MiniMe Fingerless Mitts

My son is four years old. When I took up knitting he regarded it skeptically. Then he decided that my bamboo circulars could be used to good effect as tools to wire up his home-made “laptop” (some old routers, a mouse and an busted wireless antenna he scavenged from his daddy’s junk pile). A bit later I caught him sitting in a chair quietly twiddling his hands together in his lap with a strange motion (his hands were empty).

I asked him what he was doing. “I knittling” he calmly replied.

Recently I knitted him a small snake hand-puppet. When I attempted to put it on his hand he screamed, flailed and generally objected to the thing. It met with the same response for about a week and then I stuffed it with waste yarn, sewed up the opening and called it a “cat toy” which I gave to my best friend (who has cats).

He really has shown no interest in any of the items I have knitted.  Until now.

Over the weekend I made a pair of fingerless mitts as a Christmas gift. I would try them on and take them off as I went along and this process fascinated him. It is a fabulous and easy pattern for Magic Loop Fingerless Mitts from Myra Wood (that first link is only going to work if you have a Ravelry account*). When I had Grandma try them on for size it was the last straw. He couldn’t stand it anymore.

I asked him if he wanted me to make him a pair and for the very first time his response was Yes. Of course, now I had to come up with the pattern.

Big hands, little hands

Click here for a printable pdf of the pattern: MiniMeMagicLoopMitts

This pattern is a bit too much to put into the body of this post – so I got all high techy and stuff and made the above pdf. If you have any problem with it, please do not hesitate to leave a comment and I will figure something out for us.

Dinking around:

Originally I thought I was just going to make some modifications to the existing pattern. But it really doesn’t work like that. There is a matter of scale, and the fact that a child’s hand is of different proportions. The cross stitch motif in the original was much to bulky for the mini-mitt, so I cut it down to a 2/1 rib from a 3/2 rib. I also started the thumb gusset quicker than on the adult version, and obviously the thumb isn’t as long. Same for the body of the hand.

This pattern fits my small 4 year old. I would guess it would fit the 3 – 6 age range, but I recommend trying it out on your toddler as you go (you might have to resort to a cookie bribe, I did when the novelty wore off). You might need to add a row between the cuff and the beginning of the thumb gusset. And if your child’s fingers are longer you might need to add some rows before the final ribbing.

I seriously doubt that anyone would need to add an extra increase to the thumb gusset – those would have to be some pretty chubby thumbs! But if you need more length in the thumb part of the palm I would add a row between the 2nd and 3 set of increases.

I am going to put this up on Ravelry – so if you make a pair I would love to see what they look like.

Now, what other knitted item do you think I could pique my little man’s interest?

 

 

*If you don’t have a Ravelry account and you are a knitter/crocheter, well, I feel very sorry for you. 😉

Fallen Out of Love Scarf

It has happened to the best of us. You go into a LYS or are surfing on Etsy and you find a skein of wild and crazy hand-painted sock yarn. It isn’t what you would normally get, but something about it calls to you. And you justify to yourself, look at the yardage, I could make a pair of socks. Or a small lace shawl. Or a scarf. I will totally find a great way to  use this. I love this, it must be mine.

And it comes home with you, and it joins your stash.  Or it shows up in the mailbox and you realize that the yarn artist must have their computer screen on drastically different settings than yours, and it joins your stash.

And it marinates.

And then you pull it out and try to remember what the heck you were smoking when you made that particular purchase. You have fallen out of love.

This is a pattern for that yarn. You spent money on it and there is a part of you that still cares for it’s fluffy little butt. But at no point has your skin tone shifted from a shade somewhere between Zombie and Vampire to a dusky hue that will go well with that particular shade of orange. It needs to be softened, ameliorated, toned down. So lets go with a complete opposite. Bust out that intensely boring bulky wool that you bought to … why in the world did you ever buy something that boring?

These yarns, alone they do not demonstrate that you have the best judgment when purchasing yarn. But together! Together they can be magic.

Dramatic no?

Well, maybe not magic – but a pretty nice scarf that you aren’t totally embarrassed to wear or gift to someone. Added bonus, a super simple pattern that makes the rows chug along with a fair amount of speed.

Fallen Out of Love Scarf

Yarn needed: 1 skein Cascade Yarns Eco-Wool Bulky or equivalent in a neutral color. 1 skein variegated sock type yarn – fingering up to sock weight, same approximate yardage as the Bulky. However much yarn you have determines the length of the scarf.

Size 11 needles, or size needed for a loose knit. Gauge isn’t really that important, you just don’t want it to stiff enough to stand up by itself.

k = knit, p = purl, s = slip purlwise, wyif = with yarn in front, psso = pass slipped stitch over

Holding both yarns together now and throughout, cast on 20 stitches

Set-up (garter)
rows 1 – 4: k19, s1-wyif

Main blocks (10 rows of stockinette)
row 5, 7, 9, 11, 13: k19, s1-wyif
row 6, 8, 10, 12, 14: k3, p14, k2, s1-wyif

Separating bands (4 rows of moire stitch)
row 15, 17: k3, (s1, k1, yo, psso both k & yo) x7, k2, s1-wyif
row 16, 18: k3, p14, k2, s1-wyif

Repeat until you almost run out of yarn or get really bored.

Finish with one repeat of Main Block (10 rows stockinette) and then 4 rows of garter.
Bind off, block and then weave in ends.

edited to add: a fancy pants PDF for you to download should you wish FallenOutOfLoveScarf

Mods:

This really simple pattern can be customized to the hilt. Instead of the 3 stitch garter edging you could do any knit/purl combo that strikes your fancy. For the separating bands you can use any basic pattern that helps the entire thing lay flat. This particular stitch is a 2 stitch pattern, so replacing it with the same would be easiest. If you want to keep the same cast on then you will need to keep the stitch pattern something that goes evenly into 14. Of course, if you are in love with a different pattern, you can always modify the number of stitches cast on to be appropriately divisible.

Nice and squishy!

But think hard, you see what we have learned about love.