Added a Greek Key Design to World’s Simplest Mittens

I’ve begun knitting mittens before and always ended up ripping out the stitches. I don’t like to give up, and when I came across a free mitten pattern by Tin Can Knits, titled “The World’s Simplest Mittens” I tried once more. (The link goes to the download page at Ravelry.)

If I can’t knit the simplest mittens ever, then I should maybe give up for good.

I dislike DPNs so I used my nine-inch circular needles to knit most of the mitten.. DPNs were used for the decreases at the top of the fingers and the thumb (and also on the second mitten for the colorwork). Both mittens are made the same, no right or left. Very easy.

casting onto 9 inch circular needles — Casting on and using 9 inch circular needles

Needles I Used

I began with a size 6, 9 inch circular needle (Clover brand) and used that for the entire cuff. Then I switched to a size 7 circular until the pattern where I used size 8 DPNs because I don’t have a 9-inch circular in that size.

The small circular needles work out well sometimes, but my hands can get tired. Recently I tried to knit baby booties and ended up switching back to DPNs.

The yarn I used is Malabrigo Rios and was leftover from knitting my Umpqua sweater. I began with the gray / tan and added dark green in the cuff and pink with the green in the Greek Key design.

knitting mittens on 9 inch circular needle — Adding a band of green to the cuff

The design came from my 150 Scandinavian Motifs book and fit exactly into my stitch count. I began the design right after putting the thumb stitches on hold.

knitting mittens with thumb on hold with waste yarn to finish up fingers — The thumb is put on hold while I finish the finger section

For the second mitten I used a larger needle (size 8 US) while knitting the design and it seemed to work out a bit better and not as tight. It is not noticeable and now I know to do this when doing stranded colorwork.

Pair of hand-knit mittens with Greek key pattern — Finished my first pair of mittens!

The mittens were washed in the washing machine inside a mesh laundry bag and then air-dried on the windowsill. First I did throw them into the dryer (while still in the bag) for a few minutes.

Now… if only it would snow in Florida because I am ready!

pair of mittens with greek key — Mittens

Next I made making fingerless mitts using this same pattern and the same yarn with the gray color as stripes.

Orange fingerless mitts in Malabrigo — Mittens pattern becomes fingerless mitts

Small projects are good for using up yarn, but I dislike knitting small things in the round. I made one pair of flip-flop socks for my daughter and will never make more..haha. I’ve given up on socks in general, but mittens are more fun and this pattern is super easy.