Monday, February 17, 2020

Skerries Mitts

The Skerries Mitts pattern comes from Marie Wallin’s Shetland Book. They looked like a useful and quick knit that wouldn’t be complicated, and I had most of the colours she used along with close enough substitutes for any I didn’t.

They are quick, they’re not complicated, they are useful, and I’m on my third pair now (they seem to get promised away before I finish them, the fourth set might stay with me). The only bad thing I have to say about them is that they use hardly any yarn and I really need to clear out more of my stash. 

I liked the first pair, but they were a bit to long for me, and although the colours looked good, they weren’t my colours. For the second pair I took out a few lines of plain colour whilst keeping the patterns, and moved the thumb opening up a bit whilst making it smaller. For the third pair, which I’m currently working on, I’ve changed the motifs around. For the next pair I’m thinking ribbing instead of moss stitch, possibly making them much shorter, and so it goes on.

There’s nothing especially clever about the pattern - it’s a tube with a thumb hole in it, which is satisfyingly adaptable and good for keeping wrists warm. What it’s brilliant for is using as a kind of swatch. I’m lazy about swatching and getting colours to work in Fair isle style knitting is an endless challenge.

Each pair of these mitts I’ve made has shown me things which would work better, which is amazingly helpful. In both finished pairs I made mistakes that I’ve found quite interesting - in the first pair I missed a single row colour change, in the second pair I forgot I’d changed colours round and used green when I had meant a purple/pink colour. The difference those few rows make to the overall look of the mitt really surprised me. I’m wondering how many pairs I’ll need to make before I’m totally satisfied with the results.


6 comments:

  1. Those all look good, however, I prefer the current model which appear to be my colours. I should like to see the finished article, please?

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    1. They’re going onto the boards tonight so next knitting post will have a picture of them!

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  2. What gorgeous colorwork! I cannot do fair isle. I keep trying, but so far: ugh.

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    1. These would be a good starting project. You can knit them flat or round and there’s no increases or decreases to worry about. I like it because I can always see where I am, but I need my patterns in chart form, not written instructions.

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  3. These are beautiful! I can't knit, so I am doubly impressed when you say they're not complicated. Also I liked this BBC story today, knitwear photographed on Fair Isle in the 1970s: https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-north-east-orkney-shetland-51370635

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    1. That BBC story is wonderful, thank you for the link. Those jumpers are amazing, I wish I had the patience to commit to knitting something like that, never mind being able to work out the maths of them. Meanwhile I’m very happy with my gloves which don’t require me to count beyond 14.

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