There are more important things than mittens...

... but this December has been unusually cold, and mittens are crucial. I also got two mitten books for Christmas (well, one of them was from myself...).

So here we go:

"Norske vottar og vantar" by Annemor Sundbø - a gift from my in laws (they might be getting mittens for next Christmas..)

I modified the pattern on the front page of the book, Fuglevott i fargar, to fit a child. I'm quite happy with how they turned out. The fit my big handed five years old. I used Gjestal Superwash Sport, Gjestal Vestlandsgarn, and Gjestal Østlandsgarn from my aunt's stash. Details on Ravelry.

Most of the patterns in the book are copies of old mittens from Annemor Sundbø's collection. Some are modified patterns from machine knit mittens, others are direct copies from handmade mittens.

The book is full of inspirational photos and text, and there are several patterns I'd like to knit, like the Fugl Fønix, Olivenvott and Damevott med liljer.

Some of the patterns are also found in Terri Shea's book about Selbu mittens. Among them the Hugin and Munin mitten, that comes both in child and adult size. Most of the mittens only have one size. I would have liked more details about the sizing of the mittens. There is a list in the book, but it would be nice to see the measurements for each pattern, I believe. And as Pinneguri wrote on her blog a while ago, the patterns could have gone through a better tech editing.

But all in all, it's a very nice book, agreable to look in, with pretty lay out. But if you never have knitted a mitten before, you should probably choose a different pattern. And so far the book is only available in Norwegian. Here are my Hugin and Munin, btw, almost finished:

Details on Ravelry. For some reason, the pattern on the palm is not symmetrical (probably because the original mitten did not have a symmetric palm pattern.) I don't always love symmetry, but when it comes tom mitten palm pattern, I generally prefer symmetry. Here, accidentally, I made a mistake on the 2nd mitten. The result was a symmetric palm pattern! So a happy mistake.

Can you see the difference?

I've also casted on for a new pair of Pepperkakevotter. This time with lamb, cat, snail and pig, and a peasant thumb. I'm just about to upload new charts, if you're interested.

The other mitten book is this: Colorwork Creations by Susan Anderson-Freed. I haven't made any of the patterns yet, but there are several lovely ones, I especially like this little fellow.