 5/6 the size of the hand.


The thumb has a gore and is in a different pattern (fuzzy picture). This is partially because I am not a fan of peasant thumbs, and partially because I gave up on trying to figure out a way to have a gore and still keep the thumb pattern lined up with the body pattern. Math was melting my brain. For a while I had this feverish idea that I could cast on one entire pattern repeat more than I wanted for the fingers, then do a peasant thumb and decrease by one entire pattern repeat right above it. I still think this would be possible, I just didn't have the guts or the patience to try it. Plus, I kind of like the way the stripey thumb looks.

The biggest cheat of all is (I hope) relatively undetectable. Any row that seems to have three colors in it is actually two colors, with the third color duplicate-stitched on. So all of those red centers to squares in the mitten body pattern are actually added later. This saved me a LOT of hassle with yarns tangling and carried-over red yarn showing through on the right side. It was not quite as speedy and carefree to execute as I thought it would be. If you look closely on the picture of the cuff you can see that there is a bit of red behind one of the center white stitches; that's the stitch underneath the duplicate-stitch white.

So here it is, in all its glory, with drizzly NYC in the background:


And work begins apace on the second mitten:


When I have the time I will write up the pattern for anybody who'd like it.

frogged.

So I have made the discovery that a cuff 3/4 the width of the hand is ridiculously small. Back to the drawing board...

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.