Summer Sudoku Mitts by Melissa Michelitsch
My tale of how this pattern came to be: I happened upon this pattern for Honey Bee lace by Elaine Joann Lyons and knew I had to make something with it: http://www.knittingfool.com/pages/stCatalog2.guest.cfm?StitchID=2343&name=Honey%20Bee&numof st=12&stplus=0&rows=6&rplus=0&sym= I am told that my name (or some derivation of it) means honey bee in German and Hebrew, and I loved the unusual way that the dropped stitches were gathered in this airy motif. I originally set out to make a scarf for my mom who loves scarves, but is always too hot. 13 repeats in, I was in love with the motif, but made a fatal error and had no lifeline, so I just bound off my “swatch”. I noticed how nicely the off piece worked as a glove back…and so the Summer Sudoku Mitt was conceived. The happenstance of this inspiration resulted in a glove that was worked flat and seamed, but I also adapted the pattern to work in the round and included those instructions as well. Caveat emptor as I haven’t tried it yet, but I’ll update my post with pictures as soon as I do. To make the originally intended scarf, just work the front side flat pattern until your scarf has reached the desired ½ length. Make two of these, and graft them so that the seed stitch is at the free hanging ends. The pattern moves quickly since there are so many yarn overs and dropped stitches, and I found it easy to memorize/take cues from the previous row. The only bummer is that you need to purl out of a fresh cast on every time you repeat the pattern.
Materials: Size 5 needles (dpns if you opt for in the round…I use them regardless.) Cascade Ultra Pima 100% pima cotton in cornflower. One skein is plenty. Seaming gear (a tapestry needle, pins to assemble the pieces…I like the plastic safety-‐pin-‐style stitch markers for this job, blocking pins if desired) Sizing: My forearm is 8.75” at its widest spot just below my elbow where the gloves end. They are a bit loose on me. Make them them larger or smaller by adding or subtracting stockinette stitches evenly on either side of the “honey bee” motif on the back of the glove and to the plain stockinette on the front side of the glove. Instructions for working flat (as shown): Back: • Cast on 26 stitches. • Work seed stitch (k1p1* on RS and WS) for 4 rows. • Work pattern charted below 13 times. • Bind off loosely in purl. p k X 8 \ 10 X p k p k / o o 3 \ co co co co ku o ku co co co co X X X X / 2 / o o p k p k X 4 \ X X X o o o o / 5 X p k p k / o o 5 \ o o o X X / 4 / o o p k p k X 6 \ X o o / 7 X p k p k / o o 7 \ o / 6 / o o p k k knit p purl knit purl No stitch (place holder) X drop a stitch (always a yarn over) / knit 2 together \ slip 1, knit 1, pass the slipped stich over (or ssk) / purl 2 together \ slip 1, purl 1, pass the slipped stich over (or p2togb) co cast on ku knit underneath all 4 strands of dropped stitches Notes: • The numbers indicate how many knit or purl stitches in a row you need to do through that stretch. • The way the a pattern works, is basically you work two stitches of seed stitch at the borders, you do a four stitch repeat of faggotting, then do the honeybee lace pattern (faintly outlined in red). • The honeybee basically consists of doing one more yo on each subsequent row until you’ve done four of them in a row. You always drop the yo’s you made the previous row. After you’ve dropped
your four consecutive yo’s, you need to cast on stitches to “catch up” on your stitch count. It’s in the middle of these cast-‐ons where you do the trick that creates the “wings”. Very simply, stick your needle (back to front) under the 4 strands of dropped stitches from the previous 4 rows and wrap your yarn/complete your stitch exactly as you would to knit. Yarn over and repeat the under-‐the-‐dropped-‐stitch knit stitch. Fronts: • Cast on 22 stitches. • Work seed stitch for 4 rows. • Work stockinette stitch for 4 rows. (k on RS, p on WS). • Work reverse stockinette for 2 rows. (p on RS, k on WS). • Work stockinette for 36 rows. • Work honeybee chart below once (roughly at pulse point on writst). • Work stockinette for 28 more rows. (If you like your gloves snug around the fingers you may want to decrease a couple of stitches on your last row or two.) • Bind off loosely in purl.
10 5 \ 6 7 8 9
co \
co \
co \
co X \
\ ku X o
o X o X
ku o o o o
co o X o
co o X
co o
co
X /
X /
X /
X /
/
11 5 6 7 8 9
Thumb: • Cast on 10 stitches. • Note: The is just a little triangle gusset of fabric that give a bit of ease at bottom of the thumb hole. 1. k10 2. p10 3. k2tog k6 ssk 4. p8 5. k2tog k4 ssk 6. p6 7. k2tog k2 ssk 8. p4 9. k2tog ssk 10. p2tog (and pull yarn through to bind off). Seaming: You may prefer to block first to make stitching easier, but the pattern opens up nicely on your arm. The front and back pieces are just rectangles that should be the same size. Pin them together and then stitch them together with mattress stitch leaving the thumb hole slightly higher than the front-‐side honeybee decoration.
Adaptation for working in the round: Note: Untested theoretically offering here! k p X 8 \ 10 X k p $ p k / o o 3 \ co co co co ku o ku co co co co X X X X / 2 / o o p k $ k p X 4 \ X X X o o o o / 5 X k p $ p k / o o 5 \ o o o X X / 4 / o o p k $ k p X 6 \ X o o / 7 X k p $ p k / o o 7 \ o / 6 / o o p k $ About the chart: • $ is the wild card for this pattern and is described below. It is knit every stitch (k20) on most repeats. • Coloring just denotes motifs and not stitches, with the exception of the dark blocks which indicate no stitch/place-‐holders. • There are no purl stitches except where indicated with a p for this pattern and during repeats 9 and 10 when you need to work “flat” to produce the thumb hole. Solid blocks (regardless of color) are to be knitted. • The rest of the legend and notes for making the bee are the same as above. Instructions: • Cast on 46 stitches. (Two stitches fewer than flat to account for seams.) You probably want to divide it between your needles according to the colors on the chart above (7, 12, 7, 20) as it will be impossible to manage the drop stitch pattern across multiple needles. • Work seed stitch for 4 rows. • Begin working chart substituting the following instructions for $ as you go: o First repeat: $ = k20 for the first 4 rows, and p20 for rows 5 and 6. o Repeats 2-‐7: $ = k20 o Repeat 8: $ = substitute the chart below o Repeats 9 and 10: work flat. Reference the chart above for knit/purl instructions on the RS/WS . $ = k20 on RS and p20 on WS. o Repeats 11-‐13 rejoin in the round. $ = k20. o Decrease a couple of stitches evenly on the final round(s) if you like the opening of your gloves to be more snug. There is no decrease in the gloves shown. o Bind off loosely in purl. • Make the thumb gusset as shown above and seam in to the bottom of the thumb hole. Alternatively, could work repeat 9 in the round and increase twice per row (k10 M1 M1 k10, k11 M1 M1 K11, k12 M1 M1 K12…etc.) and then just work the 10th repeat flat. \ \ co co co co ku o ku co co co co X X X X / \ X X X o o o o / \ o o o X X / \ X o o / \ o /