Grove mittens are bringing me to my knees...

Heather is a good friend of mine - bright, beautiful, funny and generous to a fault. So when Heather recently expressed the desire to have me knit her some mittens or socks? Well, let's just say the door didn't stand a chance of hitting me in the patookus, I ran out the house in such a frenzy to get to the yarn store.

I cast on the Grove Mittens from Made in Brooklyn.

Unfortunately, the mittens were small. Small, small. The mittens might fit my mother (who has such delicate hands that they could be mistaken for a 10 year olds), but they won't fit many others. When I tried them on, I nearly cut off blood flow to my fingertips.

Nonetheless, despite the extremely narrow size, I knit on. I read a few knitting blogs, I read the Grove pattern discussion on Ravelry. People complained about the tightness of the mittens, but for some, blocking was the answer! Yay for blocking!

I finished the left mitten hand and picked up stitches for the thumb. I tried on the mitten again. I looked at how stretched out the mitten was. I knit some more on the thumb and tried on the mitten again. I attempted to tighten up the stitches. I threw the mitten across the room. I picked up the one-row scarf for Jeff's dad and knit on that while the mitten mocked me from afar. I came close to giving it to my cat to play with, but I have the one cat in the universe who cares not a flip about wool.

Part of me wants to finish it, block it and hope for something magical. (Delusional, I know.) I'm just delaying the inevitable frogging. For the the mitten to work as I want, I need a thicker yarn and larger needle. I may be sick to my stomach.

Is anyone out there? I need a pat on the back and maybe a cup of chamomile.

Comments

[Rainy Daisy]

eeek. I've heard that those mittens are not for the weak of heart...or stomach, or fingers. But if you give up, I'm sure my cat would graciously chew it up for you. Especially if the yarn is very expensive. ahem.

Good luck! They are still beautiful! Maybe your friend could find a way to go down a few sizes? And I'm happy to send you pats on the back and cups of tea, at least virtually.

Cheers!Daisy

[tortoiseshelly]

Thank you! I frogged them (sob), and I'm just going to bite the bullet and work them up with different yarn/needles.

(P.S. I lucked out that the cat doesn't like yarn, cheap or expensive. My stomach lurched at the thought of your cat chewing up expensive yarn. Poor thing. Maybe we should have a cup of virtual tea together.)