Vehnän Mitts

Recently, I was trolling the web for funky ribbing stitches to finish off my Knucks. When I found the prefect ribbing, I kept noticing a beautiful stitch being displayed in the sidebar. The website had dubbed it the "Wind in the Wheat" stitch.
I loved it so much, I had to make some mitts out of it. And, since I have some unexplainable obsession with all things Finnish, I decided to name them Vehnän Mitts; Vehnän being Finnish for wheat. (Well, really, it means "common wheat"). Vehnän Lapaset is roughly translated to Wheat Mitts, but I thought that may be a bit unwieldy on the tongue.

You can knit these mitts in a weekend and they take less than a skein.

What you need
Yarn: Any DK weight. Shown in Gloss DK yarn by KnitPicks, in cream; number 24985
Needles: A Set of US number Five DPNS or circular long enough for Magic Loop method.
Notions Tapestry needle, stitch marker
Note: If you’re making these gloves with only two DPNs or using the Magic Loop method, the stitches will rearrange themselves on the needles. I recommend arranging the stitches back to an even amount on each needle every time you work round 12.

Wheat in the Wind stitch adapted from the instructions found here: http://www.craftcookie.com/knitting-stitches/eyelet-lace-stitches/162-wheat-in-the-wind

Wheat in the Wind stitch
Rounds 1 & 3: p1, k11; repeat from *
Round 2 & all other even rounds: Knit all sts
Round 5: * p1, k1, yo, k1, yo, k2tog, k1, sl1kw, k1, psso, k4; repeat from *
Round 7: * p1, k2, yo, k1, yo, k2tog, k1, sl1kw, k1, psso, k3; repeat from *
Round 9: * p1, k3, yo, k1, yo, k2tog, k1, sl1kw, k1, psso, k2; repeat from *
Round 11: * p1, k4, yo, k1, yo, k2tog, k1, sl1kw, k1, psso, k1; repeat from *
Round 12: Knit all sts
These rounds form the Wheat in the Wind stitch.

- Instructions
Arm/Wrist
CO 36 sts on three DPNs. Join to begin working in the round, being careful not to twist. Place marker to indicate beginning of round.
Work one inch of k1, p1 ribbing. K one row.
Work Wheat in the Wind rounds 1 – 12 three times. A total of 36 rows worked.
Work Wheat in the wind rounds one and two.

Place Thumb
Work 18 sts in patt, knit next six sts with scrap yarn. Move the six sts worked back to the right needle. With working yarn, resume in patt until the end of the round.

Hand
Finish working remaining Winds in the Wheat rounds.
K 3 rounds straight.
Work one inch in K1, P1 ribbing.
Bind off in patt.

Thumb
Carefully remove waste yarn and place resulting live sts on needles; there will be 6 sts below the opening and 5 sts above. Attach yarn and k 6 sts below the opening; pick up and k 2 sts in space between below and above. K 5 sts from above opening; pick up and k 2 sts in space between this needle and lower needle. 15 sts.
K one row.
Next row: K6, K2tog, K to end of round. 14 sts.
Work K1, P1 ribbing for three rounds.
Bind off in patt.

Finishing
Weave in all ends. Enjoy!

Abbreviations
Sl1kw: Slip one stitch knit-wise
PSSO: Pass slipped stitch over
YO: Yarn over
K2Tog: Knit two stitches together

Pattern copyright 2012 Natalie Gonzalez. Please do not make these to sell, unless for charity.

Hurricane Busy Time - Wee Fairy Folk Tutorial

Well, it's not yet ten in the morning and already we've found ourselves out of things to do. Believe me, the day is stretching looooong before us. Hurricane Sandy, blast you!
We've done puzzles:

Puzzles:

Puzzles:

And you guessed it, more puzzles!

PUZZLES!

And we might've gotten in a board game or ten.

Well, it's easy to get all of this in by ten o'clock when your little one doesn't like to sleep past 6am on an every-store-has-been-asked-to-close-super-stormy-kind-of-day!
So (unsurprisingly me thinks!) I decided it was about time to do an activity that would take a few more minutes than fifteen! It was time to make some wee fairy folk, out of some objects from around the house and some stuff we found on our walks.

(I am so sorry for the quality of this and some of the next few images. The lighting is not the best right now and apparently I can't camera.) First, bend a pipe cleaner into the rough shape of a body - two arms, two legs and a neck. Forget the head - who needs a head?!

Then you make a skirt. Cut however many pieces into whatever size circle you want, with small holes in the center of each one.

Then stick the legs through and push it up to the waist!

The shirt is a rectangle with a hole in the center. Stick the neck through the hole and tie around the waist with a bit of string.

This is what it will look like!

Then take a break to enjoy the four year old's acorn art!

Then take a bead, attach some fun wool hair with a wee acorn for a hat and glue it on the neck. Make it a mate to play with and let them romp in an indoor fairy garden!
There you have it - an indoor hurricane activity sure to last for longer than a handful of puzzles! Enjoy!

Friday Finishes - A New Linky Party

I miss having a linky party on Fridays so much, I decided to to start my own Friday linky. Plus, having a reason to have a finish every week isn't a bad thing either.
Please join me this Friday, and hopefully many thereafter, in this party! You can post any finish, from knitting, sewing, crocheting, cooking, even finishing that book you keep meaning to pick up! Hey, even cleaning your house. Anything you finished over the week, link here on Fridays!
I am going to be hosting the party on this Blog, as my other one I try to keep just for knitting, and I will probably want to link to other projects as well.
When you join, just link back to my blog in your post with my Friday Finishes button, or a link, whatever, and try to leave comments on anyone else who enters - I hope others enter! *Finger's Crossed.*

Sunday Snippets - Walk in the Woods

Row Row Row Your Boat...

I recently mentioned how much I love my daughter's versions of her favorite songs. Here's a sampling:

Mini Apple Pie Magic

What happens when you take this stuff:

(Ready made roll dough, thinly sliced apples, pats of butter, white and brown sugar), pop it all in the oven and cook according to the rolls' cooking direction?
You get these:

The easiest apple pies you will ever make.
You can eat them like this:

These babies will surprise you with just how very good they are. I added a lot of brown sugar, which just caramelized perfectly!
Easy peasy fall comfort food. And my friend will probably kill me for sharing this, but I just couldn't help myself!
Hey, don't forget my yarn giveaway.

Mini Skein Giveaway

Click on over to Nantucket.Knitter to enter! Hey all you Bee Keeper Quilter's out there! And I won't forget you Mini Mania Scarfers. Not to mention anyone making ornaments or toys...
Anyone want to win 15 mini skeins?!

I was going through my stash and realized I have way too much yarn, and lots of it is the half skein variety. And I know all of us bee Keeper's are always looking for new and awesome (awesome!) yarn to add to their quilts. So I thought - why not give some of it away?
I am giving away the 13 pictured plus two surprised solid minis.
Pictures left to right
First row:1-6 are Storied Yarns, 7 I dyed.
Second Row: 1-3 are sparkly mini skeins from Knit Picks, 4-5 are random socks yarns, self striping, and 6 is a Madeline Tosh sock yarn. So click on over to Nantucket.Knitter to enter!

Too much cuteness

First off, here's a video of my daughter singing 'Happy Birthday' for me last Tuesday on my birthday.

 I love her version of famous songs. Her Alphabet Song is hilarious...According to her, there are only about seven letters, and the most important part of the song is the 'now I know my ABCs part...'. Still better than I did when I first learned it, I thought 'LMNOP' was one letter and that the 'and' of 'WXYandZ' was a letter.
We went to a birthday party yesterday and saw an amazing musician who made us some awesome balloon animals. Then we had a potluck at our house later than afternoon. Everyone (well all the kids) wore a costume, which was so beyond cute.

 Then this morning, we made playdough.

All in all this is a fairly random post, but...enjoy!

Oh, hey, don't forget my latest giveaway. Click here to enter.

New Pattern and a Giveaway!

In honor of my newly published pattern (well on Ravelry anyways!) I am having a giveaway!
I am giving away a woven stitch soap holder, a bar of wonderful soap, and a copy of my new pattern.
Visit Nantucket Knitter to enter!

28

I am.

Nantucket's Cranberries

Yesterday, Magdalena, her father (my ex) and I went to Nantucket's Annual Cranberry Festival. It's been happening for years, and was small for a long time. Then it stopped for a while, and came back amazingly! Tons of fun games, wares, hayrides, and much more. (All of this by Nantucket standards, which is to say it would appear fairly small to most of the world.)
We have had a visitor with us for a very long time now. In fact, what was supposed to be two weeks of so has become almost three months.

Meet the World Traveler Lucy! She has been super sweet in understanding that it took me far longer to get around to hanging with her than it should have!
So, this is a post about her visiting the Bogs with us, and will also be on her Blog soon!

Here's Lucy with Magdalena and her father, hanging out when we first got to the festival. We didn't dawdle there long, as shortly after this picture was taken, that gal directly behind them started eating that piece of paper hanging on the fence!
Next it was into the tent where there was all manner of cranberry and Nantucket related paraphernalia being sold. And she made some friends right quick!

Here Lucy is with Barnaby and his friend, she wanted to stay and chat but we had to be on!

We had been strolling quite a bit at this point, and this looked like a comfy spot to rest! Lucy is reclining in a basket of yarn shorn from sheep on the island, then hand-spun and sold. Pretty nice!
Next it was on to see how the cranberries were (and still are!) processed.

This is is Carrie, she explained that this machine has been around since the bogs opened and still is in use small scale on the bogs. Lucy thought it was very cool!

Next it was onto lunch.

Then a self guided tour of the bogs.

There is a family of wooden Gazelles hanging out on the bogs!

We found a tractor.

Chilling in the sunshine.

Lucy was amazed by how much work it was to harvest cranberries! Because they have air bubbles in the center of them, they float t the top of the flooded bog, and then are harvested.

Then a hayride back!
We had a very fun day, and I hope she enjoyed her (extended) visit! We had so much fun with her!