My designs are inspired by my Scandinavian heritage, and I love how symbolic Norwegian patterns are. I was thrilled when Patricia Ann Fortune ask me to collaborate with her on this Immigrant Mitten. She had the vision of a Selbu mitten that would tell the two-way story of Norwegian/American Immigration. She wanted one mitten to have a Selbu Star for Norway at the bottom and a 5-pointed star for America at the top to represent Norwegian immigration to the U.S. And for the other mitten, she hoped to flip the order to represent American immigration to Norway. On top of that, she hoped to have a compass and waves.
When Patricia invited me to design this mitten, I included all that she asked for and added the North Star to represent navigation and people to represent the immigrants. You can use whatever combination of men and women you like to tell your family's immigrant story.
I also included the year of my grandfather’s immigration, a square to represent the four corners of the earth, a sea of stars, a house for home, flowers to represent blooming where you are planted, and a compass for finding your way to a new home.
I hope that this mitten will help you remember your immigrant ancestors and remind you of their story, which is really your story. I would love to see your story in wool. Please post on Ravelry or on Instagram and use the hashtags #theimmigrantmitten #scandiwork
The Immigrant Mitten has traditional Selbu mitten construction with a gusset for the thumb. I have included my family’s Julekake recipe. I hope you enjoy it.
Sizes Women’s small-medium Women’s medium to large Men’s small to medium Yarn It was really important to us to use Norwegian wool for this project. I used one skein each of Rauma Finullgarn. For the background, I used white 401 and for the contrasting color, I used black 436. I love this mitten in traditional white and black. A pair of mittens used approximately 133 meters of white and 105 meters of black. Needles DPNs needed to obtain gauge. 2.0 mm for 35 stitches per 10 cm 2.5 for 32 stitches per 10 cm 3.0 mm for 30 stitches per 10 cm Make sure you swatch with two colors in the round Notions Darning needle Gauge and Swatch 35 stitches = 10 cm for a women’s small 32 stitches = 10 cm for a women’s medium 30 stitches = 10 cm for a women’s large or a men’s small/medium Skills Used Long-tail cast on Knitting in the round with DPNs, FlexiFlips, or magic loop (I prefer DPNs or FlexiFlips) Knit Purl Stranded colorwork Chart reading Catching floats Increases (backward loop) Decreases (ssk and k2tog) Gusset Picking up stitches for the thumb
