It’s really fun to make and to have distinctive mittens and gloves. It’s a little something that can make you smile through the cold season and a way to give a little gift of warmth to family members and friends.
Mittens that are full of colorwork may look daunting, but all that stranding makes the mittens even warmer than they would be otherwise, and it’s well worth the effort involved in learning stranded knitting and chart reading to be able to make these lovely and cozy mittens.
Jorid Linvik’s Big Book of Knitted Mittens:
45 Distinctive Scandinavian Designs is sure to inspire you to want to knit some fun mittens, whether embellished with classic motifs like birds, hearts, moose and classic colorwork designs or those with a more modern feel liks guitars and skulls, a giraffe, penguins or a turquoise lizard.
The book includes a lot of instructions on how to make your mittens come out right, including a discussion of how different gauges can give you different sizes of mittens (and which mittens can be worked to different sizes for kids and adults). The charts are a little different from others you might have seen in that they show how to divide the stitches on the needles and where to place the thumb.
Looking for more knitting patterns for Mittens? Check these out on Etsy.
The patterns are divided into general themes such as cuddly animals, mittens with bird motifs, felted mittens, mittens with symbols, mittens from the wilderness, domestic animals, motifs with personal meaning and exotic mittens. Some of my favorites are the dog mittens, with a Boston terrier motif inspired by Bob, the mascot of Ravelry; the South Pole mittens, featuring penguins and fish; Night Owl, with a large owl on the back of the hand and a small owl on the thumb; White Tiger, one of the felted designs; Flying Hearts, worked with a multicolored yarn for extra colorwork interest; Fox and Little Fox, great for a mom and child; the Sheep mittens, which form a full body on the backs of the hands when you put the together;and the Tiger Cub, an adorable motif for little ones. (Check out the patterns on Ravelry.)
There are also blank charts in the back so you can make your own designs or take motifs from the book and change them up to work on mittens of a different size.
This book is a lot of fun for people who are already comfortable knitting colorwork mittens, and it likely will inspire many more to learn the techniques so they can complete these fun designs.
About the book: 216 pages, hardcover, 45 patterns. Published by Trafalgar Square Books (click the link for a free pattern), September 2016, retail price $27.95.
Looking for more knitting patterns for Mittens? Check these out on Etsy.
Hi Sarah, I don’t have a comment on the book, but could you please help me? I have been reading your ‘teaching’ on About.com about knitting test swatches for getting tension right. I’ve knitted – a per pattern instruction- 10 stitches on 5mm needles, 14 rows st st – should get to 2″ X 2″. Width correct, but too long. So I re-knitted with 4.5mm needles – still too long, but not wide enough . . what to do? I never know which way to go when that happens -which for me is mostly.
Will appreciate you help. Thank You.
Leona.