Fingerless frenzy

I know it has been a while.  But I've been knitting and spinning like crazy.  I'm working on a pair of fingerless mitts and my mittens.  The mitts are a surprise for my friend at work who sits by the windows and freezes.  I know she freezes.  I make knitted things to help you not freeze.  Did I make her fingerless mitts to keep from freezing and still do her job?  Nope, not me....sigh...I started a pair for her over a week ago, used some beautiful sock yarn, in peacock purple, iridescent shiny and lovely.  But the yarn was too fine for the pattern and while it was simple and I could have worked out the gauge differences, they would have taken me so long to do at that fine a gauge.  So back to the drawing board.  I found a pattern I liked on Ravelry and searched through my stash.  Pulled out some left over Malibrigo from the lap blanket I made and some left over Rowan white singles from a hat.  Together they would make a lovely fingerless mitt.  It has just a bit of stranding where you move from one yarn to the other.  It is bulky yarn and I was able to knit the first mitt start to finish on Sunday except for the thumb.  I came to work on Monday, figuring I could have the second one done maybe by Friday.  And find she bought herself a pair from....take a deep breathe...from TARGET.  sigh...bad friend I am.  These will still be for my friend and I hope she can enjoy having TWO fingerless mitts to choose from.

I did deviate from the pattern, I used the pattern for the bottom half of the glove and the stranding.  The white section is all mine.  Not that it is innovative or anything, but I wanted a thumb, not just a hole for the thumb.  So I put in a gusset for the thumb.  That always fits my hand so much better.  And instead of ribbing at the top, I let it roll, hoping that won't be too annoying for her to type with.  We will see.  But I like it and boy is it soft!  It needs a good wet blocking to smooth out the stitches but I should finish them this weekend and have them ready for her on Monday.

My own mittens are pushed back waiting for me to return to them, but I'm happy with how they are turning out.

Remember how I didn't like where the thumb placement was?  It was so low for me, so I added a pattern repeat in the blue and with before putting in the them, I think it will be fine now.  It is just a smidge tight, but once I block them and wear them, I think they will fit just right. 

I do love how they look and I'm happy that I'm using up left over stash in both the rust and the white.  The blue is new, Irish Girl Knit sock yarn.  Very very nice....and from Duluth too so a local yarn.  Well as local as Duluth is to Minneapolis!