Mittens and gloves and socks and coats – it’s cold
Mittens time
It’s been so cold recently that I’ve been really glad that I’ve made so many pairs of mittens over the past few months. It all began before Christmas when I decided that some pretty fingerless mittens would make perfect presents for my sister and my nieces. I’d soon designed my Flora Fingerless Mittens, which feature a floral granny square as the central motif on the back.
I’ll be writing another post about the Flora mittens as soon as I’ve put the pattern on sale (you can already buy the actual mittens from my Etsy store), but in the meantime, here are just some of the lovely colourways…
They’re either made in Stylecraft Special DK or in Deramores Studio DK. Hope you like them – I think they’re quite feminine and perfect for chilly spring days!
Bobbles and stripes
My second design is so warm. It’s not got a name yet, but I’m loving wearing them on wintry walks with Lily the dog. They’re striped and have an offset bobble effect to give texture and add warmth. I’ve already whipped up quite a few.
Here’s some more underway on the back – very Harry Potter colours!
And here’s the bobbly front – it’s alternating double crochets and treble crochets…
Any ideas what I should call them?
Chunky mittens
Once I’d started designing mittens, seems I just couldn’t stop! I worked with two strands of the DK together and came up with these chunky mitts, which are sooo quick to make… I like the crossed treble effect and love the contrast embroidery as well.
I decided that a pair of quick-to-hook fingerless gloves would make a perfect beginners’ project, so I came up with a chunky, yet slightly lacy pair which I’m now teaching in my classes (the timetable’s here) – they just use double crochet and trebles, and are going down really well!
There’ll be some pictorial how-to help up here on the website very soon.
Out with the needles
When I was a teenager, we often knitted up gloves for ourselves, and the other day, I discovered some of the patterns my sisters and I used to use… One even still had the handwritten notes about yarn amounts used!
Even more needles
Thinking about keeping out the chills, I decided it was time to wind up the lovely HeyJay hand-dyed yarn in Rouge Jacket I’d bought at the Wool Fair last year (read about that event here) and finally embark upon some socks.
Another nostalgic moment – I suddenly remembered how, as a child, I used to help my grandmother wind hanks of wool into balls.
Nothing was wasted in those days, and any jumpers that we’d grown out of were unravelled and the yarn washed in hanks to remove the kinks, then wound into balls and knitted again. When there was no-one to hold the yarn on our outstretched hands, we used the back of a chair. And that’s exactly what I did.
I’ve chosen a pattern from Socks Yeah! book from Coop Knits I bought at the Knitting & Stitching show and used my KnitPro dpns in 2.5mm. It was so odd switching from chunky to 4 ply, but it’s providing welcome variation.
Another WIP (work in progress, that is) but then again, I have finished something…
Don’t forget the dog!
It’s been so cold, that I couldn’t forget our Lily. She’s a Staffy-cross rescue dog (do check out the lovely charity we got her from All Dogs Matter). She has really short hair, and we couldn’t have her shivering… So it was just as well as my finished project for this month was my Butterfly coat design, made from the spare Rowan Pure Wool Worsted DK (which you can get here among many other places) from the Martin Storey Windy scarf I’d made for my friend’s 60th birthday.
Lily’s little coat fits snugly and has a fleecy lining, and what’s more it matches her lovely collars from Rad N Bad.
Just like her skull coat I made the other year!
Hope you’re all keeping as warm as us!!!
