Sunday, October 11, 2009

The Autumn Winds Blow Chilly & Cold

Chevron Love Mitten

The colors I'm using for this Chevron Love mitten are from a kit called "Vintage Appliance", but really the colors seem perfectly appropriate for fall. The kit & pattern are from Knitterly Things, and the mitten has knit up pretty quickly. There are, however, a few problems:
  • The pattern gauge is about 7 st to the inch on a size US3 /3.25mm needle, which is perfectly reasonable. Since I'm a loose knitter, I went down a couple of needle sizes to a 2.75mm needle, and didn't measure my gauge until I was past the thumb gusset. I'm getting about 8-8.5 stitches instead of 7. I knew that it was running a little small on my large hands, but didn't realize that it was all gauge and not just sizing.
  • I opted not to run the colors up the inside of the mitten, because I'd rather weave in a bunch of ends than deal with 8 balls of yarn at once. This is one of the reasons I didn't realize the mitten was so small earlier--all those ends make it a pain to try on! They weren't so bad to weave in, though. Once I got past the cuff, I started weaving them in periodically so I didn't have to do all 60-ish at once. And now that I've counted how many ends there were, I think that I may have been insane to cut the ends.
  • I love, love, love the colors, and there's no chance that this pair will fit me or that I'll rip it out.
  • I think that the thumb is a little stumpy, even if these are going to a small handed person. Since my hands are too long for the mittens, it's fruitless to judge this by myself. Before I start the 2nd mitten, I need to have someone try these on and tell me if I need to add length to the thumb. The fact that I'm even imagining this means that I'll probably have to cut the orange tip (I wove in the ends), and I'm afraid that it could get ugly.
While I'm disappointed not to be able to jump into mitten #2, and that this pair won't be for me, I do have this for consolation:

P1060045

Chevron Love Mitten Kit #2: Metropolis! Time to dig out some larger needles!

5 comments:

cinetrix said...

Ahem, not only do i have a small head, I have small hands--like a carny! Just sayin.

AllyB said...

ooo, they're fabulous! I love the colors.

Ella said...

~laughing~

We had a bathtub that green color, and I think our counters were the same as the orange. But I certainly agree - very fall like. Somebody will have toasty and beautiful hands. Early Christmas knitting partially done perhaps?

:D

Laura said...

Super cute! Okay, now I'm really feeling the itch to learn how to knit! :)

dem Efa said...

I'm pretty sure my hands are smaller than yours...Hey, that's one less Christmas gift you need think over.