After hats and can covers came gloves -- sort of

Okay, so after I made a bunch of hats (does anyone make anything else when they're starting out?), I tried the can covers and then decided my hands were cold. The logical answer would be to go to Target and buy a pair of those gloves that cost about $2, but that would be cheating! The other thing is this -- I really don't like having my fingers completely covered. I can scratch my nose, I can't grip things, I can't type -- it's just not very practical to me.

I work from home doing transcription and editing and I don't like paying huge utility bills, so I don't keep my house very warm. The fingers, however do get cold and that makes it hard to type. So, I decided to make handwarmers. This was before I had seen any patterns for them. I just figured that I had a mitten loom, so why not just make a mitten without closing it off? That way, I could still type, but my hands would stay warm.

My first attempt was pretty simple - no pattern stitches, no fancy cuff, just some cotton blend denim yarn and a rib stitch. Viola! I love them! Of course, that meant that I had to keep experimenting and doing fancier stuff, right? Sure! (Gee, wish I still had that manicure!)





So the next pair, I used some fun fur yarn mixed with Wool Ease and did a fancy cuff. Then I thought, "Gee, wonder if I could put a cable down the middle?" Well of course I could! I've made many, many pairs of these since then and sold most of them. The one on the right was recently made for a friend. The beauty is that you can fold the cuff at both the top and bottom of the tube so that you either cover more or less of the wrist/fingers to suit your needs.

I've done cables with needles before and the concept is the same. This is a one-over-one cable, which is really simple. Wider cables would get more challenging to do on the looms, but it's not impossible. :)