Review: Stitch Style Mittens

In honor of day two of snow in Arkansas, I thought it would be fun to look at a collection of projects that’s perfect for when you need to keep warm.

Stitch Style Mittens is an old book (published in 2007, but still available on Amazon) that includes 20 projects in knit and crochet. There are fingerless mitts, mittens, gloves and muffs by a variety of designers and for a range of skill levels.

There are some really cute projects here. I like the Spot-on Mittens by Judy Furlong, which are white with stranded knit spots worked in different colors. Jennifer L. Appleby’s Slip-Stitch Wrist Warmers are pretty and practical, in a classic stitch pattern and a sweet pairing of purple and pink. The super-long and picot-edged Textured Gloves from Malgosia Dzik-Holden are sophisticated show-stoppers, while Katherine Hunt’s Striped Mittens in black and white are a staple for knitters everywhere.

The Fair Isle Warmers pictured on the cover and designed by Gabrielle Carter are nice, too, and great practice on lots of little motifs (good for stash-busting, too). Most of the patterns can be viewed on Ravelry.

Some of the projects are a little strange, or just not suited to my taste, but if you’re a big fan of keeping your hands warm, this one is worth looking up.

Have you been knitting any mittens, gloves or mitts lately? I’d love to hear about it!

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.

Generally I like knitting patterns where I feel like you can use whatever yarn you have (because my stash is big enough and I want to use it, thanks) and make a successful project. This is one of those times when a special yarn makes the process that much easier.

The Floral Bouquet Shawl from Xandy Peters uses a specific extended color pooling yarn from Feisty Fibers, which allows you to place the bobble flowers with increasing frequency as you knit the project.

It starts with a solid color yarn, then the two color yarn is added in, and you make a bobble whenever you encounter the color pops. This would be hard to replicate with other yarn that doesn’t have the extended color pooling built in.

The background of the shawl is ribbed, making the project reversible.

The shawl uses fingering/sock yarn and comes out to be an asymmetrical triangle that’s 54 inches/137 cm long and 36 inches/ 90 cm deep and 60 inches/150 cm across the top edge.

Xandy says the pattern is for intermediate to advanced knitters. Knowing how to work traditional bobbles would probably help, but there’s a great video tutorial for how to work the floral bobbles so you can practice on other yarn or even incorporate the bobbles into other projects.

The bobbles are five-petaled flowers but they also kind of look like starfish to me, which could be fun on a child’s cardigan or other pattern. They’d also be fun on the leg of a sock or around the brim of a hat for extra whimsy.

The pattern includes photo and video tutorials, and written and charted instructions. It also includes tips on what to look for if you choose to use different yarn for the project, and instructions on how to dye your own yarn to use in the project.

If you want to give it a try, you can find the pattern on Ravelry.

[Photo: Xandy Peters]

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