Week 1: Lady's Mittens with Thumb Pattern Now Available

Project #1 is done!  I knit the mittens in two color schemes: the pink & black version was knit with Brown Sheep Nature Spun Sport yarn and the blue & brown version was knit with Rowan Felted Tweed.    Needles used were US #5 for the pink version and #4 for the blue version.

My first thought was to convert the pattern to knit in the round, but I was quite pleased with the original instructions, which were knit flat and seamed.  It made a nicely fitting mitten with the thumb in just the right place.  

This is a very stretchy mitten, so will easily fit a wide range of hand sizes.  You may wish to adjust the number of rows in the mittens to suit the hand size of the wearer; our model has medium size hands.  The thumb was a tad long for her, it would be perfect with perhaps 4 rows of main color rather than the 8 rows specified in the pattern.

Free "updated" instructions for knitting this circa 1888 pattern can be found here

Lady's Mittens: Back to The Drawing Board

Sometimes the project just doesn't want to be finished...

I pondered the mitts last night and the original picture.  And decided the cuff needs to be shorter, like half the length.  So I'm redoing them.  Which is just as well, since I realized I had only cast on 40 stitches for mitt #1 instead of 48.  Must be the Nyquil.

Lady's Mittens: One Done

I know I promised "no cell phone pix", but I'm at Lois' and I have no camera.  So you  get what you get and you don't have a fit :-)

Finished Mitten #1 today, very easy pattern, which took me just a couple of hours.  The hardest part?  The 3 rows of embroidery on the back of the mitt.  I haven't done embroidery in about 30 years, so my work is a bit sketchy.

I am making these per as the original instructions, knitting flat and seaming. Could easily be knit in the round though, and when I rewrite the instructions I will probably do them in the round.
These mitts are done in k1,p1 ribbing so are very stretchy. The finished mitten has quite a long cuff, they would be nice and warm under a jacket.

Original colors are blue with brown contrasting color; mine are bright pink with black. I may knit a second pair in the original colors, haven’t decided yet.

3 rows of Herringbone embroidery is done on the back of the mitts. Instructions for working this stitch can be found at this site